Where was the FBI in the months leading up to the violent siege on the Capitol? Among the many questions surrounding this week’s jarring events, this one reveals the extent to which double standards in law enforcement threaten our nation’s security.
For weeks, Donald Trump’s far right-wing supporters publicly called for and planned a protest in Washington, D.C. on January 6, the day Congress was to certify the election results. Officials knew the Proud Boys and QAnon may try to breach the Capitol perimeter. Yet when the day came, the mob of pro-Trump extremists seemed to catch law enforcement by surprise. They breached the Capitol perimeter, ransacked congressmembers’ offices, and openly posted photos of their destruction and their weapons online.
Law enforcement eventually got the situation under control later Wednesday evening — but only after members of Congress went into lockdown and bloodshed led to the death of four individuals.
Later reporting found that the FBI and an intelligence unit inside the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) didn’t even issue a threat assessment for the pro-Trump protests. They certainly had the resources to take this threat seriously.
For nearly two decades, the U.S. government has shoveled money into a behemoth national security apparatus. The FBI’s annual budget has ballooned from $3 billion in 1999 to nearly $9 billion today. Much of this 300% increase went to countering terrorism with a mandate to surveil, investigate, and prosecute “homegrown terrorists.”
In no uncertain terms, the directive was for the FBI to target Muslim men and Muslim communities.
— Read the full article published on January 10, 2021 on Medium here.
