What we know about the attack on two Minnesota lawmakers

Getty/Minnesota state Senate

On Saturday, two state lawmakers from Minnesota were gunned down in their homes in what Governor Tim Walz called a “politically motivated assassination” attempt. The attacks left one politician dead and the other seriously injured.

The suspect, Vance Luther Boelter, has been taken into custody after he was found hiding in the woods near the village of Green Isle in Sibley County, police said on Sunday night.

Police called the two-day search for Boelter the “largest manhunt in the state’s history”, with multiple law enforcement agencies working together to find him.

The attacks drew condemnation from across the political spectrum. President Donald Trump said in a statement that “such horrific violence will not be tolerated”.

US Senator Amy Klobuchar, a Minnesota Democrat, called it “an attack on everything we stand for as a democracy”.

Who were the victims?

State representative Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, were shot and killed in their home, the governor said.

She had served in the Minnesota House of Representatives for 20 years, and was speaker of the chamber from 2019-25.

State Senator John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette, were shot multiple times and injured, but survived. They had surgery.

Both lawmakers are Democrats.

What happened?

Law enforcement has confirmed the attacks occurred in the early hours of Saturday in the cities of Brooklyn Park and Champlin, Minnesota.

Drew Evans, superintendent of the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, said police received a call at 02:00 local time about an incident at Hoffman’s house in Champlin.

Another call to police came in at 03:35, when officers were checking on Hortman’s home, nearby in Brooklyn Park.

Police discovered what looked like an emergency vehicle parked at the home with emergency lights flashing.

Coming out of the home was someone resembling a police officer, who immediately opened fire on officers, darted back into the house, then escaped on foot.

Mark Bruley, chief of Brooklyn Park police, said the suspect was “wearing a vest with a Taser, other equipment, a badge” posing as law enforcement in order “to manipulate their way into the home”.

Who is Vance Luther Boelter?

Police identified the suspect as 57-year-old Vance Luther Boelter. They did not give details on a possible motive.

A former political appointee, Boelter was once a member of the same state workforce development board as Hoffman.

“We don’t know the nature of the relationship or if they actually knew each other,” said Evans.

Investigators reportedly found a list of 70 “targets”, including the names of state Democratic politicians, in a vehicle the suspect drove for the assassination.

Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, congresswoman Ilhan Omar, Minnesota’s two US senators, Amy Klobuchar and Tina Smith, and state Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison were on the hit list, according to local media.

Locations for Planned Parenthood, which provides abortions and contraception, were also on the list, a person familiar with the investigation told the Minnesota Star Tribune.

Evans told reporters he would not describe the notebook found in the car as a “manifesto” as it was not “a treatise on all kinds of ideology and writings”.

Boelter is a security contractor and religious missionary who has worked in Africa and the Middle East, according to an online CV.

Boelter once preached as a pastor at a church in the Democratic Republic of Congo, according to Facebook photos. He had travelled often to the nation, indicate posts from his LinkedIn account.

An online video from two years ago seemed to show him addressing a congregation, adding that he has a wife and five children.

He had also worked back in Minnesota for a major food distributor, a convenience store chain and for two funeral services businesses, according to his online profile.

According to local TV affiliate KTTC, Boelter’s only criminal history in Minnesota was for traffic tickets, including speeding and parking violations.

He texted a troubling message to friends at a Minneapolis residence, where he had rented a room and would stay one or two nights a week, the Minnesota Star Tribune reports.

Boelter said: “I’m going to be gone for a while. May be dead shortly, so I just want to let you know I love you guys both and I wish it hadn’t gone this way.”

A wanted poster for Vance Luther Boelter

How did police find Boelter?

On Sunday night, police said they found Boelter after receiving information that he was seen in the area of Green Isle, a village not far from his home.

He was arrested in a rural area with mostly farmland, fields and small woods, and taken into custody “without any use of force” or injury to police.

Police said Boelter was armed when he was arrested, but did not provide further information on the type of weapons present.

Evans said Boelter’s arrest brought “a sense of relief” to communities and lawmakers who were on the suspect’s list of targets.

He also said law enforcement believed the suspect acted alone and was not part of a broader network.

Authorities also condemned Boelter’s impersonation of a police officer while carrying out the attacks, saying “he exploited the trust our uniforms are meant to represent”.

Minnesota Governor Tim Walz also followed with a plea for civility, urging people to “shake hands” and “find common ground”.

“One man’s unthinkable actions have altered the state of Minnesota,” he said.

“This cannot be the norm. It cannot be the way that we deal with our political differences.”

Prior to Boelter’s arrest, his wife was detained in a traffic stop along with three relatives in a car in the city of Onamia, more than 100 miles from the family home, on Saturday morning, but released after questioning.