POLITICAL VIOLENCEViolent Extremists Like the Minnesota Shooter Are Not Lone Wolves
The threat of domestic violence and terrorism is high in the United States – especially the danger posed by white power extremists, many of whom believe white people are being “replaced” by people of color. Contrary to popular myth, the vast majority of far-right extremists are not abnormal deviants with anti-social personalities, but are, in fact, otherwise ordinary men and women.
After a two-day manhunt, Minnesota authorities arrested and charged 57-year-old Vance Boelter on June 15, 2025, after he allegedly shot and killed Minnesota House Democratic leader Melissa Hortman and her husband in their home and seriously injured another state senator and his wife.
Boelter, disguised as a police officer, went to other Minnesota politicians’ homes late in the evening on June 13. In his parked car he left behind a list of names and addresses of other Minnesota state and federal elected officials, as well as community leaders and Planned Parenthood locations.
This incident is the latest to demonstrate how political and often hate-based violence is becoming a more common part of American politics.
“Let me be absolutely clear: this was an act of targeted political violence, and it was an attack on everything we stand for as a democracy,” U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota said in a June 14 statement.
The threat of domestic violence and terrorism is high in the United States – especially the danger posed by white power extremists, many of whom believe white people are being “replaced” by people of color.
I am a scholar of political violence and extremism and wrote about these beliefs in a 2021 book, “It Can Happen Here: White Power and the Rising Threat of Genocide in the US.” I think it’s important to understand the lessons that can be learned from events such as the recent Minnesota shootings.
After decades of research on numerous attacks that have left scores dead, we have learned that extremists are almost always part of a pack, not lone wolves. But the myth of the lone wolf shooter remains tenacious, reappearing in media coverage after almost every mass shooting or act of far-right extremist violence. Because this myth misdirects people from the actual causes of extremist violence, it impedes society’s ability to prevent attacks.
The Lone Wolf Extremist Myth Is Dangerous
FBI Director Christopher Wray said in August 2022 that the nation’s top threat comes from far-right extremist “lone actors” – who, he explained, work alone, instead of “as part of a large group.”
Wray is wrong, and the myth of the lone wolf extremist – the mistaken idea that violent extremists largely act alone – continues to directly inform research, law enforcement and the popular imagination.
