Canadian authorities identified on Monday the alleged gunman who went on a deadly shooting spree in a Québec City mosque on Sunday evening as 27-year-old Alexandre Bissonnette. Bissonnette faces six counts of first degree murder and five counts of attempted murder for opening fire in the Cultural Islamic Center of Québec, killing six with ages ranging from 35 to 70 years old and wounding eight more. Bissonnette, a white French-Canadian student at a local university, appears to have far-right, anti-immigrant views.
In the aftermath of the shocking attack, Fox News reported that the suspected shooter was Moroccan.
This turned out to be incorrect. The Moroccan man, who was at first considered a suspect by local authorities, was later classified as a witness who called 911 after the shooting. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau described the shooting as a ‘”terrorist attack on Muslims,” and world leaders expressed their solidarity. The White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said Donald Trump spoke on the phone with Trudeau before offering this bit of nonsense. “It’s a terrible reminder of why we must remain vigilant and why the president is taking steps to be proactive instead of reactive when it comes to our nation’s safety and security,” Spicer said, continuing to imply that the attack was somehow carried out by an external terrorist, rather than a homegrown white one.
“[Bissonnette] was known in the city’s activist circles as a right-wing troll who frequently took anti-foreigner and anti-feminist positions and stood up for U.S. President Donald Trump,” the Globe and Mail reports. “Mr. Bissonnette’s online profile and school friendships revealed little interest in extremist politics until last March when French nationalist leader Marine Le Pen visited Quebec City and inspired Mr. Bissonnette to vocal extreme online activism, according to people who clashed with him.”
