Domestic terrorists, and in particular militia groups and white nationalists, pose a heightened terrorist threat, the intelligence community said on Wednesday in a new report ordered following the January 6 attack on the Capitol.
“Narratives of fraud in the recent general elections, the encouraging impact of the violent violation of the United States Capitol, the conditions related to the COVID-19 pandemic and the conspiracy theories that promote violence – will almost certainly stimulate some [domestic violent extremists] to try to get involved in the violence this year, ”according to the report.
The report, prepared by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Department of Justice, comes later President biden
Joe BidenBiden and Congress must take bold steps to avoid violent extremism The Hill’s Morning Report – Presented by Facebook – Biden faces the Republican Party’s immigration and obstruction offensive. Democrats defend border crisis MORE ordered a comprehensive review of the threats of domestic terrorism a few days after taking office.
The report emphasizes that lone wolves and small groups of extremists are the most likely to carry out attacks, warning that “they often radicalize independently when consuming violent extremist material online and mobilize without direction from a violent extremist organization, making it difficult to detect and the interruption. “
The report comes as Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas
Alejandro MayorkasThe Hill’s Morning Report – Presented by Facebook – Biden faces the Republican Party’s immigration and obstruction offensive. Democrats defend border crisis Biden tells migrants ‘don’t show up’ amid the wave at the border MORE on Wednesday it issued a similar warning to lawmakers about the risks posed by small groups of extremists.
“At this moment, domestic violent extremism, the lone wolf, the loose affiliation of individuals following ideologies of hate and other ideologies of extremism that are willing and able to take these ideologies and execute them in illegal, illegal and violent ways is ours biggest threat in the homeland now, ”he said.
Tuesday’s shootings in Atlanta were a very recent reminder of the dangers of lone wolf attacks.
The shootings in three massage parlors killed eight people, including six Asian women, although police said on Wednesday it was too early to determine the sniper’s motive.
“Solitary criminals will continue to pose significant detection and disruption challenges due to their ability to radicalize independently of violence, the ability to discreetly mobilize and access to firearms,” said the report.
Wednesday’s assessment warned that racially motivated extremists and militia groups pose the most lethal threat, with the former most likely to conduct mass victim events targeting civilians, while militia groups focus on government and police targets.
The report also focused specifically on the threat of white nationalist groups, saying that they have “the most persistent and worrying transnational connections”.
The assessment is largely in line with the impetus of Democratic lawmakers, who argued that the intelligence community needs to focus its efforts on white nationalists as well as right-wing extremists.
In a letter to the FBI last month, Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats asked the agency to further detail their categories for different types of extremists, arguing that broad categories, such as racially or ethnicly motivated violent extremists “minimize the threat of supremacy. white and very – sure violence. “
This sentiment was echoed by the president of the Chamber’s Intelligence Committee Adam Schiff
Adam Bennett SchiffHouse’s panel will assume the revocation of the 2002 war warrant in the ‘next few weeks’. House Democrats want to silence opposing opinions, not ‘false news’. (D-Calif.) On Wednesday.
“Today’s report highlights how we face the greatest threat from racially or ethnicly motivated violent extremists, especially white supremacists and violent extremist militias,” he said in a statement.
“This violence is not limited to lone wolves who carry out mass shootings or attacks, but also to more sophisticated cells and plots. However, lone actors pose some of the most difficult challenges to detect, as they can keep their plans to themselves or meet like-minded people in private chat rooms, ”he said.
The assessment noted these same challenges, identifying social media as a recruiting tool and, at the same time, blaming encrypted messaging apps for making it more difficult to monitor how groups are recruiting and planning.
In a recent appearance before lawmakers, FBI director Christoper Wray said that disclosing serious threats online while trying to monitor communications from serious actors presents some of the agency’s biggest challenges.
“Trying to figure out who’s just saying, you know, ‘What we should be doing is X’ or ‘Everyone should be doing X’ versus the person doing this and actually getting traction and then gaining followers. And of course that assuming that they don’t communicate through encrypted channels about all of these things is one of the most difficult things there is to do in the world today, “he said.