Inform, Entertain, Inspire
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Article by Notre Dame professor cited in Buffalo mass shooter’s white supremacist manifesto

Notre Dame's golden dome
Jennifer Weingart
/
WVPE
John Gaski has been a Notre Dame faculty member since 1980.

University of Notre Dame officials say they are “appalled” that an article written by a Mendoza College of Business professor was cited in the Buffalo mass shooter’s white supremacist manifesto.

The article came to light earlier this week following several social media posts. It was written by John Gaski — an associate professor of marketing who has been with the university since 1980 — and published in Investor's Business Daily in 2013, shortly after George Zimmerman was acquitted on murder charges over the killing of Trayvon Martin.

Headlined “A Discussion On Race, Crime And The Inconvenient Facts,” Gaski wrote that there is a “racial victimhood industry” and includes uncited, supposed statistics on violent crimes committed by Black and white Americans.

Payton Gendron, the 18-year-old who allegedly shot and killed 10 people last Saturday in a Buffalo grocery store, cited Gaski’s article in his manifesto as supposed proof that Black men are more likely to rape white women.

Gendron’s manifesto espouses white nationalist rhetoric — including the “great replacement” conspiracy theory — and officials are investigating the shooting as a racially motivated hate crime. Prosecutors are also considering terrorism charges.

In a statement, Gaski said that it was “sobering” to be cited in the manifesto, that it was never his “intent to in any way incite violence — in fact, just the opposite” and that he’s “appalled and deeply distressed” that his article is “associated in any way with this young man’s horrific actions.”

The University of Notre Dame is a financial supporter of WVPE.

Contact Jakob at jlazzaro@wvpe.org or follow him on Twitter at @JakobLazzaro.

If you appreciate this kind of journalism on your local NPR station, please support it by donating here.

Jakob Lazzaro came to Indiana from Chicago, where he graduated from Northwestern University in 2020 with a degree in Journalism and a double major in History. Before joining WVPE, he wrote NPR's Source of the Week e-mail newsletter, and previously worked for CalMatters, Pittsburgh's 90.5 WESA and North by Northwestern.