Douglas Lovelace, director of the Strategic Studies Institute at the US Army War College, contrasted Adkisson with another 21st-century mass shooter, Elliot Rodger, who killed six people in the 2014 Isla Vista killings in California. According to Lovelace, Adkisson was "largely considered a terrorist" while Rodger was widely viewed as a mass murderer, a distinction that Lovelace questioned.