Tipsheet

The Media Should Ponder This Question Regarding the Attempted Mass Shooting at Lakewood Church

Matt Vespa
Matt Vespa  |  February 13, 2024 6:30 AM

Mia did a deep dive into every aspect of this attempted mass shooting at Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas, over the weekend. What a circus. The megachurch is the one helmed by Joel Osteen. Two off-duty police officers acting as security stopped the mayhem, killing the shooter, Genesse Ivonne Moreno, 36, who was a biological female but went by male aliases. Yet, this shooting will soon disappear like a Houdini act for obvious reasons. The details of the shooting provide a multi-layered case for why the liberal media will flee from this incident since it once again gives them nothing to use against Republicans.   

Let’s get this game rolling. Yes, an AR-15 was used, but “Free Palestine” was written on it. Moreno isn’t white. She was known to law enforcement for numerous mental health issues and hails from El Salvador. An immigrant trying to shoot up a church, carrying antisemitic materials with a “free Palestine” emblazoned rifle isn’t a story the Left wants to pounce on with energetic fervor: 

Before dying, Moreno declared she had a bomb, although a bomb squad later searched the premises and found no evidence of explosives in Moreno's backpack or car. The shooter also sprayed "some type of substance" on the ground, but investigators still aren't sure what it is. A HAZMAT team and a decontamination crew checked the property to ensure no risk is posed to the public. 

"Right now, I can safely say we have not found anything that is of concern to our community or to this location, but we're going to take our time to ensure that we look at every aspect," Houston Fire Department Chief Sam Peña said at Sunday's news briefing. 

Moreno had pulled into the church's parking lot in a white vehicle and entered the building from the west side accompanied by a small, elementary-aged child. The shooting happened in between the church's English and Spanish services. Footage from the church's live feed shows a host making announcements in Spanish, interrupted by sounds of gunshots and screams. 

[…] 

In the past, Moreno assumed the altar-ego Jeffery Escalante as well as other male-presenting personas. 

Moreno's Facebook page—which expressed leftist, anti-police views—has since been scrubbed. Moreno's since-deleted Instagram account featured posts of her cleaning an AR-15 and donating money to Lakewood Church. There, she uploaded a screenshot of the contribution's confirmation. "[A]s for me and my household...I will honor and bless my church," Moreno wrote on Instagram. 

In a sign of the times, law enforcement officials can’t even hold a press conference right anymore, opting to play the pronoun game, but the final shot the establishment press will take on this shooting is that it’s somehow a mystery:

Now, I’m not going full blast on this point here because Mia offered another one: Moreno was going through an ugly divorce. She had family members who were part of this congregation, and they might have been seeking legal advice on the custody battle. Then again, given Moreno’s criminal history that stretches back to 2005, how did she acquire long guns? It’s not petty crimes either—this person was arrested for “assaulting a public servant, assault causing bodily injury, and unlawfully carrying a weapon.”

That provides another area where the media can’t go concerning pro-gun control advocacy and background checks. Shouldn’t one of these violent crimes have popped up? The Uvalde shooter, Salvador Rolando Ramos, used his grandparents’ address on the 4473 form, which you would think set off a red flag since Ramos’ grandfather is a convicted felon and cannot be around firearms. 

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The Sutherland Springs shooter was a former Air Force veteran who spent a year in jail for domestic violence. The Air Force never forwarded his conviction and incarceration to the FBI. Dylann Roof should have been prevented from buying a handgun he used in the church shooting in South Carolina due to narcotics charges that weren’t properly filed. Then-FBI Director James Comey admitted this failure was on them. 

It circles back to mental health and how the National Instant Criminal Background Check System is only as good as the information contained in it and the people who run it. Also, shouldn't we be worried about how prohibited persons are still able to obtain firearms? It's almost as if criminals don't follow the laws on the books.

You already know why this shooting isn’t going anywhere. Who wants to bet by Thursday or sooner, this story, barring some earth-shattering development, is out of the cycle? It's another radioactive story for the liberal media.