On March 2, FBI Director Christopher Wray condemned the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol as “domestic terrorism.”

He did so while testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee, which was investigating how the attack happened and what could be done to prevent such future attacks.

“Unfortunately, January 6 was not an isolated event,” Wray said. “The problem of domestic terrorism has been metastasizing across the country for a long time now, and it’s not going away anytime soon.”

He said the number of FBI domestic terrorism investigations had doubled since he took office in 2017 to more than 2,000. The number of investigations into white supremacists had tripled, while the number of probes into anarchist extremists had risen significantly as well.

Wray also said the FBI had found no evidence to support the Right-wing lie that the attack on the Capitol was staged by left-wing extremists such as Antifa to try to frame Trump supporters.

More than 400 people have been charged in connection with the insurrection.Yet Trump—who instigated the attack for two months—remains unindicted. 

Right-wing terrorism has a long history in America:

• The Supreme Court’s decision, in Brown v. Board of Education(1954), striking down segregated facilities, unleashed a wave of Ku Klux Klan violence against blacks, civil rights activists and Jews.
• Between 1956 and 1963, an estimated 130 bombings ravaged the South.
• During the 1980s, more than 75 Right-wing extremists were prosecuted in the United States for acts of terrorism, carrying out six attacks.
• The April 19, 1995 attack on the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City by Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols killed 168 people. It was the deadliest act of domestic terrorism in the history of the United States until 9/11.
• By 2020, Right-wing terrorism accounted for the majority of terrorist attacks and plots in the United States.
• A 2017 Government Accountability Office report stated that Right-wing extremist groups were responsible for 73% of violent extremist incidents resulting in deaths since September 12, 2001.
• Right-wing violence rose sharply during the Barack Obama administration and especially during that of Donald Trump. His remark after the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, that there were “some very fine people on both sides” convinced white supremacists that he favored their goals, if not their methods.

After 9/11, American law enforcement and Intelligence agencies initiated major reforms to focus on Islamic terrorism.

A similar reform effort, focusing on Right-wing terrorism, could include the following:

• The FBI’s designating Right-wing political and terrorist groups as the Nation’s #1 enemy.
• Turning the Bureau’s powerful arsenal—bugs, wiretaps, informants, SWAT teams—on them.
• Prosecuting militia groups for violating Federal firearms laws. Using Federal anti-terrorist laws to arrest, prosecute and imprison Right-wingers who openly carry firearms and threaten violence, even if states allow such display of firearms. 

FBI seal

• Creating TIT (Turn in a Traitor) hotlines for reporting illegal Right-wing activities—and offering rewards for information that leads to arrests.
• Treating calls for the murder of members of Congress—as Georgia Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene has done—as felonies punishable by  a minimum of at least 20 years’ imprisonment.
• Prosecuting Right-wing leaders involved in the treasonous attempt to overthrow the United States in the Capitol Building attack.
• Such prosecutions should include Donald Trump as the chief inciter for the treasonous attack on the Capitol Building on January 6.
• Prosecuting as “accessories to treason” all those Republican members of Congress who stoked Right-wing anger by lying that the 2020 Presidential election had been stolen from Donald Trump, although every objective news source proved he had lost.
• Directing the Treasury Department’s Terrorist Finance Tracking Program (TFTP) at fundamentalist Christian churches that finance Right-wing terrorism—just as it halts the financing of Islamic terrorist groups by Islamic organizations.

• Using drones, planes and/or helicopters to provide security against similar Right-wing terror demonstrations—especially in Washington, D.C.
• Using the Federal Communications Commission to ban Fox News—the Nation’s #1 Right-wing propaganda network—from representing itself as a legitimate news network, and requiring that its stories carry labels warning viewers: “This is Right-wing propaganda, NOT news.”
• Encouraging victims of Right-wing hate-speech—such as the parents of murdered children at Sandy Hook Elementary School—to file libel/slander lawsuits against their abusers.
• Seizing the assets of individuals and organizations found guilty of Right-wing terrorism offenses. 

* * * * * * * * * *

Of all the reforms offered here, prosecuting Donald Trump for treason would prove the most significant.

The 75,000,000 Americans who voted to give him a second term still look to him for leadership. As do the majority of Republicans in the House and Senate.

Senate Republicans refused to convict him in his second impeachment trial—just as they refused in the first. Their excuse: “It’s unconstitutional to impeach a former President.”

But a former President can still be prosecuted for crimes he committed while in office—just as a former Senator or Supreme Court Justice can.

Whatever the outcome, this would send an unmistakable message to Right-wing terrorists: “Your days of immunity are over—and you will be held accountable for your terrorist acts, just as Islamic terrorist groups are.”

On September 11, 2001, 19 Islamic terrorists snuffed out the lives of 3,000 Americans in New York, Washington, D.C. and Pennsylvania. 

They did so by turning four commercial jetliners into fuel-bombs—and crashing them into, respectively, the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City; the Pentagon, in Washington, D.C.; and—unintentionally—a field in Somerset County, Pennsylvania.

World Trade Center – September 11, 2001

But within less than a month, American warplanes began carpet-bombing Afghanistan, whose rogue Islamic “government” refused to surrender Osama bin Laden, the Al-Qaeda mastermind of the attacks.

By December, 2001, the power of the Taliban was broken—and bin Laden was driven into hiding in Pakistan.

For more than 16 years, the United States—through its global military and espionage networks—relentlessly hunted down most of those responsible for that September carnage.

On May 1, 2011, U.S. Navy SEALS invaded bin Laden’s fortified mansion in Abbottabad, Pakistan—and shot him dead.

And today—almost 20 years after the 9/11 attacks, the United States continues to wage war against Islamic terrorists. 

On January 6, the United States suffered another spectacular terrorist attack—this time launched by Right-wing Americans.

Thousands of Fascistic supporters of President Donald J. Trump—many of them armed—stormed and ransacked the Capitol Building in Washington, D.C.  Five people—including a Capitol Hill policeman—were killed.

The insurrectionists’ goal: To stop members of Congress from counting Electoral Votes cast in the 2020 Presidential election, from which former Vice President Joseph R. Biden was expected to emerge the winner.

For Trump—who had often “joked” about becoming “President-for-Life”—that Biden had won the election was intolerable. And it must be prevented by any means—legal or otherwise. 

After overwhelming the Capitol Police force, the Stormtrumpers damaged and occupied parts of the building for three hours. Legislators huddled fearfully while National Guard units from several states finally evicted the insurrectionists.  

The Capitol attack marked the first time in American history a defeated Presidential candidate violently sought to remain in office.

It should also mark a desperately-needed change in the priorities of American law enforcement, which has traditionally focused on Left-wingers—and especially blacks—as the country’s mortal enemies. 

Numerous commentators have noted the contrast between the tepid police response to the Capitol attack by white Right-wingers and the brutal crackdown on peaceful blacks protesting the murder of George Floyd in Washington D.C. on June 1, 2020.

U.S. Park Police and National Guard troops used tear gas, rubber bullets, flash-bang grenades, horses, shields and batons to clear protesters from Lafayette Square—so Trump could stage a photo-op at St. John’s Episcopal Church. 

It’s time for American law enforcement and Intelligence agencies to wage all-out war on Right-wing terrorism—and those Republican voters and Congressional members who support it.

On March 2, FBI Director Christopher Wray testified before the United States Senate Judiciary Committee on the Capitol attack and the growing challenges of Right-wing terrorism.

Christopher Wray

The hearing came as the FBI continues to make near daily arrests related to the riot. So far, more than 300 people have been hit with a variety of charges, from trespassing to conspiracy against the government.

According to PBS Newshour Correspondent Lisa Desjardins:

“[On March 1] federal prosecutors filed a revealing document in the case against Proud Boy leader Ethan Nordean, seen here with a megaphone on January 6. This charges that he and other Proud Boys raised money and collected protective gear weeks ahead.

“On January 6, prosecutors allege, they used high-tech radios to communicate and purposely dressed incognito, no Proud Boy colors or clothing. This, prosecutors say, was to help with their plan to turn others in the crowd, who they called normies or normiecons, to join them in violent attack.”

Wray was appointed FBI director in 2017, after Trump purged James Comey for refusing to become his personal KGB chief. Wray himself had been marked for dismissal because he refused to agree with Trump’s false claims of widespread voter fraud during the 2016 Presidential election.

Only Trump’s loss to Joe Biden had prevented a similar purge of Wray.

Referring to Right-wing terrorists, Wray warned: “They don’t have a formal membership in an organization. They don’t have clear command control and direction, in the way that, say, an al-Qaida sleeper cell might have. And  that’s much more challenging to pursue.” 

From Trump on down, Republicans have tried hard to convince Americans that it was Antifa—not Right-wing Stormtrumpers—who brutally attacked Capitol police and threatened the lives of Congressional lawmakers.

Their goal: To absolve Trump and put the blame on Antifa.

There are three problems with that assertion:

1. The insurrectionists’ carried out their attack amidst a sea of red MAGA caps and blue and white “TRUMP” flags.
2. There was not a black face to be seen in the mob—all were white.
3. Numerous videos recorded rioters’ saying they were acting on orders from their President.

On March 2, Senator Richard Durbin (D-Illinois) asked FBI Director Christopher Wray: “Do you have any evidence that the Capitol attack was organized by—quote—‘fake Trump protesters’?”

To which Wray replied: “We have not seen evidence of that at this stage, certainly.”