Michael Kunzelman, Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) – After the 2020 presidential election, thousands of Donald Trump’s most fervent supporters heeded his call to join “violent” protests against his loss. . Hundreds of people stormed the Capitol under the banners of the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, and other extremist groups and movements in response to Trump’s lies that the election was stolen.
Since the January 6, 2021 attacks, many of these far-right networks have disbanded, splintered, or retreated from public life. However, fears of election-related chaos have not yet disappeared. Experts warn that political violence remains a threat ahead of the November 5 election.
Election officials have been inundated with threats, misinformation and information about the potential for “election denialist” groups to wreak havoc. The FBI was investigating Monday after fires destroyed hundreds of ballots in mailboxes in Portland, Oregon, and neighboring Vancouver, Washington.
Trump has used social media to promote violent conspiracy theories that have become a mainstay of Republican politics. Many, including Trump himself, have sought to recast the Capitol rioters as 1776-style patriots and political prisoners. President Trump also vowed to use the military to attack “the enemy from within.”
Four years ago, most of the Trump supporters in the mob had no criminal records and were not affiliated with any organization other than a shared loyalty to a president who urged them to “fight like hell.” This helps explain why it is difficult for authorities to identify and avoid threats.
“It only takes one person to cause a lot of damage,” said Kurt Braddock, a professor at American University who studies extremism.
Heidi Beirich, co-founder of the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism, said the extremists she monitors don’t seem obsessed with this year’s elections, at least in online public conversations. Ta. Many probably learned a lesson from the Capitol riot defendants who flooded social media with self-deprecating posts before, during, and after the siege.
“We don’t know if anything is going on in the encrypted chats,” she added.
Experts say that during this election cycle, Mr. Trump and his allies have fueled anti-LGBTQ and anti-immigrant rhetoric in ways that have galvanized extremists. Starting on January 6th, the Proud Boys protested during Drag Queen Story Hour. Just recently, Springfield, Ohio, was overwhelmed with disinformation bomb threats after President Trump and his running mate, J.D. Vance, amplified false and xenophobic rumors about Haitian immigrants in the city.
Far-right conspiracy theories of all kinds are spreading virtually unchecked on mainstream platforms, including a slew of lies about the federal government’s response to hurricane-ravaged battleground state North Carolina.
Trump and his allies have frequently used his rallies as a platform to vent racism and xenophobia, with some drawing comparisons to a pro-Nazi rally in 1939. This includes Sunday’s rally at New York’s Madison Square Garden. Vice President Kamala Harris has said she believes President Trump is a fascist. Former chief of staff John Kelly said the former president admired Adolf Hitler while in office.
President Trump was shot in the ear in one of two assassination attempts this year. He denounced it as a threat to democracy and accused Democrats of fostering political instability.
Beirich said election-related intimidation could be difficult for authorities to curb “because it can happen all over the country.” She and other experts worry that extremists will try to disrupt vote-counting efforts, perhaps in battleground states.
“It feels like the calm before the storm,” she said.
Experts on extremism are not the only ones concerned. About 4 in 10 registered voters are “very” or “extremely” concerned about violent attempts to overturn next month’s election results, according to a new poll conducted by The Associated Press-NORC. The Public Relations Research Center said yes.
Of the more than 1,500 defendants charged in the Jan. 6 attack, more than 200 have been linked to extremist groups or movements by federal authorities, according to a review of court records by The Associated Press.
Among them are approximately 80 leaders, members, and associates of the far-right Proud Boys group and more than 30 defendants with ties to the anti-government group Oath Keepers. Other groups, including the Groyper movement, have had fewer members prosecuted in federal court.
Four years ago, President Trump told Proud Boys to “stand back” during his first debate with Democrat Joe Biden. When President Trump invited his supporters to Washington for a “Stop the Steal” rally, the group’s leaders applauded his rallying cry and eagerly joined the fray.
Currently, some of the top leaders of the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers are serving up to 22 years in prison for a violent conspiracy to prevent the peaceful transfer of presidential power from Trump to Biden.
The imprisonment of the group’s national leader created a vacuum. In the case of the Proud Boys, local chapters tend to consider themselves autonomous and promote more extreme ideologies, said Jared Holt, a senior research analyst at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, which tracks hate online. It is said that it accounted for a part of it.
“Their organizational capacity is much lower than it was in 2020,” Holt said. “There’s always the possibility that after the election these groups suddenly find the motivation to rally and start showing up at events. But this year they’ve been pretty docile.”
Oath Keepers, founded in 2009 by Stewart Rhodes, a graduate of Yale Law School, has been inactive since his arrest and incarceration.
“That was his kid, and no one has really stepped up to fill his void,” Holt said.
Dozens of rioters at the Capitol were supporters of the anti-government Three Percenters movement or belonged to militia groups such as the Gray Ghost Partisan Rangers, Southern Indiana Patriots and North Texas Patriot Boys. . Beirich said the government’s response to Jan. 6 appeared to have given militia groups a “huge handicap.”
“They don’t go away,” she said. “They may appear elsewhere, but I have to say that the militias over the past year or so have been relatively inactive compared to previous eras.”
Many of the other January 6th rioters were inspired by QAnon, which President Trump is secretly fighting against a Satan-worshiping child sex cabal made up of prominent Democrats and Hollywood elites. It was centered around a baseless belief. The self-proclaimed “QAnon Shaman” remains one of the most famous figures in the insurrection.
Mike Rothschild, author of The Storm Is Upon Us: How QAnon Became a Movement, Cult, and Conspiracy Theory of Everything, says the QAnon movement has evolved beyond a strange web of “mystery and code.” He said that
Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube have cracked down on QAnon since January 6, directing believers to platforms like Telegram and Trump’s Truth Social. Rothschild said many people flocked back to Twitter (now called X) after Elon Musk bought it. He believes QAnon adherents remain “extremely dangerous.”
“They’ve been building up their anger and frustration for four years,” he said.
First published: October 29, 2024 8:57am PDT
