The Secret Service of the NYPD: Bringing the U.S. to the Front of the Fire: The January 6 Cybercrime against anti-Trump protests

Federal officials, including those at the FBI and Department of Homeland Security, are monitoring what they say has been an uptick in violent rhetoric online including calls for “civil war” since former President Donald Trump asked supporters to “protest” what he said was his impending arrest.

Now experts are bracing for renewed discussions of civil war, as the Nov. 8 midterm elections approach and political talk grows more urgent and heated.

But the Secret Service documents obtained by CNN tell us there was plenty of intelligence coming in just before January 6 regarding the potential for violence.

There is a tendency for politicians to make any failure in predicting the future into an intelligence failure. That allows elected officials to put the feet of the people on the front lines of intelligence gathering to the fire.

At that time, I was the deputy commissioner for intelligence and counterterrorism at the New York Police Department. My intelligence analysts also shared information we gathered with the US Capitol Police and the Washington, DC, Metropolitan Police. Congress is looking into allegations of the Secret Service sharing information with other agencies.

The January 5 summary reads: ” Right wing groups responded from across the nation and formed quick reaction forces in Virginia.” Should the president request help, stand by at the ready.

The Secret Service was provided information from the US marshals service that was posted on the website Parler on January 6. I’m here to take care of justice. F—k Pence sellout traitor we better see him coming out that building in handcuffs or were going in.”

The Capitol Police’s Threat Assessment of the January 3rd Storming of the Capitol: Comments on a Report from the New York Public Intelligence Unit

“While we have not yet identified specific plans to engage in large-scale violence, we remain concerned about singular acts of political violence occurring in the days ahead,” Daniel J. Jones, president of Advance Democracy, a not-for-profit research organization, told CNN.

The question shows a fundamental misunderstanding of how intelligence flows between agencies. The two organizations that are supposed to share information widely with law enforcement partners are the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security.

Critics claimed that the Secret Service had downplayed the possibility of violence. I can say with certainty that the caveat was simply meant to say that there is no indication that the post is about violence.

The document went to great pains on the first page to make it clear that there had been altercations between pro and anti- Trump demonstrators in Washington just weeks previous, as well as numerous arrests.

The Capitol Police intelligence arm produced a threat assessment on January 3rd which was three days before the storming of the Capitol.

The document was written by a team of Capitol Police intelligence analysts working for Jack Donohue, an expert on politically motivated violent extremism. Prior to joining the NYPD, Donohue was a deputy.

Sund’s January 3 memo: “What did we learn from the Capitol?” a senator’s message on the issue of security for January 6

This is what his January 3 memo concluded: “Supporters of the current president see January 6, 2021 as the last opportunity to overturn the results of the presidential election. This sense of desperation and disappointment may lead to more of an incentive to become violent.” The target of the pro-Trump supporters are not necessarily the counter- protesters, but Congress itself, according to the judgment on that page.

Stop the Steal’s tendency to attract white supremacists, militia members and others who actively promote violence could lead to a dangerous situation for law enforcement and the general public. The time was Sunday, January 3 at 3 p.m.

Sund testified that he asked the House of Representatives Sergeant-at-Arms, Paul Irving, to ask for National Guard troops for January 6. According to Sund’s testimony, Irving, who effectively reported to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, said “he was concerned about the ‘optics’ of having National Guard present and didn’t feel that the intelligence supported it.” Irving denied Sund’s account in his written testimony,

Some media reports have said that my decision about using the National Guard troops was influenced by optical conditions. That is categorically false. ‘Optics’ as portrayed in the media did not determine our security posture; safety was always paramount when evaluating security for January 6.”

Stenger said that he would not approve the request and suggested that I ask them how quickly we could get support if we had to request assistance in January. When Sund called National Guard Gen. William Walker on the days leading up to January 6, he asked if Walker would be able to get troops on the ground if needed. The formal approvals to mobilize were needed by Walker.

The sergeants-at-arms testified in March that they never discussed the January 3 request from the Capitol’s chief of staff with either Pelosi or McConnell. Irving said that the intelligence didn’t say that there was a coordinated attack on the Capitol. Stenger died of cancer in June.

It was possible that the president was going to give a speech to a large crowd of supporters on the Ellipse and tell them to “fight like hell” in order to save the country. That didn’t enter the threat stream until it actually happened.

The sergeants-at-arm and Capitol Police Chief had to fall on their swords. In March, congress called for a review of how the Capitol Police make critical decisions. Congress passed legislation giving the chief of the Capitol Police the authority to ask for emergency assistance from the DC National Guard and other federal agencies without having to go through the Capitol Police Board.

The swift passage of the new legislation shows that even elected officials who work by committee understood that the police chief shouldn’t have to run a crisis.

Do U.S. Civil Libertarians Uncover the Crime Before the Capitol Attack on January 6? Comment on the Case against the US solicitor general

Critics say that law enforcement officials underestimated the potential violence before the fatal attack at the Capitol on January 6.

In addition, USCP is working with law enforcement agencies in surrounding states, including police departments from Maryland and Virginia. Washington, DC, police will have civil disturbance units available on Friday as well.

Hundreds of people could show up for events at the Supreme Court and Capitol grounds, according to a document from Capitol Police.

The US solicitor general decided against responding to the case, thinking it wouldn’t be worth much to the justices. The justices were able to consider the case on January 6 due to the time that it took for the DOJ to waive its response.

Sources tell CNN that the stepped-up posture comes out of an abundance of caution and reflects what has become standard protocol for USCP in the wake of the deadly riot two years ago.

Over the past two years, USCP has changed their approach and drafted a framework that could potentially be volatile. The tactics the department uses frequently include better coordination with partner agencies and standard tactical and medical planning.

CNN.com: The Dean Obeidallah Show on CNN. Rejoinder: Trump and the Oath Keepers: The Donald Trump Investigation of Mar-a-Lago

Editor’s Note: Dean Obeidallah, a former attorney, is the host of SiriusXM radio’s daily program “The Dean Obeidallah Show.” You can follow him via his official handle,@DeanObeidallah. The opinions expressed in this commentary are his own. View more opinion on CNN.

Donald Trump knows more about his base than anyone else. He should understand that his words in the past have been followed by acts of violence by some supporters — ranging from incidents at his campaign rallies to the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol.

It’s reassuring to see that Bragg, the Manhattan district attorney, told his staff by email Saturday night, “We do not tolerate attempts to intimidate our office or threaten the rule of law in New York.” While not mentioning Trump by name, he added, “Our law enforcement partners will ensure that any specific or credible threats against the office will be fully investigated and that the proper safeguards are in place so all 1,600 of us have a secure work environment.”

Later Saturday, in a follow-up on Truth Social, Trump repeated the message in all caps, writing, “THEY’RE KILLING OUR NATION AS WE SIT BACK & WATCH. We have to save America. PROTEST, PROTEST, PROTEST!!!”

Kelly Meggs, a leader of the Florida chapter of the paramilitary group the Oath Keepers, is just one example. In December 2020, Meggs wrote on Facebook that Trump said it is going to be wild. It is going to be crazy. He wants us to make it wild. He called all of us to the Capitol and he wanted us to make it crazy. Sir, yes, sir! Gentlemen, we are going to DC and we will bring your s**t.

This scenario seems to have played out after the FBI’s August 8 search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence in the investigation of handling classified documents following a court-approved warrant. It was shortly after this that Trump issued a statement that read in part, “These are dark times for our nation as my beautiful home, Mar-A-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, is currently under siege, raided, and occupied by a large group of FBI agents.” Two days later he baselessly accused the FBI of potentially planting evidence.

It is no surprise that the FBI was subject to a large amount of threats. A person who repeated false 2020 election claims on the internet is dead after trying to get inside an FBI field office in Cincinnati.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/19/opinions/trump-call-for-protests-obeidallah/index.html

The online chatter surrounding the January 6 attack on the US Capitol has not been monitored in the past two years, and there is no hope of an arrest

The former president also has repeatedly floated pardoning the January 6 attackers should he be reelected — even claiming they deserve an “apology.” Trump’s message is clear: I will have your back if I can get back in the White House.

This email sounds like a prosecutor is talking to a mob boss in a case. But that is where we are as a nation given what has happened in the past few years.

If the facts and the law warrant criminal charges, Trump should face an indictment, just as any of us would. Criminal charges should be brought if there is a call to violence. No one is above the law — not even Donald J. Trump.

But the online chatter has been just that – and has lacked the actionable information, coordination and volume that preceded the January 6 attack on the US Capitol, US officials and security experts tell CNN.

That dynamic has led to a cautious response from the Biden administration, which has refrained from making too much of the chatter and been careful about what it shares regarding potentially violent rhetoric with state and local law enforcement, a senior US official familiar with the online chatter told CNN.

A senior law enforcement official also told CNN that while the online chatter is growing with time, it’s all “familiar” to the intelligence community, meaning nothing that rises to the level of major concern as of now.

Sources tell CNN that the threat of arrest has gone up two years after January 6. As a good indicator of the current situation, the senior law enforcement official pointed to a small protest on Monday in New York City, noting that one group that was scheduled to come decided not to out of apparent fear of being arrested.

Some people in the Trump camp worry that any protests against his arrest could end up being infiltrated by federal agents.

When Trump told his backers when and where to come to his defense, they showed up, but now a lot of them have lost faith in him.

“The steady stream of anti-government hostility and increasingly violent rhetoric is worrying, but it hasn’t reached the volume of what we saw in the run-up to January 6 yet,” Ben Decker, the CEO of online threat analysis firm Memetica, told CNN.

Some posts from influential right-wing figures in recent days have seemingly been more geared at creating chaos than at sparking violence. Posobiec called for a nationwide bank run on Truth Social after Trump said that he would be arrested.

CNN talked to law enforcement and security experts and they said they haven’t seen any groups that are calling for protest similar to the ones seen on January 6. One expert that tracks extremists on social media said engagement on some posts was much less than they had expected.

Bragg is not releasing a hush money payment to Stormy Daniels, but he is preparing to do so in the House

It is unclear if and when the office of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg will unveil charges against Trump as part of its probe into a hush money payment from former Trump attorney Michael Cohen to adult film actress Stormy Daniels. House Republicans, though, are already pledging to investigate Bragg’s investigation.

Three House GOP chairmen on Monday sent a letter to Bragg calling for his testimony and claiming that Bragg’s investigation was an “unprecedented abuse of prosecutorial authority.”