NATIONAL
SECURITY
Intel report warns that far-right extremists may
target Washington, D.C.
The district is "likely an attractive
target" for the boogaloo movement and other groups, the intelligence
assessment warns.
By NATASHA
BERTRAND
06/19/2020
03:32 PM EDT
The Trump
administration is warning law enforcement and public safety officials that a
far-right extremist movement known as “boogaloo” may be setting its sights on
the nation’s capital.
On Monday,
the National Capital Region Threat Intelligence Consortium (NTIC), a fusion
center for Washington, D.C. that provides support to federal national security
and law enforcement agencies, warned in an intelligence assessment that “the
District is likely an attractive target for violent adherents of the boogaloo ideology
due to the significant presence of US law enforcement entities, and the wide
range of First Amendment-Protected events hosted here.”
The
assessment, dated June 15 and obtained by Politico, reported that “recent
events indicate violent adherents of the boogaloo ideology likely reside in the
National Capital Region, and others may be willing to travel far distances to
incite civil unrest or conduct violence encouraged in online forums associated
with the movement.”
A senior
DHS official forwarded the assessment to security stakeholders on Friday,
noting that “while it identifies Washington D.C. as an attractive target, the
boogaloo ideology is not restricted to a specific region and those who wish to
cause division are routinely using peaceful protests as means of cover. Heading
into a weekend of more planned protests, we believe this information to be
useful to all of our membership.”
Separately
on Friday, DHS published its own intelligence note assessing that “domestic
terrorists advocating for the boogaloo very likely will take advantage of any
regional or national situation involving heightened fear and tensions to
promote their violent extremist ideology and call supporters to action.”
The note,
dated June 19 and obtained by Politico, aims to “provides information regarding
some domestic terrorists’ exploitation of heightened tensions during recent
First Amendment-protected activities in order to threaten or incite violence to
start the ‘boogaloo’—a colloquial term referring to a coming civil war or the
fall of civilization.”
Participants
in the boogaloo movement generally identify as anarchist, pro-Second Amendment
members of citizen-militias who are preparing for a second Civil War or
American revolution, extremism experts say. Several boogaloo adherents have
been charged in recent weeks for acts ranging from felony murder to terrorism,
and police last month seized military-style assault rifles from so-called
“boogaloo bois” in Denver.
The DHS
note says boogaloo tactics “likely will be repeated in future similar incidents
wherein domestic terrorists attempt to shut down or endanger government
operations, judging from domestic terrorists’ continued calls for attacks.”
And the
NTIC assessment is the first known government confirmation that suspected
“violent adherents of the boogaloo ideology” may reside in D.C. and have an
abundance of potential targets.
“These
individuals may target law enforcement as violent adherents have in other parts
of the country, and motivated adherents have an increased number of targets
given the concentration of law enforcement agencies in the region,” the memo
reads.
It cites
planning documents shared by boogaloo adherents online, including military
manuals, CIA handbooks, “and revolutionary literature which provides
instructions on bomb-making.” And it says that other documents shared by the
boogaloos refer to national guard depots, police stations and factories that
produce munitions as “very solid targets.”
The
assessment is striking given the public emphasis President Donald Trump and
Attorney General Bill Barr have placed on alleged violence carried out by
adherents of the left-wing ideology antifa, while refusing to specifically
identify and denounce the far-right groups like boogaloo that have been have
been charged in recent weeks for acts ranging from felony murder to terrorism.
“It’s
ANTIFA and the Radical Left,” Trump tweeted on May 30. “Don’t lay the blame on
others!” Barr similarly homed in on the anti-fascist protest movement the
following day, in a statement presented from the Department of Justice in D.C.:
“The violence instigated and carried out by Antifa and other similar groups in
connection with the rioting is domestic terrorism and will be treated
accordingly.”
To date, no
federal charges have been filed against individuals linked to antifa—violent
acts at Black Lives Matter protests, including setting police cars on fire,
have been attributed to individuals with no clear political or ideological
affiliation, according to charging documents.
But
right-wing extremists, militia groups and vigilantes have become more
activated, with more than half a dozen separate violent incidents across the
country in the last month alone—most within the last week.
Law
enforcement and government officials, moreover, are increasingly in the
crosshairs. A Santa Cruz county police officer and a federal officer in Oakland
were murdered, allegedly by a boogaloo adherent, earlier this month, and
boogaloo members in California’s Bay Area have reportedly been plotting to
kidnap elected leaders’ children.
Experts on
far-right violence and extremism say the president and attorney general’s
rhetoric is political, and that the real threat has been laid out in the
federal charges filed in the last month and the federal alerts, such as from
NTIC and DHS, being sent to law enforcement warning of far-right violence.
But some
argue that the unwillingness to name and shame these far-right groups publicly
and from the top is not harmless, either.
“It puts a
target on the backs of law-enforcement -- whether federal, state or local --
because these individuals, with the power they have at the podium, are not
speaking out about who is really carrying out these abhorrent acts of
violence,” said Jason Blazakis, a senior research fellow at The Soufan Center,
a nonprofit that studies emerging threats.
A DOJ
spokesperson pointed to Barr’s comments about the extremists being a “witches
brew” of violent actors and groups.
But
singling out antifa is similarly “dangerous and foolish,” said J.J. McNab, an
expert on violent political extremism and a research fellow at George
Washington University's Program on Extremism. “There is nothing to back it up.
I don’t think that if they called out these right-wing groups it’d make much of
a difference, but now anyone who wears black [at these protests] has a target
on their back,” McNab said, referring to antifa sympathizers’ tendency to wear
all black. “It’s irresponsible and frustrating.”
Ohio,
Pennsylvania, New Mexico and Texas have experienced incidents in the last week
involving armed, right-wing vigilante individuals and militias seeking either
to protect Confederate statues or attack Black Lives Matter protesters.
On Sunday,
Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner warned vigilante groups who
claimed to be “protecting” a Christopher Columbus statue in South Philadelphia
that using bats or hatchets “or anything else for an illegal purpose is a
criminal act.” The FBI arrested an El Paso man on Wednesday who, armed with an
AR-15 style rifle, allegedly threatened to “take out at least 200 [N******].”
A man was
shot in Albuquerque on Tuesday as tensions rose between protesters there and
the New Mexico Civil Guard, a self-described civilian militia, though the Guard
has claimed the shooter was not one of their own. And a group of about 80 Black
Lives Matter protesters in Bethel, Ohio—organized by resident Alicia Gee, who
called on people to join her to tell “whoever will listen that no matter the
color of your skin you are loved, you deserve everything you can possible dream
of, and you matter”—were overwhelmed this week by 700 armed counter protesters,
including motorcycle gangs and Second Amendment proponents.
“There is a
clear link between far-right groups and gun culture that doesn't really exist
in the culture of individuals who identify with the antifa movement,” Blazakis
noted. “That’s a key distinguishing feature. There is a potential shared
narrative between boogaloo and antifa, given the anti-government bent. But the
way they project the threat is different.”
DHS alerts
sent to law enforcement in recent weeks and obtained by Politico similarly make
no mention of antifa--instead, they warn of threats posed by “militia
extremists,” “white supremacists,” and “anarchist extremists,” which is how the
right-wing boogaloo movement is characterized by extremism experts. And an
“officer safety bulletin” disseminated to law enforcement from ATF Baltimore
and the Baltimore police department earlier this month, obtained by Politico,
warns explicitly of social media postings by “boogaloo” members threatening
violence against federal and local law enforcement officials.
“In
alignment with their second amendment views, members of this movement are
likely to possess multiple types of weapons,” the bulletin reads. “Use caution
if coming in contact with any individual(s) whom may identify with the
‘boogaloo’ movement.”
Brian
Levin, executive director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at
Cal State San Bernardino, said the center’s research shows there have been 27
homicides connected to far-right extremists in the U.S. since 2019, with none
connected to the far-left since at least 2016. White supremacists, he added,
continue to pose the “most ascendent and prominent threat,” Levin said.
Other think
tanks have compiled similar data. The Center for Strategic and International
Studies released a report on Wednesday that found that “right-wing extremists
perpetrated two thirds of the attacks and plots in the United States in 2019
and over 90 percent between January 1 and May 8, 2020,” defining such
extremists as “white supremacists, anti-government extremists, and incels.”
DHS, FBI,
and state and local law enforcement have done a good job tracking these groups
on the ground, said McNab, despite political rhetoric from the top that
suggests a concentration of resources toward battling antifa.
“We
continue to worry about international terrorism by groups like al-Qaeda and
ISIS, but now the threat from lone actors already here in the U.S. and inspired
by those groups, the homegrown violent extremists, that threat is even more
acute,” FBI Director Chris Wray testified in February. “At the same time, we
are particularly focused on domestic terrorism, especially racially or
ethnically motivated violent extremists.”
But the
changing organizational nature and rapid spread of far-right extremism, which
is bolstered by conspiracy theories and stressors during an already volatile
election year, can make it difficult for police to interdict.
“The
politicization of national security threats is retrograde and hurting our
response,” Levin said. “We’re not seeing this level of violence now from the
left because these extremist movements respond to inertia from the mainstream.
The hard right hangs on Trump’s every word. And even in ambiguity, they see
support.”
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