In one of those incidents, before he set off an explosion in a Tesla Cybertruck, U.S. Army soldier Matthew Livelsberger shared serious and troubling information in an email sent on New Year's Eve.
A deceased driver was found in the truck. If it was LIvelsberger, the well-respected active-duty Green Beret likely died from a self-inflected gunshot at age 37.
He was also a “100% patriot” and a “Rambo-type” of soldier, his uncle, Dean Livelsberger, told The Independent.
“He used to have all patriotic stuff on Facebook, he was 100 percent loving the country,” he continued. “He loved Trump, and he was always a very, very patriotic soldier, a patriotic American. It’s one of the reasons he was in Special Forces for so many years. It wasn’t just one tour of duty,” Dean Livelsberger said.
For Tim Miller, president and founder of the security company Lionheart International Services Group and himself a former Secret Service special agent, there are many questions and not enough answers.
In an appearance on the Washington Watch show last Friday, Miller told host Tony Perkins the information coming out of Las Vegas is "truly shocking" to hear.
"Perhaps it wasn’t what was represented, a disgruntled person. There’s information coming out that he was a very reliable member of the 10th Special Forces Group. There’s a lot of information flowing which suggests I think we have a rough road ahead in 2025,” Miller said.
Livelsberger’s exploding truck killed no one and injured just a few.
It’s a result that doesn’t add up with his training and experience. Had he wanted to harm others, he was more than capable of leveling the hotel given his training.
“He could have had a horribly more impactful attack. That didn’t happen. The question is why?” Miller asked.
One answer may be that Livelsberger struggled with concerns he had about national security and U.S. military transparency, an email revealed. It described a 2019 civilian-killing airstrike in Afghanistan, which Livelberger said he witnessed. It also included the soldier's belief the drones plaguing the East Coast are really cutting-edge technology being deployed by China.
The email was sent to Sam Shoemate, a former U.S. Army intelligence officer who is now an independent journalist. Shoemate, who frequently receives whistleblower tips from active-duty military personnel, said he was skeptical of Livelberger's email until the Trump hotel bombing just one day later.
Shoemate's story was picked up by podcaster Shawn Ryan, the former U.S. Navy SEAL. Ryan interviewed Shoemate last Friday in a one-hour interview in which both men said the man sounded more like a determined whistleblower than a crazed bomber.
The speculation was also raised that Livelsberger, who did not come across as suicidal, was not the person found in the Tesla Cybertruck.
During the show, Ryan informed his audience the Special Forces soldier had also attempted to contact him.
Meanwhile, maybe the Special Forces soldier simply went over the edge. An ex-girlfriend said Livelsberger displayed signs of what she believes was post-traumatic stress disorder as far back as 2018, The Daily Mail reported.
Perhaps those signs of his struggle were missed.
After the New Orleans attack, Miller said he could understand how terror attacker Shamsud-Din Jabbar, a former U.S. Army staff sergeant and later a reservist, became a radicalized follower of the Islamic terror group ISIS.
Abdur Rahim Jabbar, the brother, said that Shamsud-Din Jabbar had recently renewed his Muslim faith after abandoning it in his 20s and 30s, according to Reuters.
Christian values not wanted
“What changed?" Miller asked. "There are some very important things we’re not calling out because of political correctness. We’ve allowed every kind of ideology to be celebrated. Even in the U.S. military, drag queens and drag shows, and there is an absolute moral vacuum that used to not be because everybody that came into the military understood we were all united under the banner of the red, white and blue."
Now that traditional values system has been beaten down and pushed away.
“When you undermine those values, you constantly tell people, ‘Well, I know your conscious says this, but you must believe this.’ It does create a freefall which I think we’re seeing,” Miller said.
That’s the feedback Miller has received from active military personnel.
“I’ve talked to a lot of military members who are incredibly frustrated because the values they believe in, Christian values, are being scorned, mocked and sometimes suppressed,” he said.
Much of current military policy under President Joe Biden and his defense secretary, Lloyd Austin, stands in direct opposition to Christian values.
Days after his inauguration in 2021, Biden signed an executive order repealing Donald Trump’s ban on transgenders for military service. Now they serve openly.
The administration has encouraged drag queens and drag performances, and circumvented the 2022 Supreme Court ruling that returned regulation of abortion to the states by paying for leave and travel expenses for military personnel.
Trump’s pick for Secretary of Defense had a rocky reaction early, but Pete Hegseth, for now, remains in the fight.
“I’m hopeful under this new administration that we can get back to letting the military be what the military because it is a calling. You and I entered the military because it was something bigger than ourselves,” Miller told Perkins. “As believers, we were serving the nation. We’ve got to get back to that.”
The way to return the military to a calling and not a social experiment is to hold the government accountable.
“It all starts with a very solid document called the Constitution where we were guaranteed rights. We have to hold the government accountable. Every Believer in this nation needs to stand strong for Christ. We’re at risk of losing this great nation if we don’t begin to put things back in place like values, morals and Christian ethics that made us great to begin win,” Miller said.
