This Week's Overdue Terrorism Warning

My first reaction to news reports of this week’s Homeland Security threat advisory was surprise that it even got issued — because this country and the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) don’t have a great track record of honesty about domestic terrorism threats. In 2009, DHS withdrew a report on domestic violent extremism (DVE); caving to pressure from Republican-associated groups. Worse, Trump actively weakened the entire set of systems intended to help us identify and counter DVE.

Upon further investigation, I found that this week’s DHS terrorism warning is basically an update to a bulletin issued in June that was set to expire this week.

But — it’s more than an update. This week’s warning has new parameters reflecting the changed threat environment, and that’s very important.

Here’s the summary (from the PDF):

“The United States remains in a heightened threat environment. Lone offenders and small groups motivated by a range of ideological beliefs and/or personal grievances continue to pose a persistent and lethal threat to the Homeland. Domestic actors and foreign terrorist organizations continue to maintain a visible presence online in attempts to motivate supporters to conduct attacks in the Homeland. Threat actors have recently mobilized to violence, citing factors such as reactions to current events and adherence to violent extremist ideologies. In the coming months, threat actors could exploit several upcoming events to justify or commit acts of violence, including certifications related to the midterm elections, the holiday season and associated large gatherings, the marking of two years since the breach of the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021,and potential sociopolitical developments connected to ideological beliefs or personal hostility. Targets of potential violence include public gatherings, faith-based institutions, the LGBTQI+ community, schools, racial and religious minorities, government facilities and personnel, U.S. critical infrastructure, the media, and perceived ideological opponents” [emphasis added].

This is the most thorough and accurate such bulletin issued. Finally. It actually genuinely reflects the domestic terror threat.

It’s good to see this bulletin issued, although it’s surreal to see the post-9/11 system that started out as a color-coded warning system used for the domestic threats brought about by our own citizens, media, and politicians. The system is now called the National Terrorism Advisory System (NTAS), and has replaced color-coded warnings with text-based bulletins. When we think about this particular bulletin in that post-9/11 light, its significance deepens.

Also, as surreal as it is we need our federal homeland security institutions to take domestic threats as seriously as they take foreign terrorism threats.

The US Senate for one doesn’t think that’s happening. Here’s this month’s US Senate Homeland Security & Governmental Affairs Committee (HSGAC) full report on The Rising Threat of Domestic Terrorism (with an executive summary here).

This excerpt is from the HSGAC report’s executive summary:

“This report finds that the federal government — specifically FBI and DHS — has failed to systematically track and report data on domestic terrorism as required by federal law, has not appropriately allocated its resources to match the current threat, and has not aligned its definitions to make its investigations consistent and its actions proportional to the threat of domestic terrorism. This report also finds that social media companies have failed to meaningfully address the growing presence of extremism on their platforms.”

We don’t need a US Senate report to tell us that we’re not doing enough about domestic terrorism, but it helps to hear the words stated out loud and clearly.

We don’t need a report to tell us we’re not collectively doing enough about domestic terrorism, because it keeps happening — both as threats, and as actual incidents. Today’s potential mass shooters are yesterday’s would-be bombers. Called-in or digital threats are as pervasive as people going around in public carrying handguns and assault weapons with the specific intention of looking intimidating. All of which are helped by Republican-pushed gun laws that help people get and carry firearms in many places, and which make it harder for law enforcement to track who’s getting the worst of the weapons.

We’re also not doing enough as a society. After 9/11, there was a serious collective consciousness to a certain level about “not letting the terrorists win,” and other such mentalities. We’re not only not doing that in the shadow of this threat — but fully a third of our population, media, and elected leaders either endorse the entities making the threats, or refuse to speak out against the threat actors.

So we’re not doing enough collectively, but we’re also not collectively working at the speed of the threat. We’re way behind. The HSGAC report cited above notes that “Since 2019, DHS and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) have repeatedly identified domestic terrorism, in particular white supremacist violence, as the most persistent and lethal terrorist threat to the homeland, including in multiple threat alerts provided to Congress and law enforcement agencies across the country. Despite this acknowledgement and multiple analyses, plans, and National Strategies across multiple Administrations, this investigation found that the federal government has continued to allocate resources disproportionately aligned to international terrorist threats over domestic terrorist threats.”

Given that, it’s not a surprise that this week’s DHS NTAS warning this week is way, way, way late. Time summarizes part of that point with this headline: “No One Should Be Surprised by the Mass Shooting at Club Q.” But pick a target. The threats are everywhere:

The threats are everywhere, they’re increasing, and they’re endorsed or condoned by major media outlets, famous people, and politicians. They’re being actively enabled on a fast-radicalizing Twitter. They’re being legalized in states. They’re being dismissed by a soon-to-be-majority Republican US House that intends to reinstate people to committees who were removed for threatening their colleagues.

The threats are being ignored, condoned, or actively endorsed by countless Republicans.

Also, the threats are to basically everyone but white men.

Even schools are even on the threatened list. Although to be honest… schools should have always been on the potential terrorism radar since the very first major school shooting. That’s a threat we’ve been willfully blind to for over two decades now.

Oh wait! Who are the people doing the threatening? Yes, yes… it’s mostly white men.

There is a definite trend. Considering that the pale males tend to hold most of the power, money, and authority in the US, one can certainly see why we’re having a major collective problem aggressively taking on this particular set of threats. That’s one reason. Mayo-hued men also ironically (or whatever) tend to feel the most persecuted in the US; assumedly because they’re feeling the pressure of no longer always holding positions of power and control as has been standard over centuries of white, male supremacy.

There are several other overall problems here too.

One is that we’re not doing anything collectively in government — not just federally as highlighted in the HSGAC report, but nationally. Federally means across the federal government, and nationally means at every level of government; down to county commissions and school boards. Some of that national leadership should in theory be coming from DHS. As DHS is not taking domestic terrorism as seriously as it should be, that national leadership is correspondingly weak and lacking.

One problem is that law enforcement and military organizations have some infiltration or sympathy toward those pushing the extremist narratives and threats. In the worst cases, fully radicalized individuals are members of the military and law enforcement at every level. That is one of the many pieces of this overall problem that we’re not taking on aggressively or collectively at every level. It’s especially notable as functional law enforcement is critical to countering terrorism and appropriately handling and mitigating threats.

One problem is that we’re not taking on the culture war aggressively or realistically. Democrats as one huge piece of the coalition of the majority are often accused of bringing a briefing book to a knife fight. We all need to learn to fight differently; and to better leverage spectacle, media, narrative, stories, and emotions.

One problem is that we’re a bit frozen in shock. That’s to be expected when there is a hyperactive authoritarian movement. Such a movement tends to involve frequent and repeated shocks to the population; and increasing chaos. The shocks and the chaos weaken resistance, keep people disconnected, keep people from acting, and keep people feeling disempowered. This organization’s 5-part strategy can help to counter that.

One problem is that we have some denial. Some of the denial is milder; from people who just want to live life every day and stop with all of this absurd drama all over the place. Some of the denial is deeper, more insidious, an more committed — like in the form of those actively trying to erase science, facts, diversity, the existence of LGBTQ+ people, or our very violent US history.

This NBC article about how this terrorism threat has metastasized and decentralized has an excellent quote for a way forward:

“It is going to require an ‘all hands on deck’ approach from activists, community groups, religious organizations, non-profits and more. This means organizing large coalitions that have the ability to put pressure on venues hosting far-right events and tech companies platforming conspiracy accounts. These coalitions need to build a mass movement that can counter-organize and protest at the scale necessary to disrupt the far-right’s ability to function and build community.”

At Shift the Country, we agree. We’ve been getting ready to do things exactly like that, and more.

Here are our 5 Things to help:

• Thing 1:  Connect With People.

• Thing 2:  Do More With Community & Coalitions.

• Thing 3:  Involve Businesses Through Partnerships & Pressure.

• Thing 4:  Champion Vision, Values, & Moral Courage.

• Thing 5:  Drive the Narrative, Create a Buzz, & Spread It Everywhere.

We don’t need to build a bunch of new stuff; although we’ll need some.

What we need to do is to do way more with the existing groups that we’ve got.

We’ve got to take it all to the next level. The Shift the Country 5-part approach is intended to help any group or person do exactly that.

Experts in civil war, civic unrest, insurrection, and terrorism tend to estimate that we’ll be in this extended domestic insurgency for perhaps a decade. With the level of radicalization out there, it will take a very long time for folks to de-radicalize. Our mission here is not to go after that crowd, although it is an area that needs attention.

Our focus at Shift the Country is to energize, galvanize, inspire, fire up, and mobilize the majority as much as we can to get folks fired up to shift the direction of this country. We need to collectively shift our future, our morality, what’s acceptable, what we invest in, what problems we solve, and the overall agenda. An energized majority pushing for a shared agenda and vision is absolutely shown to be successful in countering authoritarian movements throughout history.

We can do it.

Join us. Shift the Country is brand new this year, and just getting going. Imagine what we can pull off together… and you’re already doing this work. We need more of that, and we need you.

Volunteer here. Donate here. Subscribe. Share this post. Thank you.