QAnon in the Capitol and the National Guard (Part 4)
Right-wing extremist militias have been a threat for years, and we've known that military members participate-so, why has the FBI suddenly decided to properly vet troops days before the inauguration?
More than 21,000 National Guard troops were stationed in Washington, DC, as of Monday, with up to 25,000 expected for the inauguration, and law enforcement officials have begun to undertake the mammoth task of additional security screenings. These additional background checks will now include previous social media posts, after the investigation into the attack on the US Capitol continues to reveal rioters with law enforcement and military backgrounds.
A criminal complaint was issued last Friday for Timothy Louis Hale-Cusanelli, an Army reservist from New Jersey who maintains a security clearance and has access to a variety of munitions. Hale-Cusanelli, 30, is facing five federal charges: Entering a restricted government building, engaging in disorderly conduct to interrupt government business, violent entry and disorderly conduct in a Capitol building, illegal demonstration in a Capitol building and obstructing law enforcement.
This was the latest service member charged by federal authorities for his alleged participation in the insurrection. Hale-Cusanelli is only one of nearly a dozen retired military servicemen and servicewomen who have either been charged or are wanted by federal authorities in connection with their participation in the insurrection at the US Capitol on Jan. 6. Alleged members of anti-government militia groups, like the Three Percenters and the Oath Keepers are both part of an extremist movement that has seen a substantial upward trend in participation and activity since 2008.
The goal of these home-grown paramilitary groups is to promote the idea that the government is plotting to take away the rights of US citizens and must be resisted. It is also well known that many former and current law enforcement and military members are suspected of being deeply embedded within these organizations. According to Javed Ali, a former senior director for counterterrorism at the National Security Council,"The large number of individuals with ties to law enforcement or the military already arrested or apparently now under investigation [for the US Capitol riot] suggests a deeper level of far-right sympathizers in these fields."
During an intelligence briefing on Monday, the FBI privately warned other law enforcement agencies of a series of threats by adherents to the extremist theories of the QAnon conspiracy group, who participated in the siege on the Capitol on Jan. 6. The threat involves far-right, white nationalist extremists planning to pose as National Guard members in Washington, in an attempt to disrupt Wednesday’s inauguration.
According to the FBI, the members of this group have reviewed and shared maps of vulnerable spots in the city, and actively discussed how those facilities could be used to interfere with inauguration security on Jan. 20. In their recent briefing, the FBI confirmed that the people involved in the dissemination of this plan and the map include both “lone wolves” and devotees to the QAnon extremist movement.
No specific plots to attack the inauguration have yet been uncovered, and “numerous” militia and extremist groups have been publicly denouncing violence targeted at the transition of presidential power, a move likely intended to provide cover for any future attacks. The FBI also refuses to further detail the threat level and/or credibility of any of the plots ahead of the inauguration, and referred the public to FBI Director Wray’s statement from last week that confirmed agents were monitoring a “extensive amount of concerning online chatter” and noted the challenge of “trying to distinguish what’s aspirational versus what’s intentional.”
Wray also explained last week that the agency was “monitoring all incoming leads, whether they’re calls for armed protest, potential threats that grow out of the January 6 breach of the Capitol, or other kinds of potential threats leading up to inaugural events and in various other targets.”
The need to keep the details of the gleaned intelligence confidential is understandable, but considering that the FBI overlooked the threat level on Jan. 6, altogether, this elusive and general approach is difficult to trust. Capitol Police Officers, speaking on the condition of anonymity, have now described feeling unprepared and “betrayed” by department leadership leading up to the attack on the US Capitol.
Officers describe events that include getting their riot gear at the last minute, with some receiving their helmets on the morning of the scheduled protest. Officers also say they were not trained on how to use their protective gear, and many left helmets in their lockers, and never had access to them. Minority officers also describe being bombarded with racial slurs by those launching the attack.
Capitol Police, who had no authority to make arrests that day, were forced to shout their identities to other law enforcement responding to the scene. They were not able defend themselves, or the Capitol-ultimately being put in a position where they could not succeed. When you add these Capitol Police details to the FBI overlooking intel on the impending Capitol attack, and to the reports of Congress members taking insurrectionists on suspicious “reconnaissance” tours (see video in tweet below) — there is reasonable cause for concern.
We also know that the agency’s capacity and funding has been cut significantly by the Trump administration, who made a particular point to eliminate federal resources to fight the threat posed by white national extremists across the board, despite the increased threat posed by these domestic terrorist organizations and their ongoing activity. Federal agencies have been scrambling to fight domestic terror with limited resources for several years now, after the Department of Homeland Security cut resources that were once devoted to fighting domestic terror, in order to reassign and redirect FBI agents to fight jihadis instead of white supremacists.
This begs the question: why would the FBI only think about conducting deeper dives into the backgrounds of National Guard troops on the week of the inauguration, and why aren’t these troops screened thoroughly before they are cleared for service? We can now add this question to many others about overlooking critical inside intelligence warnings and public threats on the internet, as well as failing to prepare Capitol Police to be on the front line.
It seems likely that the breach on the US Capitol was the result of an agency failing to process and manage all of their immense intelligence after their resources were gutted, and the agency was caught off guard. But, included in this overall failure are undoubtedly a few key players who were working from the inside to either knowingly or unwittingly assist domestic terrorists in a coup.
Considering that the inauguration is tomorrow, and that it is a prime target for another attack in the wake of the Capitol siege, we should really be further along in the overall investigation. We also need to get down to the bottom of where the weak link in the chain is, and where to put the responsibility for the devastating collapse in security. When you factor in that Trump has decided to be notably absent from the event, while most other prominent American politicians and officials will be in attendance, you realize that the target has been elevated to another level and the consequences for repeating the same mistakes would be unthinkable.
Amee Vanderpool writes the SHERO Newsletter and is an attorney, published author, contributor to newspapers and magazines and analyst for BBC radio. She can be reached at avanderpool@gmail.com or follow her on Twitter @girlsreallyrule.
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I cannot get a satisfactory answer as to why all of the video that has come out of the capitol building has been civilian. Are there not security cameras in there? Why is the FBI seemingly relying on footage from reporters etc?
It is possible that the information the FBI has about plans for disrupting the inauguration is so disturbing that the public might, quite literally, panic. I suspect that it is keeping what it knows to itself to prevent the groups and individuals planning disruption from knowing how much the FBI knows about them.
I am anxious about tomorrow, very anxious. I know this is what Trump wants, to keep his opponents off balance and torture them with expectations of horrible things to come. If he pardons violent white nationalists and militia types, it would not surprise me; he wants to leave Biden with a going-away present that cannot be removed easily.
I hope that the assault on the Capitol is the last gasp of white supremacy but I fear it's actually the first salvo of the denouement and that the long slide down the end will take years.