Chris Jennings

Yes, exactly.

The case was first at trial and then in subsequent coverage.

The emphasis of the story was shifted.

It very much became a case about

religious freedom and especially about gun rights because it's – by a bit of a historical accident, all of the bloodshed and the siege and the original setup takes place during the George H.W.

Bush administration.

But the postmortem happens overwhelmingly during Bill Clinton's first term.

And Clinton came into office, as people will recall, with some rather modest gun control ambitions.

So the Weaver story was taken up as this sort of vindication of a longstanding notion that the feds are out to take your guns.

And that's why Randy Weaver was shot.

All of the sort of theological stuff, the white power terrorism, which was the original reason for the federal interest in that area, was forgotten.

And it became a sort of story about big government issues.

coming to kill you because you're a fundamentalist or because you have guns.

And so it's been my sort of anecdotal experience that people who identify as conservative know the story of Ruby Ridge pretty well.

They can tell you, you know, who the Weaver family was, even if their facts are not quite right.

Whereas liberals generally recall very little of the episode.

It became a sort of foundational myth, especially on the far right, but I would say more just within the conservative movement.

Well, I think, you know, especially in the last few years, a lot of the conspiracy theories that animated the Weavers and the people in their world have moved.

you know, into the mainstream.

The notion that there's a deep state or a secret government that is actually pulling the strings.