Nashville school shooter had antisemitic manifesto

The shooter who killed a fellow student at Antioch High School in Nashville on Jan. 22 before killing himself was inspired by extremist beliefs, including antisemitism.

The incident began at 11:09 a.m. in the cafeteria as 17-year-old Solomon Henderson opened fire, killing a 16-year-old and grazing another student. According to police, he fired 10 shots in 17 seconds. He attempted to livestream his attack on Kick, but the stream apparently cut out.

The Anti-Defamation League’s Center on Extremism reported that their preliminary research showed he was “fueled by violent misanthropic views, anti-Black hate and hateful extremist beliefs including inceldom and antisemitism,” and praised previous school shooters.

A 300-page manifesto linked to Henderson was filled with antisemitism and anti-Black racism, though Henderson himself was Black. He wrote that he was “ashamed to be Black” and had materials from the Goyim Defense League, a neo-Nazi group that had marched in Nashville last summer. Large portions of his manifesto are said to be plagiarized from other recent online manifestos by mass shooters.

He also said he was inspired by Candace Owens, a Black right-wing pundit who was recently named Antisemite of the Year by StopAntisemitism. He wrote that she helped push him “further and further into the belief of violence over the Jewish question.”

Owens called the manifesto “an obvious troll” and said it was “truly sickening that people would use the death of a young 16-year-old girl to try to quickly score political points, rather than to responsibly make sure that what they are sharing is accurate.” She called it a targeted “domestic violence situation.”

Henderson wrote that he was “miserable” and suicidal, and that his friends outgrew and ignored him. But he added that he was not being bullied, and did not intend to kill anyone in law enforcement.

He referred to himself as a “mentalcel,” someone who identifies as an involuntary celibate based on an intellectual or learning disability,” according to the ADL. He reportedly frequented incel boards online, where incels of color are often told they are incels “because they are not white, leading to intensifying self-loathing and internalized racism.”

Henderson was also apparently fixated on the 15-year-old girl who killed two in a school shooting at Abundant Life Christian School in Madison, Wisc., last month, and he lauded other mass attackers.

His apparent manifesto referred to the “Final Solution to the Jewish Question,” and listed “soft targets” among Jewish, Muslim, immigrant and the LGBTQ community. He also used 88, shorthand for “Heil Hitler,” in two of his screen names.

Last October, Henderson was suspended from school for two days for using a box cutter to threaten another student, also in the cafeteria.