Perspective“Domestic Terrorist Actors” Could Exploit Floyd Protests, DHS Memo Warns

Anarchist and militia extremists could try to exploit the recent nationwide protests spurred by the death of George Floyd, the Department of Homeland Security warned in an intelligence note sent to law enforcement officials around the country.

Betsy Woodruff Swan and Natasha Bertrand write in Politico that

The memo, dated May 29 and marked unclassified/law enforcement sensitive, cites “previous incidents of domestic terrorists exploiting First Amendment-protected events” as one reason for DHS’ concern of additional targeted violence by “domestic terrorist actors.”

It also reveals, citing the FBI, that on May 27, two days after Floyd’s death, “a white supremacist extremist Telegram channel incited followers to engage in violence and start the ‘boogaloo ’— a term used by some violent extremists to refer to the start of a second Civil War — by shooting in a crowd.” One Telegram message encouraged potential shooters to “frame the crowd around you” for the violence, the document said.

And on May 29, “suspected anarchist extremists and militia extremists allegedly planned to storm and burn the Minnesota State Capitol,” the memo reads, citing FBI information.

Administration officials, led by President Trump and Attorney General Barr, have been actively promoting the notion that Antifa, a loose network of leftist radicals who often destroy property and use violent tactics, was responsible for many of the violent incidents which accompanied some of the protests. Security experts stress that there is no evidence for this argument, and that Trump’s and Barr’s comments appear to be motivated by political calculations, not the reality on the ground.

Woodruff Swan and Bertrand write that the DHS intelligence unit memo

does not use the terms “left” or “right.” But it defines “militia extremists” as people who direct violence at the government because they believe it is taking away Americans’ freedoms and setting up a totalitarian regime. That definition also notes that militia extremists oppose laws regulating gun ownership and often form armed paramilitary groups. Those details are all hallmarks of far-right extremism.

The DHS intelligence unit note is at least the fifth DHS has sent out to law enforcement officials around the country in the last two months warning of the mobilization of far-right domestic terrorists, white supremacists, and violent extremists in the context of a national crisis.