Berliner Abendpost - US manhunt intensifies after Minnesota lawmaker shootings

Following the discovery of a vehicle, the search was being centered on Sibley County, a rural area about an hour southwest of the Minneapolis suburb where the killings took place early Saturday.

"Over 100 law enforcement officers and numerous SWAT teams... are in that area searching for him," Drew Evans, head of the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, told a press conference Sunday evening.

A second lawmaker and his spouse were also attacked in a nearby community, surviving but with serious injuries, authorities said.

He said it was not clear if the suspect, 57-year-old Vance Boelter, was on foot. When asked if Boelter was possibly receiving assistance, the official said "all options are on the table."

Boelter, disguised as a police officer, is alleged to have shot and killed Democratic state representative Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark at their home early Sunday.

Before those murders, he also allegedly shot and wounded Democratic State Senator John Hoffman and his wife Yvette.

Yvette said Sunday her husband was "enduring many surgeries" but "is closer every hour to being out the woods," according to a text message from her shared on X by US Senator Amy Klobuchar.

The lawmaker was shot nine times and Yvette eight times, she said in the message.

- 'Politically motivated' -

Boelter fled on foot after exchanging gunfire with officers arriving at the Hortmans' home, where he left a vehicle.

A notebook with names of other lawmakers and potential targets was found inside the car, which Evans said Sunday was not a "traditional manifesto."

"I am concerned about all our political leaders, political organizations," Klobuchar said Sunday.

"It was politically motivated, and there clearly was some throughline with abortion because of the groups that were on the list, and other things that I've heard were in this manifesto. So that was one of his motivations."

As speaker of the Minnesota House of Representatives from 2019 to January 2025, Hortman was committed to legislation that protected reproductive rights in the state, local media reported.

- 'Bring the tone down' -

The United States is bitterly divided politically as President Donald Trump embarks on his second term, implementing hardline policies and routinely insulting his opponents. Political violence has become more common.

Trump himself survived an assassination attempt last year, with a second attempt foiled by law enforcement.

Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro's home was set on fire this year.

An assailant with a hammer attacked the husband of then-US House speaker Nancy Pelosi in 2022.

"We need to bring the tone down," Klobuchar said on CNN.

US Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, himself attacked by a neighbor in 2017, told NBC "nothing brings us together more than, you know, mourning for somebody else who's in political life, Republican or Democrats."

On Saturday the FBI released a photo that appears to show Boelter wearing a mask as he stands outside the home of one of the lawmakers.

It is offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to his arrest and conviction.

The shootings came on the day a dramatic split screen showed a country divided: hundreds of thousands of protesters across the United States took to the streets to rally against Trump as the president presided over a military parade in Washington -- a rare spectacle criticized as seeking to glorify him.

Trump has condemned the attacks in Minnesota on the lawmakers and their spouses.

In a conversation Sunday with ABC News, Trump was asked if he planned to call Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, who was Kamala Harris's running mate in the election Trump won last year.

"Well, it's a terrible thing. I think he's a terrible governor. I think he's a grossly incompetent person," the president said.

"But I may, I may call him, I may call other people too."

U.Neumann--BlnAP