ARGUMENT: EXTREMIST THREATJanuary 6th Report Summarizes Extremist Threat – But Leaves Key Gaps
The House Jan. 6 committee’s 845-page report is unquestionably valuable, but significant questions remain largely unanswered around two interrelated components of the committee’s investigation: the scope of law enforcement and intelligence failures preceding the attack on the U.S. Capitol, and what concrete steps should be taken to combat both those failures and the rising threat of domestic violent extremism in the aftermath of January 6th.
In the last few days of 2022, the House Select Committee investigating the January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol released its final report, the culmination of nearly 18 months of investigative work aimed at analyzing the facts, circumstances, and causes of the events of Jan. 6, 2021.
Jon Lewis writes in Just Security that while the inherent value of this 845-page report to the public record is unquestionable, significant questions remain largely unanswered around two interrelated components of the committee’s investigation: the scope of law enforcement and intelligence failures preceding the attack on the U.S. Capitol, and what concrete steps should be taken to combat both those failures and the rising threat of domestic violent extremism in the aftermath of January 6th.
Lewis writes:
One of the committee’s three enumerated purposes was the examination and evaluation of evidence developed by government agencies “regarding the facts and circumstances surrounding the domestic terrorist attack on the Capitol and targeted violence and domestic terrorism relevant to such terrorist attack.” The report did so in the executive summary, finding that “the intelligence community and law enforcement agencies did successfully detect the planning for potential violence on January 6th, including planning specifically by the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys militia groups who ultimately led the attack on the Capitol. As January 6th approached, the intelligence specifically identified the potential for violence at the U.S. Capitol.”
The report’s chapter on violent extremism, “Be There, Will Be Wild!” lays out a clear and robust summation of the facts known surrounding the violent extremist mobilization that ended in the attack on the Capitol. This chapter provides a clear chronological overview of the role of the Oath Keepers, Proud Boys, Three Percenters, Groypers and other extremists in the events of Jan. 6, including the extensive operational planning by Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes and Proud Boys Chairman Enrique Tarrio. Rhodes was recently convicted on seditious conspiracy charges related to this conduct, while Tarrio and his Proud Boys co-defendants are set to face their own seditious conspiracy charges at trial in the coming weeks.
The committee’s report is not without flaws, though. Lewis concludes:
The absence of recommendations concerning violent extremism and law enforcement represent two of the most glaring omissions in the report. The intelligence failures that led to Jan. 6 have been meticulously catalogued by outside experts and by the U.S. Government Accountability Organization (GAO). The mobilization by both organized domestic violent extremist groups and the broader “Stop the Steal” coalition was plotted largely in plain sight: on social media platforms, in public statements and calls to action, including by public figures and right-wing actors with substantial followings. Despite this feature of the attack, outside of a vague call for “continued and rigorous oversight” of the Capitol Police and a recommendation to designate the Jan. 6 session of Congress a National Special Security Event, the report shies away from addressing the underlying intelligence and law enforcement failures.
If the work of the committee was intended to represent a bipartisan attempt to understand and address the causes of the attack on the U.S. Capitol, analyze the key actors, and recommend corrective measures – including recommendations that could be taken to “prevent future acts of violence, domestic terrorism, and domestic violent extremism, including acts targeted at American democratic institutions” – it is both perplexing and disappointing that the sole recommendation provided in response to violent extremism is a general call for federal agencies to “move forward on whole-of-government strategies to combat the threat of violent activity posed by all extremist groups” and “review their intelligence sharing protocols.” Against the backdrop of broader federal inaction in the face of a resurgent domestic violent extremist threat, the committee’s failure to provide substantive, actionable, or relevant policy recommendations on this subject represents more than just a missed opportunity. It is an unfortunate abrogation of responsibility.
