Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) quickly blamed mental health after a gunman killed eight at a Texas mall Saturday, but he downplayed the suspect's ties to white supremacy.
During an interview on Fox News, host Brian Kilmeade asked Abbott about reports that the alleged shooter at the Allen Premium Outlets had links to white supremacy and neo-Nazism.
"He's a white supremacist Nazi sympathizer?" Kilmeade asked.
"Well, so, listen, I know that there are a lot of, let's say, early stories about the shooter out there," Abbott said. "What I could tell from talking to the investigators yesterday, and that is people should not jump to conclusions because there's a lot of conflicting information about him."
But just a day earlier, Abbott had jumped to the conclusion that mental health was to blame for the shooting.
"What Texas is doing in a big-time way, we are working to address that anger and violence but going to its root cause, which is addressing the mental health problems behind it," he told Fox News on Sunday.
An FBI report reviewed by Rolling Stone indicated that the shooter in Allen had ties to white supremacy.
The "review and triage of the subject's social media accounts revealed hundreds of postings and images to include writings with racially or ethnically motivated violent extremist rhetoric, including neo-Nazi materials and material espousing the supremacy of the white race," an FBI bulletin said.
Watch the video clip below from Fox News.
