As soon as Anthony Quinn Warner was named person of interest in an apparent Christmas Day suicide bombing in Nashville, Tennessee, conspiracy circles began to question his identity or applaud his actions.
Warner, 63, is accused of planting a bomb in downtown Nashville in the early hours of Christmas morning, damaging more than 40 businesses, committing suicide and injuring several people. Investigators have not yet identified the reasons for the attack. However, it appears that a certain pro-Trump segment took the terrorist side, and another Tennessee man allegedly attempted a similar threat, albeit without real explosives, on Sunday.
Officials have not announced Warner’s possible motives or whether the incident is being treated as an act of terror. Early reports suggest the FBI is investigating whether Warner (according to police authorities, fired the bomb from a RV outside an AT&T building) was influenced by conspiracy theories about 5G technology. A real estate agent who worked with Warner who was questioned by the FBI told the Nashville WSMV that agents were questioning Warner’s interest in the technology, but did not know if he had those beliefs.
Before, however, before these potential motives came to light, some conspiracy movements were already seeking to exonerate Warner. Moments after his name appeared in connection with the case, subscribers to the far-right QAnon conspiracy movement began flooding Twitter with absurd ideas, falsely claiming that Warner was an actor, in part because another Anthony Quinn he was a Hollywood star before he died in 2001. Other QAnon fans broke his name to associate his initials with invented tracks or to dissect parts of his name to show “Q WARN.”
Theorizing did not stop instead of anonymous Twitter. Lin Wood, a lawyer trying to annul the election in favor of President Donald Trump, appeared to question the bombing in several tweets. In one, he included Warner’s name in a tweet about false accusations. In another, he tweeted images of a ruined stretch of downtown Nashville, noting that “that RV sure had a big hit. Or did he?”
Wood did not return any request for clarification on the tweets.
For his part, Trump, who has previously been enraged against acts of property damage, accusing leftists of terror, has been remarkably silenced during the bombing.
“President Trump has been informed of the explosion in Nashville, Tennessee, and will continue to receive regular updates,” White House spokeswoman Judd Deere said. Washington Post in a statement Friday. “The President is grateful for the incredible interventions and prays for the injured.”
Trump has not yet tweeted about the attack. Asked if Trump had made or planned a comment, Deere told The Daily Beast, “I’m his spokesman and I have him, so yes he has.”
As QAnon followers debated Warner’s innocence, the pro-terrorist channels on the messaging platform Telegram openly adopted his tactics. Some of these channels, which have called for civil war and violent attacks, cheered the possibility that Warner may have been a terrorist influenced by QAnon, or, in the provenance of these groups praying for the violence of conspiracy theorists , a “bomber boomer” “.
On Sunday, another tennis player allegedly mimicked the threat of the Warner bomb, albeit without the bomb. James Turgeon, 33, is accused of driving a truck through Rutherford County, near Nashville, while issuing a warning similar to the one Warner touched from his RV before the bomb exploded. Although Turgeon was said to play similar audio, officials said Turgeon and Warner appeared disconnected.
Turgeon’s motives are also unknown, although his digital footprint is larger than that of Warner, which did not appear to have public social media under its own name. On Facebook, Turgeon shared several memes about staying with Trump on November 7, after the victory of President-elect Joe Biden was revealed.
Turgeon, who is being held on $ 500,000 bail, was charged with two felony counts of filing a false report and one of altering evidence. It was not immediately known if he had a lawyer.
David Rausch, director of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, told the media Monday that Turgeon appeared to have fueled the Warner bombing.
“There is no other connection than the person taking advantage of the situation,” Rausch said Monday.