WASHINGTON, D.C. – On Friday, May 14th, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) quietly admitted that the 2017 Alexandria, Virginia baseball field shooting by a far-left radical who tried to murder several GOP members of Congress has now been classified as “domestic terrorism” carried about by a “domestic violent extremist.”
The incident was previously classified as “suicide by cop.” In April, current FBI chief, Christopher Wray, was confronted by Republican lawmakers over the agency classifying the shooting as a “suicide by cop” under a previous director.
The new classification appears in the middle of an appendix on page 35 of a 40-page FBI-DHS report, titled “Security Strategic Intelligence Assessment and Data on Domestic Terrorism.”
In a section describing approximately 85 different “FBI-Designated Significant Domestic Terrorism Incidents in the United States from 2015 through 2019,” the Alexandria baseball field shooting appears, with the FBI categorizing the perpetrator as a “Domestic Violent Extremist.”
The FBI described the incident as:
“An individual with a personalized violent ideology targeted and shot Republican members of Congress at a baseball field and wounded give people. The subject died as a result of engagement with law enforcement.”
Wenstrup, Scalise, and several over GOP members signed a letter to Wray asking the director to conduct a review of how the “suicide by cop” designation was reached by the FBI and to update the conclusions of the investigation.
The letter noted that if it was not for Scalise’s security detail there would have never been any law enforcement present during the GOP Congressional baseball practice. Further, the officers were in plain clothes inside an unmarked vehicle, casting immediate doubt on the “suicide by cop” theory.
The Republicans also noted that Hodgkinson had a “potential hit list” in his pocket. The names on that list were GOP Reps. Jim Jordan (OH), Mo Brooks (AL), Trent Franks (AZ), Morgan Griffith (VA), Scott DesJarlais (TN), and Jeff Duncan (SC).
The letter, signed by everyone at the practice and everyone on the purported hit list, said:
“We all agree that violent extremism of any kind must be rooted out and addressed by our law enforcement agencies, but we cannot presume to understand the scope of this issue if our law enforcement agencies do not investigate all instances of extremism, regardless of motivating ideology, with equal vigor.”
During the late April hearing, in front of a House appropriations subcommittee, Jill Sanborn, the executive assistant director of the FBI’s National Security Branch, acknowledged it was an intentional attack on lawmakers and that, if it happened today, Wray’s FBI would consider it to be domestic terrorism.
Sanborn said:
“It’s fair to say that the shooter was motivated by a desire to commit an attack on members of Congress and then knowing by doing so he would likely be killed in the process. Cases like this are challenging because there were, as you mentioned, a couple clues left behind, but he died in the process, never allowed us to fully examine through, say, and interview, his motivation.”
She added:
“There are also indicators that the shooter intended the shooting to be his final act on earth, but those things are not inconsistent with someone who was motivated by a variety of factors to commit violent acts based on a blend of ideological or personal motivations and this conduct is something that today we would characterize as a domestic terrorism event.”
FBI admits they were ‘aware’ of Boulder shooter prior to killings. So was the Boston Marathon bomber. Now what?
March 24th, 2021
BOULDER, CO – The mass shooting in a Boulder grocery store this week which claimed the lives of 10 people was a tragic crime. Adding to the tragedy, the gunman may have been previously known to federal law enforcement.
Ahmad Al Aliwi Alissa was armed with both a semiautomatic rifle and a pistol when he walked into the King Soopers store on Monday and opened fire, officials said.
The New York Times reported that the FBI was aware of Alissa prior to the killing spree:
“The suspect’s identity was previously known to the F.B.I. because he was linked to another individual under investigation by the bureau, according to law enforcement officials.”
Officer Eric Talley, 51, with the Boulder Police Department was killed by the gunman after responding to the reports of shots fired inside the store.
Talley was one of the first officer to arrive on scene, and was reportedly shot in the head by Alissa during an exchange of gunfire.
The authorities identified the nine additional victims as Denny Stong, 20; Neven Stanisic, 23; Rikki Olds, 25; Tralona Bartkowiak, 49; Suzanne Fountain, 59; Teri Leiker, 51; Kevin Mahoney, 61; Lynn Murray, 62; and Jody Waters, 65.
Authorities are still investigating a motive for the shooting. Alissa was born in Syria, but raised in the United States.
Reports that the FBI was aware of the gunman prior to the shooting because of ties to another incident follows a startling admission that the agency struggles to handle all the threats facing the country.
During congressional testimony March 2, FBI Director Christopher Wray said:
“Everywhere I go, someone has really good ideas about things they think the FBI should be doing more of, but I have not found very many people with great ideas, or at least responsible ideas of things the FBI could be doing less of. And so our folks are busting their you know whats-
“To try to deal with all these threats. We need more agents. We need more analysts. We need more data analytics, et cetera.”
If the FBI had prior information that could have prevented the Boulder attack, an assumption not yet proven, it would not be the first federal law enforcement failure to prevent a domestic attack.
One year ago, a report released by Inspector General Michael Horowitz of the Department of Justice revealed that between November 2009 and January 2017 under the Obama administration and former FBI director James Comey, the FBI missed numerous opportunities to stop homegrown jihadist terrorists from killing and injuring Americans during that time frame.
The report released by Horowitz identified six attacks by individuals who were under the FBI’s radar, including Boston Marathon bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev.
The attack on the Boston Marathon on April 15, 2013 killed three people, including a young child and wounded more than 260 others.
The report read:
“(An audit) found that the FBI counterterrorism agent assigned to the (case)…did not take certain available steps to evaluate the subject.
“The DOJ (IG) concluded that certain available investigative steps, including conducting additional database searches, asking questions of Tsarnaev and his parents to elicit information about any plans Tsarnaev may have had to travel to Russia, and interviewing Tsarnaev’s former girlfriend and wife, would have resulted in a more thorough assessment (of the threat).”
Other intelligence failures that have led to violent attacks on Americans inside the United States include the 2009 Fort Hood attack that killed 13, the 2015 Pulse Nightclub shooting that killed 49, and the 2017 Hollywood/Fort Lauderdale International Airport attack that killed five people.
Each of these and other attacks, involved intelligence failures prior to their commission, according to the report.
While not having a clear explanation as to why intelligence failures occurred, during testimony Director Wray said he did have some idea as to why domestic violence is on the rise.
He said that some of the violence is being fed by people being home from work because of the pandemic. He said another cause is the staffing problems with police departments:
“I’m not sure there’s any single factor that’s driving it. I think it’s a variety of things. Some of it may be the pandemic itself in its own way has had an impact. There are people who are maybe not at jobs or not in school or not otherwise available, and they’re more … there’s more potential for wrongdoing to occur.
“We’ve talked about some of the challenges with local police departments and some of the issues there in terms of their recruiting and staffing. A lot of them are understaffed in addition to the recruiting challenge. So that’s a problem. “
Police departments nationwide have reported large numbers of police officers retiring and resigning, as well as difficulty recruiting new officers.
Departments have pointed to the vilification of police officers in mainstream media, Democratic talking points, and calls for defunding the police by left-wing advocacy groups like Antifa and Black Lives Matter as a major reason for the staffing problems.
FBI quietly changes 2017 GOP baseball shooting to 'domestic terrorism' (lawenforcementtoday.com)
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