Speaker 1: Yesterday, there was some very interesting hearings in Washington, D.C.,
sort of primarily about the Janet what happened on January 6th.
And a little bit later, we're going to get to the comments from Donald Trump's former
acting secretary of defense about when Donald Trump finally did say, OK, let's bring in
the National Guard to clean up what's going on on January 6th.
We'll get to that later.
But one of the really interesting I don't know if we would call it a side story.
It's really kind of a main story that came out yesterday during the testimony is that
the Biden administration's top law enforcement officials, including Merrick Garland, the
attorney general, including Homeland Security Secretary Mayorkas and a number of others,
they said in no uncertain terms that white supremacists are the greatest domestic terrorist
threat within the United States.
Now, if you've been watching my show for a while or if you're familiar with the data
on domestic terrorism, this would not be a surprise to you.
The story that the right has been telling for a very long time is that American Muslims
or immigrants from Muslim countries, even left wing ecoterrorists in some versions of
the story, are really the great domestic threat.
But when you look at the data and you look at domestic extremism incidents, you very
quickly understand that the biggest threat in the United States indeed, is white supremacists,
which sometimes overlap with these sort of patriot and sovereign citizen antigovernment
type movements.
That's really where the bulk of the threat comes from.
And Merrick Garland said yesterday to lawmakers, quote, Domestic violent extremists pose an
elevated threat in twenty twenty one and in.
The FBI's view, the top domestic violent extremist threat we face comes from racially or ethnically
motivated violent extremists, specifically those who advocate for the superiority of
the white race.
Now, what you are also starting to see is that Republicans are having to find a new
way to even talk about this.
And Senator Richard Shelby, for example, instead of focusing on the level of threat, is trying
to make the administration seemed biased in its priorities.
And when it was Richard Shelby's turn to talk to Merrick Garland, he asked, are you investigating,
for example, the protests in Portland, Oregon, with the same vigor that you're investigating
what happened on January 6th?
The implication and wrapped up in that is the implication and the assumption that the
Portland protests were left wing violence, whereas I guess he sort of may be conceding
that the January 6th riots were right wing violence.
And Merrick Garland responded very well and said, quote, We don't care what the ideology
is.
Violations of law are pursued and are prosecuted.
I think it's fair to say that in my career as a judge and in law enforcement, I have
not seen a more dangerous threat to democracy than the invasion of the Capitol.
That doesn't mean we don't focus on other threats as well.
And so we we are starting to see this kind of shift among the right, where it's becoming
essentially undeniable that the bulk of the incidents are these right wing patriot, sovereign
citizen, anti-government and certainly white supremacist, racially, ethnically, religiously
motivated events.
But what Republicans are now kind of going back to and it's good that they're having
to change what they're saying, even though it's still bogus, is OK.
Well, maybe these are the numbers, but what about the attention that's being paid?
There are political decisions that are being made about who to investigate, who to charge,
et cetera.
And that should be and that should be looked into.
But it's sort of like a welcome to our world moment.
This is what many of us have been saying about the judicial justice system for a very, very
long time.
When you look at who actually does drugs, has drugs, deals, drugs versus who is prosecuted,
who is policed, what are the sentences that are given out?
We've been pointing out that there's a lack of equity there for a very long time along
racial lines for sure, among class lines as well as we've discussed.
So now unable to continue denying the empirical reality of where the greatest number of threats
come from, they are pushed back to having to make an argument the left has been making
about the justice system for a very long time.
I don't know where this will go, but yesterday's hearings were very interesting because they
touched on a lot of these different tangential topics.
They're big topics, but tangential to the to the day of January 6th, including investigative
priorities for federal law enforcement, including what the biggest threats are.
And a little bit later in the show, we will get to some of the testimony about the nitty
gritty of what happened on January 6th.
Send me your thoughts on this.
You can find me on Twitter at David Pakman.
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