Utah Gov. Spencer Cox additional elaborated on how investigators have decided that Tyler Robinson, the alleged shooter of Charlie Kirk, had been radicalized, pointing to gaming and “dark internet” tradition as potential components that contributed to a shift.
Cox on NCS’s “State of the Union” Sunday gave extra particulars about his remark to the Wall Street Journal final week that Robinson had been “deeply indoctrinated with leftist ideology,” suggesting that got here from conversations Robinson had with associates.
In an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press” with Kristen Welker, Cox added, “According to family and people that we’re interviewing, he does come from a conservative family but his ideology was very different from his family and so that’s part of it.”
Robinson, Cox mentioned, shouldn’t be cooperating with authorities, however they’ve been capable of glean vital data from household, associates, and acquaintances.
Cox urged issues modified for Robinson after he dropped out of Utah State University.
“It seemed to happen kind of after that — after he moved back to the southern part of Utah. Clearly, there was a lot of gaming going on, friends that have confirmed that there was kind of that deep, dark internet, Reddit culture and these other dark places of the internet where this person was going deep. You saw that on the casings. … the meme-ification that is happening in our society today,” he advised NBC.
In an interview with ABC’s “This Week” with Martha Raddatz, Cox additionally confirmed reviews that acquaintances had been joking on-line with Robinson about images launched by the FBI throughout the manhunt.
“Those conversations definitely were happening. And they did not believe it was actually him — it was all joking until he admitted that it actually was him,” he mentioned.
Cox, who appeared on a trio of Sunday exhibits to supply some new particulars about the investigation, mentioned the White House requested him to.
“I don’t do a lot of national media anymore and it was the encouragement of the White House that I’m on this program this morning,” he advised Raddatz.