The Other McCain

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Crazy People Are Dangerous: Pennsylvania Arsonist Edition

Posted on | April 15, 2025 | 43 Comments

As soon as Pennsylvania State Police announced that Cody Balmer had been charged with setting the fire at the Pennsylvania governor’s mansion in Harrisburg, someone found Balmer’s Facebook page and a deep dive found little evidence to point to a motive. Like most other people — including Gov. Josh Shapiro himself — I immediately assumed the motive must be antisemitism. Like, you attack the residence of the Jewish governor on the first night of Passover, what else could it be?

So when I plunged into Balmer’s Facebook page, I expected to find evidence that the suspect was either (a) a neo-Nazi Jew-hater or (b) a “progressive” pro-Palestinian Jew-hater. But there was no evidence of either inclination. In fact, there was very little hint of political inclinations at all. The guy was a welder and mechanic, with a black wife and four mixed-race kids, which obviously seemed to rule out any neo-Nazi tendencies, but there weren’t any “free Palestine” messages, either, He had a couple of sarcastic posts indicating he wasn’t a big fan of Joe Biden, but there weren’t any MAGA pro-Trump messages, either. Thomas Stevenson of The Post Millennial dug even deeper than I did and discovered that Balmer described himself as a “registered socialist,” so it’s a fair surmise he was a Bernie Bro back in the day, which might explain his disdain of Biden as an “establishment” Democrat.

However, there were also a couple of indications that Balmer’s life had taken a downward turn in recent years. In 2023, he was charged with three counts of assault, and more recently his Harrisburg home — which reportedly had once belonged to his grandmother — had been lost in foreclosure and sold at auction at the county courthouse. Then on Monday afternoon, the anchor on CNN (I watch CNN, so you don’t have to) mentioned that police said “mental health issues” might be a factor. And then there was a court hearing, and oh, boy!

HARRISBURG, Pa. — The Pennsylvania man accused of firebombing Gov. Josh Shapiro’s mansion was out on bail when he allegedly carried out the arson, The Post can reveal.
Cody Balmer’s mother, meanwhile, said she desperately tried to get police to lock up her son prior to the attack.
Balmer, 38, pulled sick faces as he was hauled back into a Harrisburg courtroom for his arraignment Monday, where he was hit with eight charges including terrorism, aggravated arson, criminal homicide and prowling at night.
The former mechanic, who said he is now jobless, penniless and lives with his parents, was free after making bail for a 2023 simple assault charge, courts spokesperson Stacey Witalec told The Post.
In that case, he was accused of stomping on his 10-year-old son’s broken leg and battering his wife, according to a police report.
Judge Dale Klein promptly order him held without bond, to which he replied, “Thank you, ma’am.”
He had a ragged beard and looked gaunt as he struggled to hold his belt-less pants up while being led in and out of the courthouse. He sat breathing heavily in the defendant’s chair as he spoke with the judge.
Police said Balmer hopped the fence at the official governor’s mansion in Harrisburg home about 2 a.m. Sunday and hauled a handful of Molotov cocktails into the historic residence while Shapiro, his wife and his two children slept.
Shapiro, a Democrat who is Jewish, had just celebrated the first night of Passover. He and his family escaped unharmed, but the damage to the mansion is estimated to be in the millions.
Balmer told the judge that he had no income and had been living with his parents for the last year, and when asked whether he had any kids replied that he had “a lot” but declined to elaborate.
He also said that “the rumor” about his dangerous mental health was true, and suggested that medication he took to treat it had been negatively affecting him.
“Medication led me to different types of behaviors,” Balmer told the court.
Balmer’s mother Christie told CBS News that her son was “mentally ill and he went off his medication” in the days before the fiery attack.
Exactly what mental ailments Balmer suffers from remains unclear, but his mother said she went to four different police departments for help to get her son “picked up” before the firebombing – but was rebuffed each time.
Balmer turned himself into police Sunday afternoon and allegedly confessed to the attack, according to a Harrisburg police report.
He told investigators that he made the improvised bombs with Heineken beer bottles and gasoline from his lawn mower.
Balmer also allegedly told police he was ready to beat Shapiro with a hammer if he encountered the governor inside the mansion, and that he knew the pol’s family was likely inside at the time.

He’s not MAGA. He’s not Antifa. He’s not a Nazi or a “free Palestine” type, he’s just crazy, and Crazy People Are Dangerous.



 

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Category: Crime, Pennsylvania

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