He had a good life going

Based on accounts from people who knew him at school, he did not.

The weapon he used was owned by his parents for many years prior. He grew up in a household full of guns. From everything we can tell right now, it seems like your typical school shooter. Depression and mental illness leads some to want to go with a bang, pun not intended. It doesn't seem like he hated Trump, so much as he wanted to target someone famous.

That said to your ladder point, literally millions of people gave their lives to kill Hitler.

Most people do not go out and attempt an assassination. That alone is an indication of some sort of psychotic break. Evidence may not have been made public yet or there may not be any. The only person who knew for sure is dead.

to kill him probably

He probably didn’t hate Trump. He seemed to be targeting a bunch of politicians. He was probably either mad at politics, or just trying to be famous.

Some people see injustice and the suffering of others and are willing to sacrifice their own lives regardless of how good they have it. I also don't understand this guy's motivations, but I sympathise with people all over the world who have chosen to end their lives in pursuit of some higher goal.

Look at Aaron Bushnell. He ended his life to protest Israel's crimes in Gaza and the US's complicity in them. I often wish I had that courage.

And with regards to killing other people, some people just deserve to die and I'm not succumbing to some liberal bullshit about civility when those same people who spout that nonsense turn a blind eye to the mass slaughter of innocents around the world in the name of the status quo and their privileged existences.

I really think this country is too crazy to really determine a motive. Why do people shoot up elementary schools? It seems so easy to think it's politically motivated, but I'm not convinced he hated trump, really.

Maybe he was listening to Marilyn Manson.

The shooter is dead, knowing what they were thinking is going to be impossible now. People are going to guess based on situational information but we will never know

They said he searched online for both Trump and Biden. Maybe it wasn't matter for him whom from them to kill. Just to kill a person of power as big as the president or a candidate of such country as US, with all modern security measures. Like Unabomber, or like in the film The limits of Control. And he was quite near.

Probably saw that Project 2025 had a section on banning porn and jailing its creators. His last phone search was even for porn 👀

No, but speculate we shal!

I think all he wanted was his ear, nothing more! He just wanted to become Lee Harvey Earswald.

Can people quit saying he bought the damn gun...he got it from his father.

All signs point to depression + disillusionment imo. He seems to be targeting the most convenient major political figure available. With the system being as inexorably broken as it is, it makes sense.

gamer

he was able to buy an AR-15 at 22 I think.

Pretty sure the reports point to him having it for over a decade. Without taking any effort to look it up, I think his dad bought him that gun in like 2013, so he was much younger at the time.

As for 'good life going', doesn't sound that way in general, but apparently he just got his associates degree from community college, and had been accepted into a university, but he decided not to go.

Not truly. We can make guesses and assumptions. But probably not really know it

We can never know or speak for why anyone does anything, unless we're relaying what the person says, because no matter what kind of act we're speaking of, the only ones who can speak for someone's intentions is that person. Anything else is putting words in their mouth, an educated guess, based on what we see and not what we don't. People should stop emphasizing motives as much as they do. Sometimes a motive might not even be able to be manifested in words while still existing.

I am sure that some information and reasoning will emerge at some point, after they've looked through his phone, computer, home and talked to people who knew him.

My best guess is he was hoping to kick off the Christian jihad/civil war by creating a martyr. He knew the maga folks would believe he was a Democrat plant and run with it.

They googled a bunch of public figures and locations, so guessing notoriety