Homegrown terrorismU.S. Coast Guard officer to be charged with mass terrorism plot

Published 21 February 2019

Christopher Paul Hasson, a U.S. Coast Guard officer will appear in court today (Thursday), charged with plotting a massive, 2-prong attack modeled after the 2011 Anders Behring Breivik’s terrorist attack in Norway. Breivik killed eight people in Oslo as a diversion, before killing 69 teenagers in a summer camp organized by the Norwegian Social Democratic Party. Hasson compiled a hit list of liberal politicians, Supreme Court judges, and journalists – but his violent plans extended to trying to “establish a white homeland,” and using biological weapons to “kill almost every last person on Earth.”

A U.S. Coast Guard officer will appear in court today (Thursday), charged with stockpiling weapons in order to carry out a massive, 2-prong attack modeled after the 2011 Anders Behring Breivik’s terrorist attack in Norway. Breivik killed eight people in Oslo as a diversion, before killing 69 teenagers in a summer camp organized by the Norwegian Social Democratic Party.

The Coast Guard officer, Christopher Paul Hasson, planned to kill critics of President Donald Trump – most of them Democratic politicians and journalists. Investigators found a hit list, which Hasson entered on a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, of liberal politicians Hasson singled out for assassination, including U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer, New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and a number of Democratic presidential candidates. CNN and MSNBC television personalities were also included on the list.

In February 2018, Hasson searched the internet for the “most liberal senators,” as well as searching to find out if they, and Supreme Court judges, had secret service protection.

Hasson was arrested last week on drug and weapon charges after the police found 15 firearms — including several rifles — and more than 1,000 rounds of ammunition inside Hasson’s basement apartment in the Maryland town of Silver Spring. Court papers said they also found steroids and human growth hormones.

The defendant intends to murder innocent civilians on a scale rarely seen in this country,” the government’s court filing says. It calls Hasson a “domestic terrorist bent on committing acts dangerous to human life that are intended to affect governmental conduct.”

Hasson’s violent plot extended beyond targeting liberal politicians and journalists. Along with the weapons and drugs, investigators found documents in which Hasson calls for “focused violence” and expresses a desire to “establish a white homeland.”

The documents describe his thoughts on ways to “kill almost every last person on Earth,” and called the idea of a biological attack and poisoning the U.S. food supply “interesting.” Police found emails on his computer, sent to various labs, in which he inquired about acquiring anthrax and toxins to create botulism or a deadly influenza.

In one of the emails, Hasson discussed “biological attacks followed by attack on food supply,” describing these as an “interesting idea.”

Prosecutors claim that Hasson visited thousands of gun websites and studied military tactical manuals on improvised munitions.

Prosecutors said they believed Hasson was not just fantasizing but was serious about his plans. They said he was a longtime white nationalist and neo-Nazi.

They said he spent time studying the lengthy manifesto Anders Breivik wrote before launching his terrorist attack eight years ago.