(Luis Cornelio, Headline USA) Some news outlets in Canada rushed to protect the preferred gender identity of the unhinged suspect behind one of the deadliest school shootings in their country’s history.
The suspect, Jesse Van Rootselaar—a biological male who identified as transgender—killed six people at Tumbler Ridge Secondary School on Tuesday. Rootselaar killed himself shortly after the mass shooting.
Critics online noted that the media appeared more focused on optics as more details about Rootselaar began emerging online.
CityNews drew backlash after using what seemed to be an AI-enhanced or photoshopped image of Rootselaar as the thumbnail for a YouTube video covering the massacre.
The altered image appeared to soften the suspect’s facial features. Online commenters quickly noted it made Rootselaar look more feminine.
Headline USA confirmed the altered image by running it through Google Lens, which traced it back to CityNews’ YouTube upload. By then, the outlet had quietly swapped the thumbnail for what appeared to be the original photo, showing Rootselaar with more defined and masculine features.
BREAKING: Canada media outlet uses an AI filter to make the Tumbler Ridge kiIIer look female pic.twitter.com/JFZhzrsi9U
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) February 12, 2026
Screenshots circulating online indicated that the video had already surpassed 100,000 views before the image was updated.
Another outlet, Canadian ABC News, not affiliated with the U.S. network, also sparked outrage after posting on X that the suspect was an “18-year-old woman with mental health issues.”
The post drew more than one million views and was eventually hit with a Community Note bluntly stating: “The shooter is a biological male who allegedly self-identifies as a transgender woman.”
Nowhere in the accompanying article did the outlet clearly state that Rootselaar was a biological male.
#BREAKING: The person who carried out a school massacre is an 18-year-old woman with mental health issues, but she did not give a motive for one of the worst mass shootings in Canada's history. https://t.co/qOfSYsFDAw
— ABC News (@abcnews) February 11, 2026
Tuesday’s mass shooting reignited debate online over high-profile violence carried out by individuals who identified as transgender or non-binary.
For instance, Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk was killed by Taylor Robinson, a 22-year-old man who reportedly told his transgender-identifying boyfriend he “had enough of [Kirk’s] hatred.”
In 2025, Robert “Robin” Westman, a man who identified as transgender, killed two children and injured 17 others at Annunciation Catholic School in Minneapolis.
In 2022, Anderson Lee Aldrich opened fire at Colorado’s Club Q, killing five people and wounding 19. Defense attorneys later said Aldrich identified as non-binary.
In 2019, one of the two shooters at STEM School Highlands Ranch in Colorado was identified as a transgender individual. The attack left one student dead and eight others injured, according to reports at the time.
