White supremacists behind majority of US domestic terror attacks in 2020

[aubiefifty 18,231]

theguardian.com

White supremacists behind majority of US domestic terror attacks in 2020

Lois Beckett

8-10 minutes

White supremacists and other rightwing extremists have been responsible for 67% of domestic terror attacks and plots so far this year, with at least half of that violence targeting protesters, according to a new analysis from a centrist thinktank.

The report found only a single deadly “far-left” attack in 2020, the shooting of Aaron Danielson, a rightwing activist, by a self-described “anti-fascist” during a protest in Portland this August. Experts on extremism said this was the first killing linked to an anti-fascist in the United States in 25 years.

Violent rightwing actors were responsible for 41 politically motivated attacks and plots this year, while “far-left” actors were responsible for 12, according to analysts at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), who have assembled a database of domestic terror attacks going back to 1994.

The new data stands in stark contrast to claims by Donald Trump and justice department officials, who have responded to massive protests against police violence and racism by arguing that leftwing violence is a major threat, and that anti-fascist, or “antifa”, activists should be designated as a domestic terror group.

Despite months of political unrest, a much smaller number of Americans have been killed in domestic terrorism incidents this year than in previous years, CSIS analysts found, in part because there has not yet been a politically motivated mass shooting.

In total, only five people died in five domestic terror incidents this year through 31 August, the analysts concluded, including Danielson, a supporter of the far-right Patriot Prayer group. The other deaths include two law enforcement officers shot dead by an anti-government “boogaloo” extremist in California; the son of a New Jersey judge shot to death by an anti-feminist terrorist; and a Black Lives Matter protester shot dead during a protest in Austin, Texas.

In recent years, the annual number of victims of domestic terrorism attacks has been much higher, ranging from 22 to 66 people, according to the CSIS database, with single incidents, such as the mass shooting targeting Latinos in an El Paso Walmart last year, or the Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando in 2016, leaving dozens of people dead.

Some high-profile incidents are not included in CSIS’s tally of domestic terrorism attacks, including the shooting deaths of two Black Lives Matter protesters in Kenosha, Wisconsin, this August.

In the Kenosha incident, the analysts did not see a clear “political motivation” by the alleged 17-year-old shooter, or evidence that the killings had been premeditated, said Seth Jones, the counter-terrorism expert who led the creation of CSIS’s dataset.

But Jones said it was noteworthy “how much domestic terrorism in the US shifted over the summer of 2020 into cities”, with a noticeable increase in the number of car attacks on protesters, and in street violence.

Donald Trump has responded to massive protests against police violence and racism by arguing that leftwing violence is a major threat. Photograph: Shawn Thew/EPA

One of the fatal incidents that was coded as “violent far-right” domestic terrorism in the CSIS database was carried out by an army sergeant in Texas who has not yet faced any criminal charges in the case.

Garrett Foster was shot to death during a Black Lives Matter protest in Austin, Texas, on 25 July. Daniel Perry, the army sergeant who was named as the shooter, has claimed he was acting in self-defense.

The CSIS report cites a series of social media comments Perry made in the months before the shooting, including, “Now is the time to take up arms and protect yourselves against violence”, and a response to a Trump tweet about protesters in Oklahoma, “Send them to Texas we will show them why we say don’t mess with Texas”, in categorizing the shooting as politically motivated terrorism.

Clint Brody, a lawyer for Perry, criticized the authors of the report for trying “to equate an act of self-defense with domestic terrorism”, and said that Foster, the protester who was killed, had also made troubling posts on social media.

Asked for comment, the Austin police department and local district attorney’s office said only that the investigation was ongoing.

The 11 non-fatal incidents analysts coded as “far-left political violence” include the burning of a police precinct in Minneapolis that was known locally as “a playground for renegade cops”; attempts to set police cars on fire in New York City and Tacoma, Washington; molotov cocktail and other incendiary attacks on government buildings in Portland, Seattle, and Apple Valley, Minnesota; and an assault on a Democratic state senator who was filming protesters tearing down statues in Wisconsin.

The non-fatal rightwing attacks include a knife attack that wounded three members of an Asian-American family in Texas; a shooting at a shopping center in Arizona by a man prosecutors said was part of the misogynistic “incel” movement; multiple terror plots by The Base, a neo-Nazi group trying to instigate a race war; and several threats and violent incidents linked to the QAnon conspiracy theory.

CSIS defines terrorism as “the deliberate use – or threat – of violence by non-state actors in order to achieve political goals”, and analysts cautioned that they had omitted many violent incidents in 2020 in which the political motivation was not clear.

For instance, “though some sources recorded over 100 far-right vehicle attacks at protests in 2020”, the CSIS database only “verified 11 as terrorist attacks”, the analysts wrote.

The percentage of rightwing domestic terrorism attacks would have been higher if CSIS had categorized “boogaloo” anti-government extremists as rightwing, as many experts do. Instead, they classified the emerging violent movement as “other”.

The New America Foundation, a liberal thinktank that maintains a database of fatal domestic terrorism incidents since 9/11, agreed with CSIS that the Portland shooting should be seen as an act of “far-left wing” terrorism, but categorized the Kenosha shooting as an incident of far-right violence.

While it is possible to debate the classification of specific cases, Jones said, the broader trend in the data is clear: white supremacists and similar actors pose the greatest domestic terror threat to the United States today, a finding that is consistent across multiple databases maintained by researchers who track extremist violence, and that was recently confirmed by a Department of Homeland Security threat assessment, which said that white supremacists “remain the most persistent and lethal threat in the homeland”.

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[aubiefifty 18,231]

rawstory.com

North Carolina man arrested after he’s discovered with guns, explosives in plot to assassinate Joe Biden

Published 16 hours ago on October 22, 2020 By Sarah K. Burris

4 minutes

Alexander Hillel Treisman was arrested in late May outside of Kannapolis, North Carolina after plotting to assassinate former Vice President Joe Biden and carry out an act of terrorism, reported WBTV News.

It’s the second assassination plot to kill Biden that the public is aware of this year.

The North Carolina Middle District Court shows that there was an arrest warrant issued on June 10, 2020 and Treisman appears to have attempted to seal the indictments.

According to the report, a federal judge argued that Treisman should remain behind bars on child pornography charges, but the evidence outlined in the indictment describes more an act of terrorism and assassination than abusive images on his electronics.

Treisman van had been parked outside a Kannapolis bank in the parking lot and the staff called the police to investigate. That’s when they found the cache of weapons and explosives.

“Through the windows, KPD officers observed an AR-15 style rifle, a box for a Taurus .380 handgun, a canister of the explosive material Tannerite, and a box of 5.56 caliber ammunition,” the order described. The indictment also includes statements from an FBI agent who is part of the Joint Terrorism Task Force.

They found “approximately $509,000 of U.S. currency (believed to be Defendant’s inheritance), books (about survival, bomb-making, improved weapons and Islam), drawing of swastikas and planes crashing into buildings” as well as five additional guns.

There were three different driver licenses in different states which Treisman was able to use to purchase weapons in other states across the country in Washington, Kansas, New Hampshire and West Virginia.

“The order said agents found child pornography on eight different electronic devices, along with other pictures and posts related to plans and ideas for possible terrorist acts,” said WBTV.

One note was found on Defendant’s Samsung S9 cell phone plotting a mass shooting at a shopping mall food court during Christmas or on Black Friday. He also saved images and videos from the Christchurch, New Zealand shooting.

His Reddit account username, AlextheBodacious, talks about pedophilia and executing those he doesn’t like.

“An internet post made by Defendant on February 22, 2020 referencing raping children and posting child porn,” WBTV also said. There is also “an audio recording made on or about April 3, 2020 of Defendant narrating ‘the perfect porn video,’ which describes Defendant killing two parents with a shotgun and then raping and impregnating their young daughter.”

He alleged on April 8 that he was “going to do a columbine for a while, [but] I think it would better to put it towards something more memorable.”

He crafted a meme on April 15 asking “should I kill Joe Biden” and his computers had a timeline of attempts looking for personal information on Biden like his address, state gun laws, parts of a rifle and night vision goggles. He even went so far as to post the meme from April 8 with a post about purchasing an AR-15 in New Hampshire and going to a Wendy’s about four miles from Joe Biden’s house.

A lawyer for Treisman claims that he has been diagnosed with Asperger syndrome, which does not lead anyone to assassination or terrorism. When the court asked Treisman if he had any mental health conditions, he said he didn’t.

Read the shocking report at WBTV.

[aubiefifty 18,231]

but mikey will holla antifa antifa antifa..............lol

 trump proclaimed those those are good people. if anyone read the articles the authorities had to decide between charging him with threats or with child porn. think about that for a minute

[Mikey 16,781]

1 hour ago, aubiefifty said:

but mikey will holla antifa antifa antifa..............lol

 trump proclaimed those those are good people. if anyone read the articles the authorities had to decide between charging him with threats or with child porn. think about that for a minute

President Trump said there were good people on both sides of the demonstrations in Charlotte, which there may have been. There were a lot of people milling around that had little to do with either extremist group.

One point of fact: One group there had a legal permit. The other side did not. Like 'em or not, the skinheads were holding all the legal cards in that one. Their opposition could/should have applied for their own permit and held their own rally a week later.

[Mikey 16,781]

1 hour ago, aubiefifty said:

White supremacists behind majority of US domestic terror attacks in 2020

That can be accurate, depending on how one defines domestic terrorist attacks. If BLM and ANTIFA's rioting, burning, looting and violence aren't classified as domestic terrorist attacks, then maybe that is accurate. Misleading, but accurate as presented.