Luigi Mangione, an American who was arrested recently for allegedly gunning down a top health insurance CEO, has been dominating headlines all over news outlets and social media platforms. However, amidst the media coverage, numerous fake posts about him have circulated.
From fake manifestos and doctored IDs to fabricated social media posts by famous companies, false claims have spread and deceived many people. Misbar gathered some of the viral claims that circulated widely online in this article, separating fact from misinformation.
Who Is Luigi Mangione?
Luigi Mangione is a 26-year-old from Maryland who was charged with murder in the assassination of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson on Dec. 9, 2024.
Mangione is suspected of having shot Thompson dead outside an investors’ conference in Midtown Manhattan on Dec. 4. Five days after the murder, an employee at a McDonald’s in Altoona, located roughly 230 miles from the crime scene, called police claiming that they had identified the suspect.
When the police officers arrived, they found a man wearing a medical mask and a beanie. They asked him to pull down the mask and immediately recognized him as the suspect, according to the criminal complaint.
Mangione gave the police a New Jersey ID with the name Mark Rosario, which revealed no records when the police searched. After arresting Mangione, police found a black 3D-printed pistol with a loaded Glock magazine and a black silencer that was also 3D-printed in his backpack. A handwritten document was found in his backpack, which has also been described as the suspect’s “manifesto.” According to the police, the manifesto did not include specific threats but indicated “ill will towards corporate America.”
Two Fake Manifestos Circulated as Mangione’s
At the time of his arrest, Mangione was carrying a handwritten document expressing his anger on the health insurance companies and a disdain for corporate greed and power.
Most outlets did not publish the Manifesto, so social media users started sharing alleged manifestos not seen in any legitimate outlet.
A social media user shared a screenshot on his X account claiming that it shows a copy of Mangione’s manifesto. The alleged manifesto recounted an alleged story of Mangione’s mother, who supposedly suffered from nerve pain in her legs.
The tone of the alleged manifesto shifted to a critique of UnitedHealthcare in the two last paragraphs, in which Mangione supposedly accused the company of violating their contract and jeopardizing the health and well-being of him, his mother, and millions of Americans.
Another longer alleged manifesto to Mangione was published widely on X, which included the same parts of the one mentioned earlier but longer and with details. Users circulated 4 screenshots of a post on Substack, a platform that allows writers to publish and monetize newsletters, claiming that he wrote this post and it is his manifesto.
In this alleged Substack post, Mangione allegedly began by saying, " The Second Amendment means I am my own chief executive and commander in chief of my own military.”
He supposedly recounted his mother’s battle with severe neuropathy. Similar to the aforementioned manifesto, the Substack post also included alleged moments of Mangione’s mother crawling to the bathroom and screaming in agony at night.
The post also concluded that Mangione allegedly criticized the healthcare system, describing it as having a capitalist structure that profits off human pain and suffering.
Misbar investigated the two alleged manifestos and found them to be fake.
Ken Klippenstein, an American journalist, obtained a copy of Mangione’s manifesto and shared it on his social media accounts. He said that major media outlets have the full document but have refused to publish it without proving a reason.
Mangione addressed the federal authorities in his manifesto, stating that he was not working with anyone. “Frankly, these parasites simply had it coming,” he added while giving the federal authorities hints on how he did.
He apologized for any strife of traumas but stressed that “it had to be done.” Mangione continued the manifesto by comparing the prices of the healthcare system in the U.S. to the life expectancy in the U.S. among other countries in the world.
The manifesto included some indecipherable words which the journalist who obtained it described as “indecipherable.”
The copy obtained by Ken Klippenstein aligns with descriptions of the real manifesto provided by credible news outlets, such as CNN which cited two lines from it: “These parasites had it coming,” and “I do apologize for any strife and trauma, but it had to be done.”
ABC also obtained a copy of Mangione's writings and said that they included mention of the expensive nature of the U.S. healthcare system compared to the world. The outlet quoted a sentence from the manifesto that said that UnitedHealthcare "has grown and grown, but as our life expectancy? No, the reality is, these [indecipherable] have simply gotten too powerful, and they continue to abuse our country for immense profit."
The CNN and ABC quotations from the manifesto align with the copy obtained by Ken Klippenstein but do not align or have any similarities with the circulating manifestos on social media.
Doctored Fake ID Mistaken as the One Mangione Gave to Police
As news outlets reported that Luigi Mangione gave police officers a fake ID that did not match any records they had, some social media users published an alleged picture of the fake ID found on Luigi Mangione during his arrest.
The picture was also published on several social media platforms such as Threads.
Misbar found that the fake New Jersey ID that Mangione had used to check into a hostel before the killing was different from the viral one.
The genuine fake ID was provided by some news media outlets, such as Sky News. It could be noted it does not bear similarities with the viral one.
Furthermore, after running the viral image on a reverse image search, we found that it matches an ID card found on Etsy and eBay. The ID found on e-commerce platforms is a replica of the McLovin ID card from the movie Superbad.
When comparing the viral fake Mangione ID with the McLovin ID card found on e-commerce platforms, it is noticeable that the address, date of birth, and expiry date are typical. Furthermore, numbers and details of height, weight, hair, and eye color are typical too. The two IDs have the same colorful rainbow pattern and "ORGAN DONOR" marking. Both licenses have the same barcode, signature, and formatting as well.
These similarities suggest that social media users repurposed the McLovin ID as a template and just replaced the original photo with Mangione's.
Fake Nintendo Post of Luigi Imprisoned With “Free Him” Captions
A screenshot of an alleged post from Nintendo of America circulated on social media platforms, where the American account of the Japanese company allegedly shared a post showing Luigi (from Mario) looking distressed as he gripped the bars of a cage. Above Luigi's image, Nintendo of America said "Free him."
The claim went viral on December 9, the same day Luigi Mangione was arrested.
The claim went viral on other social media platforms, such as Threads.
A search on the X account of Nintendo of America reveals no records of such posts.
The screenshot also cannot be true, as the sentence, “This Tweet has been deleted,” would not currently appear on the X platform.
After Elon Musk took over the social media platform in 2022, he changed the name Twitter to X and also officially switched the terminology of "tweet" to "post." In late 2024, a deleted post on X resulted in the message, "Sorry, that post has been deleted."
Burger King Did Not Post “We Don’t Snitch” on X
Another screenshot went viral on X allegedly from Burger King's official X account. The alleged post says: "We don’t snitch,” and is dated on Dec. 9, 2024, the same day Mangione was arrested at McDonald’s.
Users circulated the alleged post implying that Burger King meant in the tweet that they would not report someone in a situation where they could "snitch," referring to a McDonald's employee who called the police after noticing suspicious behavior from Mangione.
Misbar searched for the post on the Burger King X account and found no records of any similar post. The alleged post seems to have 2.4K retweets and 511 quote tweets, but Misbar’s team also did not find any records on the users who shared the post on their accounts.
Furthermore, the alleged post shows the stats of likes, tweets, and quote tweets, which is a sign that the post is fake. In September 2023, Musk removed the “quotes” counter under posts. Any post on X currently would not reveal retweets and quote tweets as in the alleged Burger King post.
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