Nashville Murderer’s Manifesto Still Secret

By Bill Donohue, Catholic League president 

As we begin the new school year, five months after a mass murder at a Christian school in Nashville, the manifesto of the killer has still not been released to the public.  

On March 27, 2023, a 28-year-old female, Audrey Hale, who falsely claimed to be a male, shot and killed three children and three adults at a Christian school in Nashville, Tennessee. The transgender person had attended Covenant School and apparently expressed her disdain for it. 

Metro Nashville Police Chief John Drake told the media at that time, “There’s some belief that there was some resentment for having to go to that school.” He was not speculating. We know that she was planning the attack “over a period of months.” More important, she left behind a manifesto that sheds light on why she did what she did. But it has not been made public. 

According to a spokesman for Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee, it is the FBI and the Metro Nashville Police who are stopping the manifesto from being released. Tennessee Rep. Tim Burchett blames the FBI. 

What’s the reason for balking? The fear, as expressed by school officials, Covenant School parents, the media, and LGBT activists is that the public may learn the real reasons why Hale did what she did. In other words, if she made vicious anti-Christian remarks, they don’t want to deal with the fallout. 

School officials and the school’s parents understandably want this issue behind them. But no such slack can be cut the media and LGBT activists. Had Hale been a white supremacist, and the manifesto contained racist statements, is there anyone who doubts that it wouldn’t have been released by now? Anti-Christian bigotry is no less invidious. 

Metro Nashville Police Department Deputy Chief Mike Hagar has reviewed the unredacted version of the documents, as well as the redacted one, and he “does not believe” the release of the redacted papers would “impede the investigation.” Then let’s do it. 

On August 26, a white racist shot and killed three black people in Jacksonville, Florida. We know all about his bigotry. So why are we still being kept in the dark about the anti-Christian bigotry of a transgender person?