A shooter took the lives of 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, Wednesday.
A shooter took the lives of 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, Wednesday. Mark Wilson/Getty Images

It took no time at all for the right to start peddling lies, half-truths, and misinformation in the wake of Wednesday's school shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida—a massacre that took the lives of 17 students and adults who had committed the grevious sin of getting up and going to school that day.

Alex Jones, the lead-supplement-pushing conspiracy theorist and professional yeller behind InfoWars, blamed the Democrats.

The Democrats have been caught in false flags before. I'm not saying this is a false flag but they've been talking about massacres and things if people don’t leave them alone, and release the memo. So, if there are massacres and they keep threatening massacres, that makes them suspects when they’ve been threatening massacres. And who what mentally-ill person they’ve wound up or what’s happening or was this gang related. We don’t know. The media will say that I said it’s a false flag and the Democrats did it. I did not say that. We’re simply questioning the long history that these folks have.

Craig R. Brittain, an Arizona Republican Senate candidate running for Jeff Flake's seat (and who formerly ran revenge porn website IsAnybodyDown), said the alleged shooter, Nikolas Cruz, a 19-year-old former student, is a DACA recipient. He is not.


Lucian Wintrich, the Gateway pundit troll who somehow conned his way into the White House Press Corps with zero qualifications or experience, shared a fake BuzzFeed post advocating that white peoples' guns be taken away. He also, falsely, said the shooter was Hispanic.


Sean Hannity used the opportunity to shill for a gun safe company.

You have to be trained in the use of it, it's not a toy. This is not a game, and if you have kids in your house, you gotta lock your guns up.

They have — you know, go to libertysafe.com. They have fingerprint handgun safes that open in a second. It's — you can't get to it any quicker, and you know, put em strategically, locate them throughout your house.

Anyway, our thoughts and prayers are with everybody — I'm not — this is not a gun debate. I don't want to talk about guns. I don't think you're gonna change people's mind. What I do want to do is I do want to keep kids safe. I don't want to see any more scenes where these kids are running out of their school, hundreds of them, they're told to put their hands up, their backpacks down in a pile, and you know, their parents are scared to death. And there's going to be two parents tonight that are mourning the death of their children. At least two, there may be more by the time this is all over.

Meanwhile, elected Republicans in Washington and around the country tweeted out their thoughts and prayers. The NRA, as usual, hasn't said a goddamn word, although they will surely have plenty of other opportunities: Parkland was the 30th mass shooting of the year and it's only February.