Remember when Luigi Mangione's mugshot broke the internet and suddenly became the most shared image on liberal social media?
Researchers just connected those viral posts to something far darker – a fundamental shift in who's most likely to tolerate political murder.
Network Contagion Research Institute's latest study found that women are now 15% more likely than men to justify assassinating political opponents, and the number keeps climbing.
New Survey Reveals Liberal Women More Likely To Support Political Violence
Joel Finkelstein runs the Network Contagion Research Institute, tracking emerging threats to national security and American youth online.
His team surveyed more than 1,000 Americans nationwide about whether political assassination could ever be justified.
The results shocked him.
"I thought we'd be seeing a bunch of guys who were unemployed who'd be endorsing this," Finkelstein told Fox News.
Instead, he found three traits that predict support for political violence: heavy social media use, belief America is "an empire in decline," and being female.
Women overall were about 15% more likely to condone assassination culture – 14.8% for Trump specifically, 21.2% for New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani.
According to NCRI data, 67% of left-of-center respondents saw political murder as at least somewhat justified, compared to 54% on the right.
Liberal women scored highest of any demographic – roughly 75% more likely than conservative males to approve.
Luigi Mangione And Social Media's Dangerous Effect On Women
Charlie Kirk died in September 2025, shot at Utah Valley University while giving a speech.
Brian Thompson, UnitedHealthcare CEO, was gunned down on a Manhattan sidewalk in December 2024.
Both times, social media erupted with support for the killers.
But Mangione's case revealed something unprecedented – dozens of young women lining up in freezing cold at 5 a.m. to get courtroom seats, wearing "Free Luigi" shirts, giving him thumbs up as he left in shackles.
"We see these lurid images of Luigi Mangione that have been packaged into some kind of sexual symbol," Finkelstein said.
"And I think that we may be seeing some downstream effects of that on people who use social media a lot, on females."
He compared it to Che Guevara – another killer whose face became a revolutionary icon divorced from the actual violence.
Women waited hours in frigid temperatures just to show support for an accused assassin, treating his court appearance like a celebrity event.
TikTok filled with videos romanticizing Mangione's looks, over 70% consumed by college-educated heterosexual women aged 18-34.
True crime audiences are overwhelmingly female, and now that demographic overlap is driving something researchers never predicted – not just fascination with killers, but active support for political murder.
Political Violence Against Trump And Conservatives Reaches Historic Levels
Political violence in America hit levels not seen since the 1970s.
The first half of 2025 alone recorded roughly 150 politically motivated attacks – almost double the same period in 2024, according to University of Maryland data.
Charlie Kirk shared NCRI's earlier assassination culture report five months before someone shot him dead.
That April 2025 study found 56% of left-leaning respondents said Trump's assassination would be justified, while 50.2% said the same about Elon Musk.
Trump survived two assassination attempts during the 2024 campaign.
Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro's home was firebombed while his family slept inside.
Minnesota state lawmakers were shot – one killed, another survived.
Through all of it, the pattern held: women, especially younger liberal women spending heavy time on social media, were most likely to see the violence as acceptable.
Finkelstein's research found that people who justified violence against political opponents were also more likely to accept violence against their own side.
"It's a spiritual crisis about the belief in democracy," he said.
The data shows older Americans across the board are less likely to condone assassination.
The youngest cohorts, who grew up with smartphones and social media as constant companions, show the highest tolerance for political murder.
Conservative males remain the group least likely to approve.
"It's still more pronounced on the left in our data," Finkelstein told Fox News.
"That's really clear, but it's growing on the right."
Trump Administration Blames Years Of Democrats Calling Conservatives Nazis
White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson responded to the study with a direct accusation.
"President Trump, and the entire Administration, will not hesitate to speak the truth – for years, radical leftists have slandered their political opponents as Nazis and Fascists, inspiring left-wing violence," Jackson said.
"It must end."
Trump understands the danger personally – he survived two assassination attempts and watched his friend Charlie Kirk get murdered.
Kirk himself had warned about assassination culture spreading months before someone killed him.
The White House pointed to years of Democrats using Nazi and fascist comparisons against Trump supporters, creating an environment where political opponents are dehumanized and violence becomes thinkable.
When you spend years telling people that Trump is literally Hitler and conservatives are existential threats to democracy, eventually someone takes you seriously and picks up a gun.
The study found that people with high social media use, who are told daily that America is collapsing under conservative rule, develop a belief that their lives are controlled by external forces beyond their control.
That "external locus of control" makes them vulnerable to radicalization – especially when paired with economic anxiety and deep political distrust.
Finkelstein warned that assassination culture is now "predictive, not just reactive" – meaning the online environment is actively creating people likely to commit political violence, not just reflecting existing sentiment.
The survey measured tolerance for violence, not intent to commit it – but tolerance is where violence begins.
When 67% of left-leaning respondents say political murder can be justified, and liberal women score 75% higher than conservative men, you're looking at a population primed to excuse the next assassination.
Political violence is down overall, Finkelstein noted – murders in general have decreased.
But politically motivated killings are spiking even as other violence falls.
Utah Governor Spencer Cox called it "a watershed in American history."
"The question is what kind of watershed, and that chapter remains to be written," Cox said.
"Is this the end of a dark chapter in our history, or the beginning of a darker chapter in our history? This is our moment. Do we escalate or do we find an off-ramp? It's a choice, and every one of us gets to make that choice."
The data suggests many Americans – especially young liberal women immersed in social media – have already made their choice.
And researchers say the downstream effects of that choice could define the next decade of American politics.
Sources:
- Michael Ruiz, "'Assassination culture' is on the rise, especially among women, study warns," Fox News, January 22, 2026.
- Joel Finkelstein, Network Contagion Research Institute assassination culture survey, January 2026.
- Network Contagion Research Institute, assassination culture study findings, April 2025.
- Multiple sources, political violence timeline 2024-2025, various dates.
- White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson statement, January 22, 2026.
