Guardian Retracts Quotes About Tyler Robinson’s Politics From Anonymous ‘High School Friend’

The Guardian has edited a widely-cited article to retract quotes from an anonymous alleged “high school friend” of Tyler Robinson, including that he was “pretty left on everything,” “really leftist,” and that “the rest of his family was very hard Republican.”

In an editor’s note, The Guardian now says that their source “said after publication that they could not accurately remember details of their relationship.”

Here’s a before and after graphic showing the removed quotes:

As seen above, The Guardian had originally said that they spoke to this person “in a phone interview Friday,” and that the person had “asked to remain anonymous.”

Versions of the article from before and after the “update” are available via the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine.

Robinson, 22, is in police custody and accused of fatally shooting Turning Point USA co-founder Charlie Kirk earlier this week.

From Real Time With Bill Maher on Friday night:

BEN SHAPIRO: If there’s a shooting at a synagogue, it is very likely to be either a white supremacist or a radical Muslim. If it is a shooting of a Republican politician, it is very likely to be a trans, Antifa, Marxist shooter.

BILL MAHER: That is just not true.

SHAPIRO: That is– it is–

MAHER: We don’t know what this kid is.

SHAPIRO: We do know this kid was of the left. We do know that.

MAHER: We know what?

SHAPIRO: That this kid was of the political left. That is according to contemporaneous reporting from The Guardian as well as Tablet Magazine today.

MAHER: It’s two days out. We don’t know shit, Ben…

* * *

Update (9/14/2025): We tagged Ramon Antonio Vargas and Anna Betts, the authors of the Guardian article, in a post on X and asked them a series of questions.

Here’s the full list:

Since these anonymously-sourced quotes about Tyler Robinson got so much attention before you removed them:

1. Did this person reach out to you? If not, how did you find them and get in touch with them?

2. How long did you originally interview them for? Is it recorded?

3. What made you think they were credible and that their (now-retracted) quotes were worth publishing?

4. How did you get back in touch with them after publication and find out that “they could not accurately remember details of their relationship”? Did they reach back out to you or vice versa? What prompted it?

5. What does “they could not accurately remember details of their relationship” mean, exactly? That you now doubt that they were truthful about their alleged relationship with Robinson, and thus [are] not a credible source regarding his political views (and/or in general)? If they weren’t a “high school friend,” what was the relationship (if any)?

6. What makes them a “verified source,” as stated in your editor’s note? Simply the fact that they went to the same high school as Robinson?

UPDATE (9/23/2025): It’s been over a week now and Vargas and Betts did not reply. The post got 60 likes and has been reposted 32 times. As of this writing it is the most liked post on X tagging Vargas in over 7 months (since Feb 2025). There have only been six other posts on X tagging Betts with 60+ likes all year.