Latest news with #Revoformation
Hindustan Times
18-06-2025
- Politics
- Hindustan Times
Was Vance Boelter frustrated over US leadership turning against Israel before Minnesota shooting?
Minnesota shooting suspect Vance Boelter voiced concerns that the US was 'turning against Israel' years before carrying out a gruesome political murder, according to a former co-worker. Charlie Kalech, CEO of a web design company that Boelter commissioned, told ABC News that the 57-year-old demonstrated growing frustration with society in the years preceding the horrific assault and had expressed concern that the US was losing its 'Judaic/Christian foundations.' Kalech stated that Boelter picked his company, J-Town, since it is situated in Jerusalem and he was interested in promoting Israel. He also mentioned that he has collaborated with Boelter for over ten years, designing websites for a variety of projects. During the process of developing a notion for Boelter's book 'Revoformation,' Kalech stated that the alleged assassin claimed that American leadership 'is slowly turning against Israel.' In September 2017, Boelter gave Kalech a PowerPoint presentation on 'Revoformation,' writing, 'I am very concerned that the leadership in the US is slowly turning against Israel because we are losing our Judaic/Christian foundations that was [sic] once very strong.' Also Read: Alleged Tyler Perry-Derek Dixon private chats leak sparks online uproar; 'If you let the cast know that…' Kalech interpreted the book's title as a combination of the words 'revolution' and 'reformation.' The presenter went on to say, 'I believe that if the Christians are united and the people who are leading this Revoformation are a blessing to Israel that it will be good for both Israel and the US.' Boelter also attempted to establish a ministry called 'Revoformation,' according to ABC News. The ministry never seemed to take off, and neither did the book. "It seemed to me like maybe he volunteered more than what was good for him,' Kalech remarked. Kalech claimed that despite his innocence, Boelter showed no overt indicators of extremism that would have motivated him to allegedly kill a congresswoman and her husband in a brutal shooting and target several others. Boelter, as per Kalech, spoke with him in May 2022. Boelter gave Kalech a PowerPoint presentation that claimed that one of his other goals was to eradicate hunger in America. Boelter is still being held by the federal government on suspicion of killing Hortman and her husband, and attempting to kill state Senator John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette, on Friday night.
New York Post
18-06-2025
- Politics
- New York Post
Accused Minnesota assassin Vance Boelter expressed growing concern that the US was ‘turning against Israel' years before evil attack
Accused Minnesota assassin Vance Boelter expressed fears the US was 'turning against Israel' years before he allegedly carried out a sickening political assassination, a former work acquaintance claimed. Boelter, 57, appeared to become increasingly frustrated by society in the years leading up to the twisted attack and had warned that the US was losing its 'Judaic/Christian foundations,' Charlie Kalech, CEO of a web design firm commissioned by Boelter, told ABC News. 3 Vance Boelter has been charged in connection with the shootings of high-ranking Minnesota Democrats and their spouses. via REUTERS Advertisement Kalech's firm, J-Town, was chosen by Boelter because they are Jerusalem-based and he wanted to show support for Israel, he said, adding that he worked with Boelter for more than a decade doing web design for various projects. While working on a concept for a book Boelter had written called 'Revoformation,' Kalech said the accused assassin said American leadership 'is slowly turning against Israel.' 3 The assassin wore a rubber mask before the horrific shootings. FBI 'I am very concerned that the leadership in the US is slowly turning against Israel because we are losing our Judaic/Christian foundations that was [sic] once very strong,' he wrote in a PowerPoint presentation he sent to Kalech in September 2017 about 'Revoformation.' Advertisement Kalech took the name of the book to be a mashup between 'revolution' and 'reformation.' 'I believe that if the Christians are united and the people who are leading this Revoformation are a blessing to Israel that it will be good for both Israel and the US,' the presentation continued. 3 Boelter expressed concern that the US was 'turning against Israel' in the years leading up to the assassination. AP Advertisement Boelter remains in federal custody on charges of murdering Minnesota Democrat Rep. Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, and of trying to assassinate state Senator John Hoffman and his wife Yvette on Friday night.
18-06-2025
- Politics
Minnesota shooting suspect started as a frustrated idealist, his writings show
Vance Boelter was preoccupied with societal problems and how he could fix them to serve the greater good, according to some of his previous writings and the man who worked with Boelter for more than a decade doing web design for a series of his projects. Before allegedly carrying out a "political assassination" on Saturday, Boelter was "clearly very religious, very passionate," and "devout, and sincere in his beliefs," said Charlie Kalech, CEO of the web design firm J-Town, commissioned by Boelter. But at that time, Boelter appeared to show no signs of the violent extremism of which he's now accused, Kalech said. Boelter is charged with killing Democratic Minnesota state Rep. Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, and wounding Democratic state Sen. John Hoffman and his wife. Allegedly posing as a police officer over Father's Day weekend, authorities said Boelter "shot them in cold blood" in an alleged early-morning rampage that launched a two-day manhunt. However, in the preceding years, Boelter seemed like a hard worker striving to make his ideas real, and sometimes, struggling to make ends meet. His fervent personality frothed with big, civic-minded ideas on how to "make the world a better place," Kalech said. In the professional relationship they had, Boelter was clearly "idealistic." "I think he sincerely believed in the projects that we worked on, that he was acting for the greater good," Kalech told ABC News. "I certainly never got the impression he saw himself as a savior. He just thought of himself as a smart guy who figured out the solution to problems, and it's not so difficult – so let's just do it. Like a call to action kind of person." Most of those grand-scale projects never came to fruition, and the last time Kalech said he had contact with Boelter was May 2022. But in planning documents and PowerPoint presentations shared with ABC News, which Kalech said Boelter wrote for the web design, Boelter detailed lengthy proposals that expressed frustration with what he saw as unjust suffering that needed to be stopped. Some of those projects were also sweeping, to the point of quixotic -- even for the deepest-pocketed entrepreneur. Boelter first reached out to Kalech's firm for a book he had written, "Revoformation," which Kalech took to be a mashup between "revolution" and "reformation." It's also the name of the ministry Boelter had once tried to get off the ground, according to the organization's tax forms. "It seemed to me like maybe he volunteered more than what was good for him. In other words, he gave too much away instead of worrying about earning money, because he didn't always have money," Kalech said. "It was never clear to me if the ministry really existed. Are there congregants? Is there a constituency? I don't know. Or was it like something in his head that he was trying to make? That was never clear to me." Kalech recalled that Boelter chose his firm for the work because they are Jerusalem-based, and he wanted to support Israel. Boelter's interest in religion's impact on society is reflected in a "Revoformation" PowerPoint that Kalech said Boelter gave him, dated September 2017. "I am very concerned that the leadership in the U.S. is slowly turning against Israel because we are losing our Judaic / Christian foundations that was [sic] once very strong," the presentation said. "I believe that if the Christians are united and the people who are leading this Revoformation are a blessing to Israel that it will be good for both Israel and the U.S." Over the years, Boelter would reach out with what appeared to be exponentially ambitious endeavors, Kalech said: "What he wanted to take on, I think, might have been bigger." Boelter wanted to end American hunger, according to another project's PowerPoint. And while the idea would require massive changes to current laws and food regulation, it appeared Boelter dismissed that as surmountable if only elected officials could get on board. "American Hunger isn't a food availability problem," the presentation said. "American Hunger is a tool that has been used to manipulate and control a vast number of American's [sic], with the highest percentage being people of color. This tool can and should be broken now, and failure to do so will be seen as intentional criminal negligence by future generations." "We should be embarrassed as a nation that we let this happen and have not correctly [sic] this injustice 100 years ago," one slide said. One slide how described how his own lived experience informed his idea, referring to him in the third person: "several times in his life Vance Boelter was the first person on the scene of very bad head on car accidents," and that he was able to help "without fear of doing something wrong" because he was "protected" by Good Samaritan law – which could and should be applied to food waste, the slide said. To keep an eye on which lawmakers supported the necessary legislation, "there needs to be a tracking mechanism," the presentation said, where citizens could "see listed every singe [sic] elected official and where they stand on the Law (Food Providers Good Samaritan Law)." "Those few that come out and try to convince people that it is better to destroy food than to give it away free to people, will be quickly seen for who they are. Food Slavers that have profited off the hunger of people for years," the 18-slide, nearly 2,000-word presentation said. "At least in his mind and on paper, he was solving problems," Kalech told ABC News. "He would think about things and then have a euphoric moment and write out a manifesto of, How am I going to solve this? And then bring those thoughts to paper and bring that paper to an action plan and try to implement it." The last project Kalech said Boelter wanted to engage him for was a multifaceted collection of corporations to help start-up and expanding businesses in the Democratic Republic of Congo, all under the umbrella "Red Lion Group." The 14-page, over 6,000-word planning document for the project outlined ideas for what Red Lion Group would offer: ranging widely from "security services" to agricultural and weapons manufacturing sectors, medical supplies, investment services, martial arts, oil and gas and waste management. Red Lion would also serve in media spaces: with "CONGOWOOD" Film Productions "to be what Hollywood is to American movies and what Bollywood is to Indian movies." Boelter was to have a 49% minority ownership of the group, with a business partner owning 51%. "The Africa thing, the Red Lion thing, we didn't really get into it, because it became pretty apparent pretty soon that he just didn't have the funds to go ahead," Kalech said – at least, as far as his web design services were concerned. "He was interested in doing good," Kalech said. "But moderation in all things, and when good becomes extreme, it actually becomes bad," adding that hurting anyone crosses a "red line." "The question one keeps coming back to is – what makes the seesaw tip? Like, he's good, he's good, he's good, he's acting for the greater good, he has all these good ideas, he's trying to engage community, serving on a government committee, he's engaging churches and places of worship, and then something happens, and he goes ballistic," Kalech said. "Who would do that? Someone who's absolutely desperate, just seeing that there's no other choice. That's the only thing I can imagine. But look, obviously someone like this is not operating on the same frequency as we are," Kalech said. "They're blinded by their faith, or their beliefs. And, you know, especially something like murder, it's so ironic, because that's one of the big 10."
Boston Globe
18-06-2025
- Politics
- Boston Globe
Minnesota shooting suspect went from youthful evangelizer to far-right zealot
Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up Friends and neighbors of the 57-year-old say they are struggling to understand what drove him to allegedly masquerade as a police officer and shoot two state legislators and their spouses in the predawn hours of Saturday - leaving state Rep. Melissa Hortman and her husband dead and the other couple seriously injured. Some point to his teenage conversion and the startling change that followed, one that became very public in Sleepy Eye, a burg of about 3,500 about two hours southwest of Minneapolis. Advertisement Through much of high school, Boelter was like every other teen, according to lifelong friend David Carlson. But after Boelter declared himself a born-again Christian, he began preaching in the local park - even living there in a tent, Carlson said. Advertisement 'Everything in his life - he just changed,' Carlson said Sunday. 'People were saying, 'Yeah, Vance is in the park preaching.' He was just trying to spread the word about Jesus.' Boelter grew up one of five siblings in a family that was locally famous for baseball - his father, Donald, was the high school coach and later selected for the Minnesota State High School Baseball Coaches Association Hall of Fame. They lived in a turreted, two-story house on a corner lot in a neighborhood where American flags fly from porches and flagpoles. In his senior year, Boelter was named 'Most Courteous' and 'Most Friendly,' according to images from his high school yearbook shared by a former classmate. It listed him as captain of the basketball team and a member of the baseball team, football team and chorus. 'Vance was a normal kid who came from a middle-class background,' said Wendel Lamason, who was friends with Boelter until Lamason moved to another town for eighth grade. The family was part of mainstream Lutheran churches, some more center-right, some more center-left, and the elder Boelter was active in church leadership. Ron Freimark, who pastored a different Lutheran congregation in Sleepy Eye, remembers the boy participating in church youth groups. 'He wasn't rebellious. He was polite and all that,' Freimark said Monday afternoon. 'He was just a good kid.' According to his LinkedIn profile, Boelter went on to attend St. Cloud State University and graduated with a degree in international relations. On a now-defunct website for Revoformation, a nonprofit he founded several years later, Boelter laid out a basic biography and said he had been 'ordained' in 1993. He said he had gone to a small Catholic college near Milwaukee - Cardinal Stritch, which is now closed - as well as Christ for the Nations Institute, a Dallas school that is part of the broad, nondenominational world of charismatic Christianity. Advertisement And, the bio claimed, he had made trips overseas to seek out 'militant Islamists' to 'tell them violence wasn't the answer.' Christ for the Nations was founded in 1970 by Gordon Lindsay, a prominent preacher in independent, charismatic Christianity. The focus of the movement initially was on evangelizing, faith healing and experiential worship such as speaking in tongues. In the last quarter-century, however, a segment of it turned to politics and changing policies, especially around abortion. A Lindsay quote long posted in the school's lobby reads: 'Everyone ought to pray at least one violent prayer each day.' The exhortation, the school said Monday, described prayer that should be 'intense, fervent and passionate.' In a statement, it confirmed Boelter had graduated in 1990 with a degree in practical theology in leadership and pastoral and said it was 'aghast and horrified' at the news that the alum was a suspect in the weekend shootings. 'This is not who we are,' the statement said. 'We have been training Christian servant leaders for 55 years and they have been agents of good, not evil.' Based on his recent online presence, Boelter's views now appear to align with the political 'far right' of Christianity in the United States, said Matthew Taylor, a senior Christian scholar at the Institute for Islamic, Christian and Jewish Studies. The followers of this kind of charismatic Christianity believe in a need 'to fight back' against demons and satanic evil in the world, Taylor said. Its core disseminates 'very extreme' rhetoric about abortion, he added, with some leaders portraying it as a form of child sacrifice that empowers demons. Advertisement Boelter 'seems very much to embrace some of the violent rhetoric and ideas that circulate through those spaces,' Taylor said. Indeed, in another sermon posted online, Boelter said God was sending people to America for a specific purpose. 'They don't know abortion is wrong, many churches,' he said. 'When the body starts moving in the wrong direction … God will raise an apostle or prophet to correct their course.' In and around Minneapolis, Boelter spent most of his career in the food industry while, as Carlson put it, dreaming of launching a security business. A former neighbor in Sleepy Eye said Boelter, his wife and their children - four girls and a boy - moved back there around 2008 when he took a job as a production coordinator for the local Del Monte plant. The family bought a three-bedroom fixer-upper on Maple Street and spent their time at the public pool or hosting Bible studies, said the neighbor, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of safety concerns. Boelter's wife, Jenny, was a stay-at-home mom who always had a smile on her face and brought apple pies over around the holidays, the neighbor said. 'They were friendly, almost too friendly,' he said. 'It was almost like there was never anything wrong.' Flags for the fallen lawmakers were at half-staff Monday in Sleepy Eye, a town named for a famous Native American Dakota chief from the 1800s. The business stretch of Main Street goes about five blocks, with several historical buildings and a repurposed movie theater marquee promoting a coffee shop and brewing company. Drive just a bit farther and the flat Midwestern landscape is dotted with farms and silver grain bins. Advertisement
Time of India
15-06-2025
- Politics
- Time of India
'Might be dead soon': Minnesota killer's last text to friend; police probe shooter's motive
(AP photo) Police are searching for 57-year-old Vance Luther Boelter, the main suspect in a deadly shooting that killed Minnesota state lawmaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, and injured State Senator John Hoffman and his wife. The shooting has shocked the community, and a manhunt is now under way. According to police, Boelter was last seen Saturday wearing a light-coloured cowboy hat, a dark long-sleeved shirt or coat, and carrying a dark bag. The FBI is offering a $50,000 reward for help leading to his arrest. 'Might be dead soon': Boelter's last text to friend Carlson David Carlson, 59, who shared a house with Boelter in Minneapolis, said he last saw him Friday night. Then early Saturday morning, he got a troubling text from Boelter. "He said that he might be dead soon," Carlson told Reuters. He then called the police. Carlson, who has known Boelter since fourth grade, said Boelter worked at an eye donation center and stayed at the house because it was near his job. "His family has got to suffer through this," Carlson added, saying he feels betrayed by Boelter and heartbroken for the victims. Links to ministries and security work Boelter had a complex background. State records show he was appointed in 2016 to the Governor's Workforce Development Board, which helps advise the governor on Minnesota's workforce system. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like She Found THIS Chat on Her Husband's Phone and Vanished Overnight medalmerit Learn More Undo He also claimed to be a Christian minister and security expert with experience in places like the Middle East, Africa, and Eastern Europe. He and his wife ran a security business called Praetorian Guard Security Services LLC, which offered armed guard services. He also said he led an organization called the Red Lion Group in the Democratic Republic of Congo. These claims, however, have not yet been confirmed. Boelter was also linked to a Christian nonprofit ministry called Revoformation. He said he became a minister in 1993 and grew up in Sleepy Eye, Minnesota. On the Revoformation website, Boelter claimed he travelled to dangerous areas in Gaza and the West Bank to talk to militants about peace and religion. "He sought out militant Islamists in order to share the gospel and tell them that violence wasn't the answer," the biography on the website said. Boelter and politics Boelter didn't list a political party preference. On LinkedIn six years ago, he encouraged Americans to vote and respect the process. "If you believe in prayer, please keep the United States in your prayers," he wrote. Carlson said Boelter voted for Donald Trump and was a Christian who didn't like abortion. But he also said, "He wasn't really angry about politics." Authorities are still trying to find out if Boelter personally knew the lawmakers. "We are still exploring that," said Drew Evans, head of the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension. "There's certainly some overlap with some public meetings, I will say, with Senator Hoffman and the individual. But we don't know the nature of the relationship or if they actually knew each other." 'Manifesto' found in car After the suspect shot at police on Saturday, he ran off and left behind a vehicle. Inside, officers found a "manifesto" and a list of other lawmakers and officials. Investigators are still reading through the writings to understand why Boelter may have done this. "It would be premature for me at this point to really say exactly what the motivation might be from these writings," Evans said. Minnesota Governor Tim Walz believes the attack was not random. "It appears to be a politically motivated assassination," he said.
