OpenAI CEO Sam Altman was the target of a Molotov cocktail attack last Friday by a radical anti-artificial intelligence (AI) activist who thinks Altman and other AI execs want to end human life on Earth.
According to the San Francisco police department, "a 20-year-old named Daniel Alejandro Moreno-Gama allegedly threw a Molotov cocktail at the Russian Hill home of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman," reports the San Francisco Standard. Moreno-Gamma then drove to OpenAI headquarters and threatened to burn it to the ground.
The attack was reminiscent of the assassination of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson in December 2024 by Luigi Mangione. Both Mangione and Moreno-Gamma wrote manifestos justifying their attacks and urging others to take action. And the reaction to both attacks on social media was similar.
Mangione had written in his manifesto not to throw bombs because "bombs = terrorism." "Kill the CEO at his own bean counting conference," he suggested.
“Please nobody throw another Molotov cocktail at Sam Altman’s house, which is pictured here—that would be easy to find now, since you know which neighborhood it’s in," wrote a poster named kittystremy on Instagram. Another user wrote: “Is the Molotov cocktail okay?”
Two days after the Molotov cocktail attack, two men stopped in front of Altman's house and let loose a volley of shots. No one was hurt. Moreno-Gamma had reportedly urged others to take action against AI executives and companies.
Prosecutors in Mangione's case argue he was providing a framework for others to follow. By detailing his planning and moral justification — stating that executives were “parasites” who “had it coming — Mangione was issuing an explicit call to action.
Did Mangione's act "inspire" Moreno-Gamma?
"A December 2024 Economist/YouGov poll taken shortly after Thompson’s murder found that 21% of U.S. adult citizens viewed Mangione either very favorably or somewhat favorably," reported MS Now. "Among 18- to 29-year-olds, a plurality of respondents in this category, an astounding 39%, view Mangione positively," the report continued.
From the adoring fans outside the courtroom to the content creators lusting after Mangione to the young people silently supporting an accused killer, this is no longer a fringe sentiment — it’s a mainstream one, that’s not just morally abhorrent but threatens the fabric of American society.
Of course, many Americans have very legitimate frustrations with health insurance companies and the broken U.S. health care system. But no terrible treatment or legitimate grievance can justify acts of terrorism. After all, if it’s morally acceptable for Mangione to kill someone or if he somehow were legally able to do so just because he believes that person is evil and harming society, well, many Americans feel that way about a whole lot of people. That’s the path to social anarchy.
"These young people who support Mangione’s alleged actions don’t seem to realize how quickly their perverse logic, if widely embraced by society, could be used to justify despicable acts of violence against the very people they support — or how short this path is toward widespread political violence or even civil war," says MS NOW.
One Reddit user whom The Free Press writer Maya Sulkin messaged with told her that “the only surprising thing about it was that it didn’t happen sooner.”
“These guys aren’t building multibillion-dollar bunkers on islands for no reason,” the user told Sulkin. “They know what they’re building is very dangerous for all of humanity. Sam Altman has even said/admitted there’s about a 25 percent chance AI will destroy humanity and is proceeding to proceed with it at breakneck speed and fighting any kind of regulation along the way.”
Post after post framed the attacks as an overdue reckoning: the working class finally striking back against the billionaires who are automating it into obsolescence and buying bunkers to protect themselves from a future they helped create. “We may look back at these attacks as heroic if the worst of AI comes to pass,” wrote Rattus_NorvegicUwUs.
Salty-Plantain-4299 put it more bluntly: “What do they honestly think is going to happen when that f****r and his other billionaire tech bros are actively working to destroy people’s lives and livelihoods. 500,000+ in the U.S. alone laid off because of AI 2024-2025. Let that sink in. How can anyone really be surprised when the pitchforks come out?”
Obviously, one of the critical problems that has to be addressed is the enormous amount of disinformation and lies that are spread about AI by the uninformed, misinformed, and ignorant posters on social media. As for the impact of AI on jobs, it could be a total wipeout or something far less disastrous. We just don't know. Other historical shocks to the economy, like the advent of the automobile or the large-scale switch to computers, meant the loss of plenty of jobs but the creation of millions more.
Andy Mills interviewed Moreno-Gamma last January about the dangers of AI and wrote about the Altman attack in The Free Press. "When I asked about Luigi Mangione, who has gained a cult following after he was arrested and charged with the murder of health insurance CEO Brian Thompson, he answered that while he didn’t agree with what Mangione is accused of doing, 'I think what we saw with Mangione is a lot of people were able to excuse it. I think that’s interesting,'" he said.
When younger people live their lives via their phones and tablets, a break with reality is inevitable. Not realizing that these CEOs aren't villains in some Netflix streamer or PlayStation game, and that they have wives and children to care for, is a consequence of the dehumanization of society brought about by dependence on social media. Living in a virtual world, it turns out, makes humans into virtual people, not real, and as easily killed as taking aim at a villain in Call of Duty.
Mills notes that when Moreno-Gamma was arrested, and the manifesto was found, "He had included the names and addresses of other AI CEOs and investors." Expect more of the same going forward.
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