President-elect Trump commented Monday on the murder-like killing of a health insurance executive, calling the viral support for the murder that has surfaced online a “disease.”

The new president, who has deep roots in New York, called out the ambush shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson during a news conference Monday, a week after police in Altoona, Pennsylvania, arrested the 26-year-old. Luigi Mangione, former graduate of the University of Pennsylvania.

“I think it’s really terrible that some people seem to admire him – like he does,” Trump said. “It was cold-blooded, just a cold-blooded, terrible murder.”

United Health Care CEO’s alleged assassin draws unmatched comparisons

Former President Trump delivers a speech during a campaign rally on October 15, 2024 in Atlanta, Georgia. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

Mangione, a computer programmer with an Ivy League background who comes from a wealthy Maryland family, allegedly tracked Thompson to a Manhattan hotel and shot him in the back with a silenced, 3D-printed pistol.

Days before police identified him as a suspect, they shared a surveillance photo taken at the New York City hostel where Mangione allegedly stayed before the murder. It showed a grinning man reportedly flirting with the young woman at the front desk as he checked in.

The image circulated widely online as interstate efforts to identify him were underway and health insurance industry critics also praised the crime.

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Luigi Mangione screams as officers restrain him as he arrives for his extradition hearing at the Blair County Courthouse in Hollidaysburg, Pennsylvania, on Tuesday, December 10, 2024. (David Dee Delgado for Fox News Digital)

“How people can like this guy is actually a disease,” Trump said Monday.

He was particularly horrified by the way the murder was carried out – shots from behind.

Surveillance video taken outside a Hilton hotel in Manhattan, where UnitedHealthcare was to host shareholders and other investors for an annual conference, shows Thompson showing up about an hour and 15 minutes before the event began.

A masked man came up behind him, fired into his back and walked away, while a horrified woman who witnessed the murder fled in the other direction.

“Maybe it’s fake news. I don’t know it; “It’s hard to believe you can even think of it, but it seems there is some interest in him,” Trump said. “I don’t understand.”

Despite the violence, many online commentators praised the unmasked suspect’s appearance and the attack on the health insurance industry.

Online fundraising sites suspended efforts to raise money for his legal defense. His image appeared in viral memes. Radical commentators praised the killing and condemned the witnesses who spotted him in a McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania and called 911.

The restaurant, its employees and local police received a wave of death threats as a result, and other major health care companies have removed portraits and biographical information of their corporate executives from their websites.

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The suspected shooter in the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, believed to be Luigi Mangione, is seen on surveillance footage flirting with a hostel worker before the Dec. 4 shooting. (NYPD)

Mangione faces a number of charges in New York and Pennsylvania, including second-degree murder, illegal possession of a firearm and carrying a false ID.

His lawyer told a Pennsylvania judge last week that he planned to fight extradition to New York.