Tennessee Republicans demand FBI release Audrey Hale manifesto amid stalled investigation

Multiple Republicans in the House of Representatives are demanding the FBI release Nashville shooter Audrey Hale‘s manifesto, while a councilmember says she’s been told it’s a ‘blueprint on total destruction.’

It comes a week after a poll where two thirds of US voters said they want Nashville police to release the manifesto — a sign of growing frustration with the investigation into the deadly attack.

Hale, who is transgender, fired 152 rounds from two assault rifles and a handgun, murdering Hallie Scruggs, William Kinney, Evelyn Dieckhaus, all 9, and headmistress Dr. Katherine Koonce, 60, substitute teacher Cynthia Peak, 61, and chef Mike Hill, 61 on March 27.

Metro Nashville Councilmember Courtney Johnston said that, regardless of when, the manifesto will not be released in its entirety, noting what is expected to be a shocking read.

‘What I was told is, her manifesto was a blueprint on total destruction, and it was so, so detailed at the level of what she had planned,’ Johnston said.

Multiple Republicans in the House of Representatives are demanding the FBI release Nashville shooter Audrey Hale’s manifesto, while a councilmember says she’s been told it’s a ‘blueprint on total destruction’

‘That document in the wrong person’s hands would be astronomically dangerous,’ she told the New York Post.

Officers retrieved a ‘manifesto’, hand-drawn maps, a suicide note, 20 journals, laptops, phones and several writings, from Hale’s home and the Honda Fit she left in the school parking lot.

Congressman Tim Burchett, a Republican from Tennessee, was disappointed by the news.

He believes it ‘could maybe tell us a little bit about what’s going on inside of her head. I think that would answer a lot of questions.’

Johnston, however, says after speaking with investigators, she doesn’t think it would be good for the rest of America to deal with the toll reading it has taken on them.

‘I personally don’t want to know the depths to which her psychosis reached … When I’m told by an MNPD high-ranking official that it keeps him up at night, I’m going to defer to that person in that agency that I don’t need to read that.’

The materials taken from Hale have been shared with the FBI’s behavioral analysis unit in Quantico, Virginia, and detail Hale’s ‘planning over a period of months to commit mass murder’ at the school, police said in a statement.

‘The documents that we have, and I have viewed those, you know, one is specifically a plan and the other is some journal-type rantings,’ said Tennessee Bureau of Investigation Director David Rausch.

Metro Nashville Councilmember Courtney Johnston said that, regardless of when, the manifesto will not be released in its entirety, noting what is expected to be a shocking read

Officers retrieved a ‘manifesto’, hand-drawn maps, a suicide note, 20 journals, laptops, phones, and several writings, from Hale’s home and the Honda Fit she left in the school parking lot

Congressman Tim Burchett, a Republican from Tennessee, was disappointed by the news

They feature none of the ‘ideological expressions’ found in other mass killers’ screeds, he said, such as the 35,000-word essay about the collapse of industrial society by ‘Unabomber’ Ted Kaczynski in 1995.

Burchett’s fellow Tennessee Republican House member Andy Ogles said there should be an investigation if the full manifesto is not released.

Americans by wide margins want to see the screed, which many believe will reveal an agenda of violent trans extremism, and equal numbers are concerned that Hale’s attack will inspire more copycat strikes on Christian schools, pollsters found.

The Rasmussen Reports survey heaps pressure on Nashville cops to release Hale’s writings, even as officials backtrack on claims she left behind a manifesto, and say her texts are just ‘journal-type rantings.’

Walter Hudson, a Minnesota state representative, became the latest Republican politician to seek the documents’ release, saying they may explain Hale’s killing spree at The Covenant School on the morning of March 27.

‘We should absolutely know what motivated someone to shoot and kill six people, including three nine-year-old children,’ Hudson tweeted this week.

Americans by wide margins want to see the screed and are concerned that Hale’s attack will inspire more copycat strikes on Christian schools

David Rausch, director of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, says Hale’s writings are deranged ‘rantings’ and do not amount to a ‘manifesto’

Caitlyn Jenner, Vernon Jones, former Trump White House adviser Sebastian Gorka and other conservatives have urged the Metro Nashville Police Department and the FBI to release the writings.

‘Why is the FBI keeping the transgender Nashville mass-murderer’s manifesto hidden?’ Gorka posted on Monday.

Hale was shot and killed by police at the school within minutes of the start of the attack.

Officers have since retrieved a ‘manifesto’, hand-drawn maps, a suicide note, 20 journals, laptops, phones, and several writings, from her home and the Honda Fit she left in the school parking lot.

They have been shared with the FBI’s behavioral analysis unit in Quantico, Virginia, and detail Hale’s ‘planning over a period of months to commit mass murder’ at the school, police said in a statement.

A police spokeswoman on Tuesday told DailyMail.com the manifesto was still being studied in an ‘active investigation’ and that she did not ‘have a date, if, when, or how we’d release it at this point.’

Experts in manifestos have also told DailyMail.com that Hale’s writings more likely relate to her emotional difficulties than the blueprint for violent transgender extremism that some have been expecting.

The Rasmussen Reports survey of nearly 1,000 Americans, carried out between March 30 and April 3 after Hale’s attack, found that respondents blame the nation’s spate of mass shootings on a range of reasons.

Some 42 percent say killers are driven by mental health problems, while 29 percent attribute attacks to the widespread availability of firearms. Other causes include social media (11 percent), school problems (7 percent), and family issues (6 percent).

TIMELINE OF NASHVILLE SCHOOL SHOOTING

9:30am – Metro Police Chief John Drake confirmed that Audrey Hale, 28, left her parents property with a red bag. She was questioned by her mother about the bag but dismissed the question.

9:53am — Hale arrives at the Covenant School in her Honda Fit. She is seen in surveillance footage driving around the parking lot, going out of frame and parking at about 9:55 a.m.

9:57am – Hale sends a goodbye message on Instagram to Averianna Patton. The message said: ‘This is my last goodbye. I love you. See you again in another life.’ She then responds, telling Hale that she has so much more to live for.

Hale replies again, saying one day, ‘this will make more sense’ but ‘something bad is about to happen.’

10:03am – Averianna Patton calls the suicide prevention hotline to try to report the messages that she has been sent by Hale. They tell her to contact the local sheriff’s department.

10:10am – Hale approaches a side entrance to the private Christian school and shoots through the glass doors to gain entry with her two AR-style rifles and a handgun.

10:12am – Patton makes an emotional call to 911 asking them to check on Hale after the disturbing messages. She is told that there is not much officers can do without an address for her.

10:13am – First shots-fired call to 911.

10:14am – Hale walks through a school hallway and walks around the property for several minutes. She then passes the children’s ministry before firing shots at 10:21 a.m. and then walking out of the video frame.

10:24am – The first Metro Police officers arrive on the scene, with Officer Englebert unlocking the door and entering the school. The five-member tactical unit enters the school and starts its search for the shooter.

10:27am – The team of officers encounters the shooter on the second-floor atrium. Police said Hale had been firing through a window at arriving officers. Englebert, alongside Officer Michael Collazo, shot and killed Hale.