Cybertruck blast suspect was a ‘Rambo type’ who loved Trump, family says
Exclusive: Matthew Livelsberger’s shocked uncle told The Independent that the Green Beret was a ‘supersoldier’
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Your support makes all the difference.The active-duty Green Beret who was driving a Tesla Cybertruck that blew up outside the Trump International Hotel Las Vegas on New Year’s Day “was a 100 percent patriot,” his bewildered uncle said Thursday.
Matthew Livelsberger, 37, was “like a Rambo-type, for lack of a better word,” Dean Livelsberger told The Independent.
Dean, whose older brother is Livelsberger’s father, Roger, himself an Air Force veteran who served in Vietnam, said his nephew “loved the Army.”
“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 he was aware of the explosion in Vegas, but had not yet been made aware that Matt, as he called him, had been named as the culprit until The Independent contacted him for comment. At first, Dean assumed the explosion had been caused by “one of those big lithium batteries that short-circuited or something,” he said. He was relieved that the blast only caused seven minor injuries and didn’t kill anyone else. But, he added, the amateurish construction of the explosive device, an array of propane tanks, fireworks and camping fuel, left him with a slew of additional questions.
“Matt was a very skilled warrior, and he would be able to make — if it was him, and if he did this — he would’ve been able to make a more sophisticated explosive than using propane tanks and camping fuel. He was what you might call a ‘supersoldier.’ If you ever read about the things he was awarded, and the experience he had, some of it doesn’t make sense, when he had the skills and ability to make something more, let’s say, ‘efficient.’ His skills were enormous from what he had been taught in the military.”
With Livelsberger’s skills, his uncle suggested, his nephew “could have fashioned a bomb that would have obliterated half of that hotel if he seriously wanted to hurt others.”
“Think of Oklahoma City,” he said. “McVeigh was just a normal soldier. Not a Tier 1 operator like Matt.”
Livelsberger was in the U.S. Army for 19 years, 18 of which were in the elite Special Forces. He was currently stationed in Germany, and was on leave in Colorado Springs when he rented the Cybertruck and drove to Nevada, law enforcement sources said.
The truck blew up just a few hours after Shamsud-Din Jabbar rammed a truck into New Year’s Day revelers in New Orleans killing at least 15 people. Jabbar, 42, was also an Army veteran who was posted to the same base as Livelsberger, and also served in Afghanistan around the same time that Livelsberger did. Investigators were looking into a possible link between the two men, who both rented their vehicles through the same carshare service, Turo, but so far they have found no “direct” connection between the two.
At a press conference on Thursday afternoon, Las Vegas Sheriff Kevin McMahill said the coroner’s office found that Livelsberger “had sustained a gunshot wound to the head prior to the detonation of the vehicle.” And while the investigation is still ongoing, he believed Livelsberger’s actions indicated “a suicide with a bombing that occurred immediately thereafter,” rather than a “suicide mission.”
Livelsberger’s military ID and passport were found inside the Cybertruck, as well as a Desert Eagle .50 caliber semi-automatic pistol and an SLR Rifleworks B30. Both weapons, and Livelsberger himself, were burnt “almost beyond recognition,” according to McMahill. He said investigators also recovered a cache of fireworks, along with an iPhone, a smartwatch, and several credit cards in Livelsberger’s name.
Special Agent in Charge Spencer Evans of the FBI’s Las Vegas Division said agents had tracked the vehicle from Denver, through Tesla charging stations in Arizona and New Mexico, before it arrived in Vegas at 7:29 a.m. on Wednesday.
Kenny Cooper, assistant special agent in charge of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms’ San Francisco Division, said it remains unclear how the explosives were detonated. He noted that everything used was consumer-grade, such as the camping fuel and propane tanks, in addition to “some explosive targets that can be purchased at any sporting goods store.” Both of the firearms in the Cybertruck had been legally purchased two days earlier, on December 30. Cooper also noted, echoing Dean Livelsberger, that “the level of sophistication is not what we would expect from an individual with this type of military experience.”
Livelsberger divorced his first wife, who now lives in South Florida with her new husband, several years ago. Livelsberger shares a newborn with his new partner, and in September posted a picture on Facebook of himself cradling the infant in his arms, according to Dean. Over the past few months, an array of photos Livelsberger posted from Germany, including pictures of himself proposing to his partner, and the ring he gave her, have “disappeared,” his uncle said.
Livelsberger’s father, who was unreachable on Thursday, was married “several times,” and had children with “a couple of different women,” according to Dean Livelsberger, who has been semi-estranged from his brother for years.
At the same time, Dean said, “Matt wasn’t estranged from the family at all. Everyone thought the world of Matt.”