White House Unveils Strategy to Combat Domestic
Extremism
The plan highlights a shift in the U.S. approach to
counterterrorism, which for decades focused on fighting foreign terrorists.
Zolan
Kanno-Youngs
By Zolan
Kanno-Youngs
June 15,
2021
WASHINGTON
— The Biden administration on Tuesday unveiled a national strategy to combat
domestic extremism, calling for aggressive steps such as hiring more
intelligence analysts and screening government employees for ties to hate
groups.
The 32-page
plan highlights a shift in the government’s approach to counterterrorism, which
for decades has prioritized fighting foreign terrorists. But violent attacks by
American extremists are growing, a problem laid bare by the deadly Capitol riot
on Jan. 6.
“We cannot
ignore this threat or wish it away,” President Biden wrote in the strategy
document. “Preventing domestic terrorism and reducing the factors that fuel it
demand a multifaceted response across the federal government and beyond.”
Mr. Biden
ordered the review of how federal agencies addressed domestic extremism soon
after coming into office, part of an effort to acknowledge white supremacists
and militia groups as top national security threats.
The
strategy, which aims to coordinate efforts across the government, outlines four
priorities: improving information sharing among law enforcement agencies,
preventing recruitment by extremists groups, investigating such groups and
confronting the longstanding drivers of domestic terrorism: racism and bigotry.
“We cannot
promise that we will be able to disrupt every plot, defuse every bomb or arrest
every co-conspirator before they manage to wreak unspeakable horror, but we can
promise that we will do everything in our power to prevent such tragedies,”
Attorney General Merrick B. Garland said on Tuesday in an address at the
Justice Department’s Great Hall.
The
administration also requested over $100 million in additional funds for the
Justice Department to hire prosecutors, investigators and analysts.
National
security officials have long complained that domestic extremism failed to
receive the attention it deserves, partly because of political wrangling.
Some
efforts to investigate attacks involving extremists, including a commission to
examine the attack on the Capitol, have been stymied by Republicans fearing the
potential political damage of increased attention on an attack by a pro-Trump
mob.
The
political problem is not new: A warning in a 2009 homeland security report that
military veterans returning from combat could be vulnerable to recruitment by
terrorist groups or extremists prompted backlash from conservatives, forcing
the homeland security secretary at the time, Janet Napolitano, to apologize and
retract the report. An edited version was eventually issued, but the political
risks of highlighting far-right extremism were clear.
Under
President Donald J. Trump, federal agencies were pressured to divert resources
to target the antifa movement and leftist groups despite the conclusion by law
enforcement authorities that far-right and militia violence was a more serious
threat.
Some
federal investigators said they felt hesitant to pursue such far-right groups
under the Trump administration.
“Trump
himself also seemed to have an affinity for these alt-right groups,” said
Elizabeth Neumann, the former assistant homeland security secretary for
counterterrorism and threat prevention under Mr. Trump. “Nobody wanted to stick
their head too far out of the crowd, because you didn’t want to get criticized
by the president.”
Some of the
recommendations in Mr. Biden’s strategy are already underway. The F.B.I. is
providing more training and domestic threat information to state and local law
enforcement partners. Every U.S. attorney’s office has an antiterrorism
advisory council. The Justice Department is carefully tracking investigations
that have a domestic terrorism nexus.
But the
president’s plan, titled “National Strategy for Countering Domestic Terrorism”
and issued by the National Security Council, also left some questions
unanswered.
The report
had been expected to detail a position on whether the government should
establish a domestic terrorism law that prosecutors could use to investigate
and charge homegrown extremists instead of relying on assault, murder and hate
crime charges. Mr. Biden had called for such a law during the presidential
campaign, but the administration did not take a position in the report on
Tuesday. It instead indicates that the administration is focused on reinforcing
methods of combating extremism already used by the government.
While there
is increasing bipartisan support to equip prosecutors with more laws to crack
down on extremists, civil rights advocates have expressed concern that new
statutes would lead to government overreach and infringements on privacy
rights. The administration referred the issue to the Justice Department for
further review, according to the planning document.
“New
criminal laws, in particular, should be sought only after careful consideration
of whether and how they are needed to assist the government in tackling
complex, multifaceted challenges like the one posed by domestic terrorism and
only while ensuring the protection of civil rights and civil liberties,” the
document said.
The report
was the latest in a series of assessments issued by Mr. Biden that labeled
white supremacists and militia groups the most lethal threats among domestic
extremists. The danger from such groups has not subsided, the document said.
The
assessment lists attacks carried out by those across the political spectrum,
including the fatal shooting of five police officers in Dallas in 2016, a
shooting at a congressional baseball game in 2017 and the siege on Congress on
Jan. 6.
Extremists
continue to be motivated by “narratives of fraud in the recent general
election, the emboldening impact of the violent breach of the U.S. Capitol,
conditions related to the Covid-19 pandemic and conspiracy theories promoting
violence” and will almost certainly “try to engage in violence this year,”
according to the strategy document.
An
assessment issued this month by the F.B.I. echoed that finding, saying that
followers of the QAnon theory could turn to violence. The conspiracy theory holds
that a corrupt cabal of global elites and career government employees who run a
Satan-worshiping, child sex-trafficking ring will soon be rounded up and
punished for their misdeeds, and that Mr. Trump will be restored to the
presidency. The information has continued to spread online.
Mr. Biden’s
plan acknowledges the difficulty in policing extremist recruitment on online
platforms, including some that are encrypted, while safeguarding posts
protected by the First Amendment.
“Dealing
with the supply is therefore necessary but not sufficient: We must address the
demand, too,” the document said.
The
administration is calling for more money for digital literacy programs to train
the public to identify hateful content and resist recruitment by extremists groups.
But while
the administration is focused on working with social media platforms to combat
extremist content, it did not include adequate safeguards to ensure the privacy
of Americans, according to Hina Shamsi, the director of the National Security Project
and the American Civil Liberties Union.
The plan
failed to address “abusive counterterrorism tools” used to surveil minority
communities, Ms. Shamsi said.
“We’re
deeply disappointed that the administration failed to impose safeguards against
biased profiling, overbroad law enforcement information sharing and other
measures that harm free expression and equal protection, including of the very
communities that white supremacists target,” she said.
Mr. Biden’s
plan does describe how the network of domestic extremists is growing.
Extremists
“who promote the superiority of the white race” are among those with “the most
persistent and concerning transnational connections because individuals with
similar ideological beliefs exist outside of the United States,” according to
the strategy document.
The
Treasury Department is being directed to investigate those overseas who may be
financially supporting domestic extremists. The report also says the administration
will work to use terrorism watch lists to crack down on groups overseas
supporting extremists in the United States.
A key piece
of the Biden administration’s plan also directs the federal government to look
at its own ranks. The Homeland Security Department announced recently that it
would undergo an internal review to root out extremism and white supremacy in
its ranks. The Defense Department has also set up a working group to examine
how to better vet recruits and educate service members who might be targeted by
extremist organizations.
The
administration will augment the screening process for military recruits and
those looking to join federal law enforcement or obtain a security clearance.
The goal, the report said, is “to prevent individuals who pose domestic
terrorism threats from being placed in positions of trust.”
Katie
Benner contributed reporting.
Zolan
Kanno-Youngs is a White House correspondent covering a range of domestic and
international issues in the Biden White House, including homeland security and
extremism. He joined The Times in 2019 as the homeland security correspondent. @KannoYoungs
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