Bad Watchdog S2 E6: The Real Threat

Host Maren Machles:  While we were preparing this final episode for release, former President Donald Trump was targeted in what the FBI has deemed an assassination attempt at a rally in Pennsylvania. One attendee was killed, and two others were critically wounded. While a lot is still unknown, we do know that the FBI is investigating the shooting as a possible act of domestic terrorism, which is the subject of this final episode. 

The alleged shooter was a young white man, a native of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, with no apparent ideological motive. Rudimentary bomb making materials were allegedly found in his car and home. President Joe Biden has ordered an independent review of security at the rally. The Secret Service, a branch of the Department of Homeland Security, is responsible for the former president’s safety. Former President Trump sustained an injury to the right ear as he turned to look at a chart showing statistics on illegal immigration.

Host Maren Machles: Before you listen, we want to give you a heads up that today’s episode discusses antisemitism and white supremacist ideology and violence. 

[Music plays.]

Last time, on Bad Watchdog...

Brennan Center for Justice’s Spencer Reynolds: Human and civil rights abuses that occur in some DHS counterterrorism programs are absolutely not necessary for counterterrorism. In fact, they’re, they’re counterproductive. Abuses undermine safety and security. It should be the case that civil rights and civil liberties are just as important as privacy and just as important as security and safety.

Former POGO Senior Researcher Freddy Martinez: The majority of the people who are in solitary confinement are also from majority Black countries, even though they sort of don’t represent a huge population of ICE detention. What we overwhelmingly saw is just a lot of, um, CRCL reports where people would come back once or twice or three times with the same recommendations that were just never implemented.

Arely Westley: We are dying in those cages. And if we’re not dying, we come out of there with trauma. The whole system needs to change, and I feel like first we need to shut down the detention centers.

[Music out.]

ABC News anchor:  We begin tonight with the deadly chaos in El Paso. The mass shooting at a Walmart shopping center. 

Maren: On August 3, 2019, a gunman entered a Walmart shopping center in El Paso, Texas, and opened fire.

ABC News anchor: From a young woman who was shopping with her mother and her son, telling me how it all started and that the gunman looked like he was, quote, “on a mission.”

WFAA anchor: One of the deadliest attacks targeting Latinos in modern U.S. history.

Maren: He killed 23 people.

TODAY reporter: The man calmly told police “I’m the shooter.” In a newly released arrest affidavit he spells out his racist motive, telling officers, in his words, he was targeting Mexicans.

WFAA reporter: A four-page manifesto allegedly written by Crucius appeared online. “I am simply defending my country from cultural and ethnic replacement brought on by an invasion.”

Maren: The ideas and the language in this terrorist manifesto — this talk about “invasion” and “replacement” — they’re common enough with those on the far right that they have a name: “The Great Replacement Theory.” This conspiracy theory is rooted in white supremacy, white nationalism, and antisemitism. It posits that there is a plot by “elites” or “Jews” to replace white people — sometimes they specify white voters — with people of color. It undergirds much of the anti-immigrant rhetoric in the United States and in Europe. 

ABC News reporter: Twenty minutes before walking into the Walmart, the shooter posted a document online that was laced with white supremacist language, expressing how he opposed race mixing and encouraging migrants to go back to their home countries.

Maren: The shooting in El Paso was not an isolated incident. Similar terrorist attacks and plots by far-right violent extremists have become more and more commonplace in the United States. 

[Music plays.]

Charlottesville Unite the Right rally participants: Jews will not replace us! Jews will not replace us!

ABC News anchor: That a group of white nationalists descended on the college town of Charlottesville, Virginia. 

CNN anchor: A Buffalo shooter murdered 10 people in a supermarket he appeared to have carefully chosen for being in a predominantly Black neighborhood.

CP24 anchor: The FBI says a gunman who opened fire inside a Walmart in Ohio may have been motivated by racist extremism.

CBS reporter: Law enforcement officials say the shooter is a white male in his twenties who was motivated by hate.

Then-Charleston Chief of Police Greg Mullen: Let me say this is the worst night of my career. This is clearly a tragedy in the city of Charleston.

CBS reporter: All nine victims were shot multiple times. The warrant says that before Roof left, he stood over a witness and uttered a racially inflammatory statement.

NBC News reporter: Entered the synagogue also potentially carrying a handgun and opened fire. According to the authorities, he did make some antisemitic comments, so it would seem to be clearly a hate crime. 

Good Morning America anchor: A suspect is in custody this morning, and police across the country are on alert this morning as well, fearing the attacks may have targeted the Asian community.

[Music out.] 

Maren: These hateful attacks are terrorism, which again is why DHS was set up. They are the exact kind of terrorism we started this season talking about. According to an in-depth analysis by the bipartisan Center for Strategic and International Studies, which is a top defense and national security think tank, terrorist plots and attacks by far-right extremists, which includes white supremacists, anti-government extremists, and incels, have been on the rise for decades. And the intersection between far-right extremism and threats to the homeland became crystal clear after the January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol. 

January 6th footage from the January 6th Committee: Breach of the Capitol! Breach of the Capitol! Of the upper levels.

Maren: Pictures and videos of that day show thousands of people swarming the Capitol. A sea of Trump campaign flags are waving in the wind. But there are other flags there too, flags used to signal anti-government views and white supremacist hate. Mixed in the sea of red, white, and blue are pops of yellow — Gadsden flags, which sport a rattlesnake and the slogan “Don’t tread on me.” Confederate flags are everywhere too. 

[Sound of rioters shouting, alarms going off.]

Maren: Just four months after the January 6th insurrection, on May 12, 2021, the Senate Appropriations Committee is holding a hearing on domestic violent extremism, where then-Senator Patrick Leahy from Vermont asks DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas about the lethality of this threat.

Patrick Leahy: So let me ask first, Secretary Mayorkas, is it still your assessment that white supremacist extremists are the most lethal threat we face in the homeland today?   

Alejandro Mayorkas: Mr. Chairman, um, I do believe that the intelligence reflects the fact that indeed that is the case.  

Maren: We’ve spent the last few episodes diving into the rhetoric and reality of immigrant detention. The fear of terrorism led lawmakers to endow DHS with wide-ranging powers, and protecting the homeland has been used to justify the detention of thousands of immigrants each year, in some cases resulting in their abuse and mistreatment.

And while there have been cases where people on the terrorist watchlist have gotten through customs or crossed the border illegally, the reality is: Undocumented immigrants have been implicated in no acts of terrorism in the United States that caused fatalities or injuries. 

The CATO Institute, a libertarian public policy think tank, recently collected visa and immigration data on 219 foreign-born terrorists who carried out attacks on U.S. soil from 1975 through 2022. Only nine of them were in the United States illegally. And since terrorist acts by people who were in the country illegally resulted in exactly zero deaths or injuries over the past 48 years, CATO researchers concluded that — and I’m quoting here — “The annual chance of being murdered in an attack committed by an illegal immigrant is zero.”

There is, however, evidence that the majority — 57% — of terrorist attacks and plots over the last few decades have been carried out by far-right extremist groups. 

Despite these statistics, and despite the fact that Secretary Mayorkas has repeatedly acknowledged that domestic terrorism is the biggest threat we face, far-right extremist attacks have proliferated, while the border continues to grow more and more militarized.

[Theme music plays.]

On this episode, we’re going to take a closer look at the threat of domestic violent extremism and, more specifically, far-right violent extremism. And we’re going to get into POGO’s investigation into one group in particular that was heavily involved at the January 6th insurrection — and has infiltrated the very agency charged with protecting the homeland. 

This is a podcast about finding the truth and holding the powerful accountable. What happens to people who are thrown into the Department of Homeland Security’s detention facilities, with the presumption that they may be a national security threat? This season we dig into POGO’s exclusive investigations uncovering the agency’s treatment of people in detention — all justified in the name of homeland security, and all overshadowing the most dangerous threat: far-right violent extremists. 

I’m Maren Machles and from the Project On Government Oversight, this is Bad Watchdog.

Episode 6: The Real Threat

[Music out.]

In order to explore the current state of far-right violent extremism in the U.S., we’re going back to Daryl Johnson, the former DHS intelligence analyst who’s spent his entire life looking at this very issue. When we left Daryl in episode 1, it was 2010, and Daryl said the higher-ups at DHS responded to the politization of his report by telling him to lay low at first, but ultimately, he said his team was dissolved.     

Former DHS Intelligence Analyst Daryl Johnson: At Homeland Security, they got rid of our unit for a number of years, almost over a decade. 

Maren: As a direct response of this report? 

Daryl Johnson: Right, yeah. They retaliated against us and shut the unit down, reassigned us to work critical infrastructure threats and international terrorism threats. So, yeah, um, and that left the FBI as the sole federal agency looking at domestic terrorism in the U.S. government.

Maren: After everything that happened, Daryl went public with his work at the Department of Homeland Security.

Daryl Johnson: In 2012, a white supremacist went into a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin, on a shooting rampage and killed six Sikh worshippers in their house of worship. And so the Sikh coalition reached out to me in the aftermath of the Oak Creek, uh, temple shooting and asked me if I would testify before Congress on the white supremacist threat, and of course I would. I had never testified before Congress ever. I’d briefed some congressional staffers when I was at Homeland Security, uh, but never, uh, in front of C-SPAN, talking to senators.

United States Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL): Previously, Mr. Johnson was the senior domestic terrorism analyst at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Intelligence and Analysis, where he led a team of analysts responsible for analyzing domestic extremist activity. Prior to his service at DHS, Mr. Johnson was the lead expert on violent, anti-government groups at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

Maren: Senator Dick Durbin chaired the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Constitution, Civil Rights, and Human Rights back in 2012 and is introducing Daryl and the other speakers for this hearing on hate crimes and domestic extremism.

Daryl Johnson: The incredible thing was the turnout. It was held in one of the larger conference rooms in the building. I want to say the seating was around 300 in that room. So many people that filled that room standing room only.

We had had so many hearings about Al-Qaida and ISIS or, you know, homegrown Muslim extremist threats. This was really one of the first in recent memory, uh, where we had a congressional hearing about the white supremacist threat. Uh, we’ve since had a few others since then, but anyways, it was a big deal. People of all types of, uh, cultures and religions and ethnicities all together to stand in unison against white supremacy.

Daryl Johnson (in testimony): We are currently seeing an upsurge in domestic non-Islamic extremist activity, specifically from violent rightwing extremists. While violent leftwing attacks were more prevalent in the 1970s, today the bulk of violent domestic activity emanates from rightwing extremists. Since 2010, there have been a multiple plots to kill ethnic minorities, police, and other government officials by militia extremists and white supremacists in our country.

[Music plays.]

Maren: While the room is full, the senators’ chairs are nearly empty. The contrast speaks volumes about the public’s interest in this topic and Congress’s disinterest.

Daryl Johnson: We didn’t really have much attendance by senators. We only had Dick Durbin for about the first 30 minutes. He was the only senator in that room. And then later, we had two other Democratic senators come in, but not a single Republican came. And I find that telling. 

You know, I was a Republican, third generation of Republican for, you know, 45, 48 years of my life. And I did this work and I did it with integrity and I did it regardless of my own political and social beliefs. And if I have the courage to stand up and call this threat out for what it is, shame on every Republican leader that has kept their silence and has not said a thing.

Maren: Nothing came of this hearing, at least, not immediately. Since 2017, Durbin and others have introduced legislation specifically aimed at combatting domestic terrorism multiple times, but each bill has failed to pass. 

Just like after the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995, this was a moment to act, to recognize the growing threat of far-right violent extremism and do something about it. But what we saw was a rise in violence claiming innocent lives from Charleston to Charlottesville to Pittsburgh to El Paso to Buffalo.

[Music out.]

Daryl Johnson: So it was extremely frustrating for those, you know, 10, 12 years after the 2009 report, where, you know, these mass shootings happened and all these different attacks had happened and lives were lost. So it was very frustrating, you know, seeing the news play out, you know, practically every month there was something new happening.

Maren: And it was clear leading up to the 2020 presidential election that the Department of Homeland Security continued to struggle to address these threats. 

On September 8, 2020, the former head of DHS’s intelligence branch, Brian Murphy, filed a whistleblower complaint alleging that he was directed to downplay the threat of white supremacy in an assessment of threats to homeland security. Then-acting Secretary Chad Wolf denied Murphy’s allegations. 

Later that month, Wolf and FBI Director Christopher Wray were asked to testify before the House Homeland Security Committee to talk about national security threats. Wolf declined to testify, but here is FBI Director Wray talking about the ways in which the FBI has been taking this threat seriously over the years.

Christopher Wray: We’re also working around the clock to prevent attacks by domestic terrorists who are inspired by one or more extremist ideologies to commit violent acts. In recent years, we’ve been laser focused on threats by racially or ethnically motivated violent extremists. They too are often radicalized online and mobilized quickly to carry out their violent plans. Within the racially motivated, racially and ethnically motivated violent extremists, I would say the biggest chunk of those, I can’t give you a percentage, but the biggest chunk of that are individuals who are motivated by some form of white supremacist ideology. And just as a point of clarification, this year, uh, the lethal attacks that we’ve seen, I think have all been from anti-government or anti-authority types, but, but if you go back over the last few years, it’s been racially motivated violent extremists that had the most lethal attacks in the, in the homeland.

Maren: Less than a week later, when he did testify before Congress, Wolf acknowledged that white supremacists extremists were a quote “persistent and lethal threat.”

And a week later during a presidential debate, then-President Donald Trump was asked to condemn these far-right violent extremists.

2020 presidential debate moderator Chris Wallace: But are you willing, tonight, to condemn white supremacists and militia groups and to say that they need to stand down and not add to the violence in a number of these cities as we saw in Kenosha and as we’ve seen in Portland?

Donald Trump: I’m willing to do anything. I want to see peace. 

Chris Wallace: Well then do it, sir. 

Then-candidate Joe Biden: Say it. Do it. Say it. 

Donald Trump: What do you want to call them? What do you want to call them? Give me a name. Give me a name. Go ahead. Who would you like me to condemn? 

Chris Wallace: White supremacists and Proud Boys. White supremacists and rightwing militia.

Donald Trump: Proud Boys, stand back and stand by, but I’ll tell you what, I’ll tell you what, somebody’s gotta do something about Antifa and the left, because this is not a rightwing problem, this is a leftwing problem.

Maren: That exchange was in September 2020, a little over three months before Congress would meet to certify the results of the election — a process that would be disrupted by the first breach of the U.S. Capitol in over two centuries. 

[Sounds of rioting and chanting.]

January 6th rioters: Proud of your boys! Proud of your boys! Proud of your boys! Proud of your boys!

First Capitol Police officer: Yeah, just for awareness, be advised, there’s probably about 300, uh, Proud Boys. They’re marching eastbound. 

Second Capitol Police officer: We’re going to try to get compliance, but this is now effectively a riot.

First Capitol Police officer: They’re trying to breach and get into the Capitol.

[Music plays.]

Daryl Johnson: You know, that was just totally unreal seeing the level of violence and unification among all these different, uh, hate and anti-government groups coming together to try to overthrow the election.

Maren: It wasn’t just the Proud Boys that were there that day. There were many others that were a part of the insurrection, including one group known as the Oath Keepers. Here is one of the final hearings from the January 6th Committee’s investigation into the events of that day, where Representative Jamie Raskin of Maryland calls out both groups and explains their involvement. 

Jamie Raskin: The Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers are two key groups that responded immediately to President Trump’s call. The Proud Boys are a far-right street fighting group that glorifies violence and white supremacy. The Oath Keepers are extremists who promote a wide range of conspiracy theories and sought to act as a private paramilitary force for Donald Trump. In the weeks leading up to the attack, leaders in both the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers worked with Trump allies. Oath Keepers leader Stewart Rhodes called for Donald Trump to invoke martial law, promising bloodshed if he did not.

Maren: Videos and pictures from that day show Oath Keepers among others wearing paramilitary gear, forcing their way into the Capitol in a military stack formation. Stewart Rhodes, the Oath Keepers’ leader, had reinforcements stationed outside the city. Ultimately, some of the people involved in the January 6th insurrection would face consequences.

WUSA anchor: So far, six people linked to the white supremacist group the Oath Keepers are charged with planning their attack.

Maren: For the record, the Oath Keepers have denied being a white supremacist organization.

WUSA anchor: The indictment claims that they took firearms and combat training before January 6th. They are also seen in videos using military formations to march through the crowd and breach the building. 

CBS anchor: Stewart Rhodes was sentenced to 18 years for seditious conspiracy. He’s the founder of the far-right militia group known as the Oath Keepers. Prosecutors say he orchestrated a violent attempt to stop the peaceful transfer of power.

Maren: We now know that the Oath Keepers were one of the main militia groups propelling the events of January 6th forward, but who are they? What do they stand for? Here’s POGO Senior Investigator Nick Schwellenbach again.

POGO Senior Investigator Nick Schwellenbach: Especially in the wake of January 6th, a lot of people were interested in the Oath Keepers. They’re a group that has appealed to people who’ve worked in the military and who work in law enforcement. The organization’s mission is, uh, we’re here to help ensure that these important public servants uphold their oath to the constitution. 

Maren: The Oath Keepers are a far-right, anti-government militia movement that was formed in 2009, after former President Barack Obama was elected. If you remember back in episode 1, Daryl talked about an uptick in the formation of far-right groups after Obama secured his nomination. The formation of the Oath Keepers is exactly what Daryl was talking about.

NickSchwellenbach: Yeah, so they’re kind of this bridge in a way between the militia movement of the 1990s, you know, like the Ruby Ridge, Waco kind of militia movement, much of which was overtly racist. And there was sort of this like dying down of the far right during the George W. Bush years. But when Barack Obama was elected at the end of 2008 and took office in early 2009, there was sort of this, like, explosion, if you will, in far-right extremism. But it’s out of this sort of fever dream cauldron of the Barack Obama administration that the Oath Keepers were formed.

Maren: Conspiracy theories lay the foundation for a lot of the controversies around the Oath Keepers. In 2011, an Oath Keeper was convicted on firearms charges for what authorities said was part of a plot to take over a courthouse in Tennessee and execute citizens arrests on officials that refused to indict Obama for his alleged illegitimacy as president of the United States, stemming back to the conspiracy theories that Obama was not born in the United States. 

The fact that different sects of the group embrace so-called “birtherism,” along with antisemitic conspiracy theories like the denial of the Holocaust, as well as their proximity to explicitly white supremacist leaders and ideology, makes the Oath Keepers a concerning group. 

But Nick flags that the group is complicated because it wasn’t totally clear in the beginning the direction that it was headed towards. A lot of people in the military or in law enforcement that signed up may not have realized that the group would end up being so anti-government or so comfortable with racist ideologies. He mentioned how Oath Keepers showed up to the protests in response to the killing of Michael Brown by police in Ferguson, Missouri.

NickSchwellenbach: There were some within the Oath Keepers who said that the Oath Keepers should take the side of, you know, the Black Lives Matter protesters. That wasn’t the dominant view, or it didn’t seem to be the dominant view within, within the Oath Keepers, but there were, there was a subset of the group. Uh, and some people have left the Oath Keepers over the years because they’ve said, you know, the group is, is racist, um, and is, is not actually living up to its stated mission of upholding the Constitution.

Maren: The organization’s identity continued to take shape over the years as a predominately right-wing, anti-government militia group. And that brings us back to January 6, 2021. While Daryl has pointed out that groups like the Oath Keepers have been organizing and growing in the shadows for years, the events on January 6th led to renewed scrutiny of these far-right violent extremist groups. 

We started this season of Bad Watchdog with that revival, and a congressional hearing about domestic terrorism and violent extremists in May of 2021. In that hearing, Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas acknowledges that white supremacy and domestic violent extremism are lethal threats.

[Music plays.] 

But he also acknowledges something else — something very concerning.

DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas: The department is taking a new approach to addressing domestic violent extremism, both internally and externally. I announced last month an internal review to address potential threats related to domestic violent extremism within DHS and ensure we are not compromised in our ability.

Maren: You heard that right. “Threats related to domestic violent extremism within DHS.” 

Months later, POGO receives a call from the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, or OCCRP. OCCRP is an international investigative journalism nonprofit organization that specializes in exposing shadowy criminal networks and hidden financial flows. Their work has helped to recover $10 billion to the public around the world, and has led to more than 600 arrests, sentences, and indictments, and over 400 official investigations.

And they shared something with Nick and POGO colleagues — a leaked Oath Keepers membership list.

Nick Schwellenbach: The records we got, you know, through OCCRP, they’re years old. The list is from, I believe, 2015. And if you look through this spreadsheet, a lot of these people signed up in the early years of the Oath Keepers, like they got a ton of press when they first were formed.

A lot of people were like, “Who is this group?” Stewart Rhodes was fairly media savvy. And on its face, again, it had a positive mission and a mission that appeals to a lot of people who sign up to work to serve in the military and the law enforcement. And so one thing a lot of experts told me is that they think a lot of people who signed up to be members of the Oath Keepers, particularly current law enforcement employees and current members of the military, didn’t really know what they were signing up for.

[Music out.]

Maren: While the membership list had been floating around on the internet for some time, POGO and OCCRP were the first to flesh out connections between the group and DHS. 

Nick Schwellenbach: And as we were, you know, coming through these, these spreadsheets, sort of, we saw a news story that others hadn’t seen or at least reported on. And that was the presence of current and former employees of DHS who had signed up to be part of the Oath Keepers. And that’s particularly concerning because DHS, along with the FBI, those are the two agencies with the explicit mission of countering domestic violent extremism.

Maren: Nick and his colleagues found more than 300 people on the list who had worked at or currently work at DHS. The majority of these people worked in the Secret Service, Customs and Border Protection, and the Coast Guard.

Nick Schwellenbach: Our count is potentially an undercount. And most of those 300 are former employees. Uh, I want to be clear about that. 

Maren: It’s really hard to accurately estimate the size and scope of how many far-right extremists have infiltrated DHS. The only reason we know about these 300 DHS employees is because a member list was leaked. But experts told Nick that one extremist working in DHS could be one extremist too many.

Nick Schwellenbach: It only takes one insider who has an association with an extremist group like the Oath Keepers to really give, give a group like the Oath Keepers a big edge and to undermine, you know, federal law enforcement attempts to go after crimes by groups like these.

Maren: Some of the people on this list could have had access to potentially sensitive information, with membership ranging from supervisors in the Border Patrol to special agents on the presidential protective detail.

Nick Schwellenbach: One of the more interesting things that I discovered in the course of my reporting is that the person who founded and created a far-right racist extremist group called The Base used to be an analyst for DHS’s Office of Intelligence and Analysis. But imagine if this guy had simultaneously founded The Base and was running The Base and was an analyst at DHS working on trying to track the very group that he like founded and led.

[Music plays.] 

Nick Schwellenbach: There are several reasons why it’s concerning. One is that this is a group that has been associated with domestic violent extremism, not only, um, working to penetrate the Capitol on January 6th, um, during that day when, you know, when it’s possible there could have been a coup. Another problem is if you have a group like the Oath Keepers who may be the targets of federal law enforcement, an insider who has an association with the Oath Keepers could feed them inside information to help them avoid search warrants, um, to help them evade capture, to help them destroy evidence. They could also feed them information that could help them pursue domestic violent extremism, such as security plans for federal buildings, operational details behind security operations.

So there’s a lot of potential problems.

[Music out.]

Maren: It’s pretty wild that an agency that’s supposed to be devoted to protecting the homeland, that’s being tapped to counter terrorism from groups like the Oath Keepers has a problem with rooting them out from within its own ranks. And when we think about perceived threats to homeland security, there’s been a lot of scrutiny on the southern border. But to find out that there’s actually a much more dangerous threat right here, within our borders, and not only that it’s within our borders but it’s actually infiltrated the very agency tasked with protecting us from it ... It makes me feel like we’re defenseless, helpless, even, to this threat.

Daryl Johnson: If they hate immigrants, for example, and they’re in a position where they’re trying to, you know, stop illegal immigrants from coming into the country, you know, it gives the appearance when you have someone in your department, wearing a badge and a patch and a gun that later you find out they’re part of an organization that hates immigrants or whatever, it really calls into question the whole agency’s, you know, purpose. We’re talking a counterintelligence insider operational security threat. 

Maren: Daryl published a new report on this very issue with fellow analyst and criminologist Alejandro Beutel, who you heard from in Episode 1 when we talked about the formation of DHS. The report details how insider threats can crop up and how they believe DHS should best address them.

Daryl Johnson: If it comes down to, hey, this agency’s investigating an Oath Keeper for criminal activity and you’re an Oath Keeper and you’re part of this investigation, whose side are you going to be on when it comes time to arrest this individual? It undermines the credibility of your agency when you have these type of people.

Maren: Here’s Alejandro.

Alejandro Beutel: The different sort of components of DHS are very difficult to manage and bring under control because of the way that DHS is structured. And as a result of that, then there are oftentimes these cultures. And take, for example, Border Patrol. There are these policing cultures that are there that very taught that often have these very toxic subcurrents — misogyny, bigotry, racism — um, that then seep into how Border Patrol agents then conduct themselves on the job, as well as off the job. 

And that becomes fertile ground then for white nationalists and other far-right extremists, in this case, anti-government extremists like the Oath Keepers, to, uh, enter into and grow and find recruits and things like that. It’s extremely problematic. 

Maren: Both Alejandro and Daryl suggest stronger monitoring and background checks when someone is hired at these agencies.

[Music plays.]

Alejandro Beutel: You’re seeing this as a development in, in some policing agencies where like, membership in an extremist group is a cause for termination or, you know, depending on the severity of what’s said is a certain social media post that could be problematic could be cause for termination or at least administrative sanction. Um, and there needs to be, uh, similar uh, things uh, taking place. And those rules importantly, not only need to exist, they need to be enforced.

Maren: In May 2021, Mayorkas put together a cross-departmental working group to conduct a comprehensive review of best practices for rooting out extremism in the ranks at DHS.

Nick Schwellenbach: The insider threat is no small issue. It’s also a thorny problem to solve. You, you get into people’s civil, civil rights and civil liberties. Um, it’s not a crime to associate yourself with a group like the Oath Keepers. Um, you know, the federal government is not supposed to police thoughts or associations.

[Music out.]

Maren: So rooting out extremism within federal law enforcement agencies like DHS is one major challenge, but what about actually fighting far-right violent extremism? What is DHS doing? Well, we reached out to DHS early on in the reporting of this podcast, asking for an interview, but nobody got back to us. We also reached out for comment on the findings of the Oath Keepers investigation and received no response.

Last episode, we spoke with Spencer Reynolds from the Brennan Center about the authority of the Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties and how to strengthen it. Spencer also has serious concerns about how DHS targets and monitors civilians they suspect might be involved with terrorist groups.

Spencer Reynolds: DHS is authorized to go after both international and domestic terrorism. Um, and you would think that they, they would target white supremacy. Um, but a lot of the, the patterns and practices of the department have shown that they more often will use those authorities to target environmental rights activists, uh, animal rights activists, racial justice demonstrators, um, like during 2020 when the Office of Intelligence and Analysis was um, targeting them and creating dossiers on racial justice demonstrators and Border Patrol special forces were whisking people away in unmarked vans. The department is holding out messaging that it is using its counterterrorism authorities to target white supremacy. Uh, in reality, um, they’re certainly not limited to that. And they spend a lot of their resources, uh, targeting racial justice and environmental movements.

Maren: According to Spencer, the logic behind DHS’s current surveillance programs targeting a variety of political groups is largely rooted in unproven linkages between expressing political and social beliefs online and carrying out violent acts. 

Spencer Reynolds: DHS has a number of these ineffective programs that frankly should just be shuttered. There is little value to its countering violent extremism. 

Maren: So what are some possible solutions? What can DHS be doing better?

Spencer Reynolds: An effective counterterrorism strategy wouldn’t start with targeting Americans for their speech and their views and things like that. When it comes to white supremacy and, um, the sorts of, uh, events we saw leading up to January 6th at the Capitol, uh, there’s plenty of kind of predicated, actionable, um, conspiracy and plotting that is happening that can be understood and prevented under just a normal law enforcement framework. There’s plenty for law enforcement to look at using its, its ordinary tools. 

[Music plays.]

Maren: It’s frustrating. I’ve spent the last 10 months talking to people about the threat of far-right violent extremism. Some of these people have tried for years to get political leaders to pay attention. Maybe if we would’ve listened to people like Daryl years ago, we could have prevented some bloodshed, but instead, year after year, more communities around the country than I can count have had to mourn loved ones lost to deadly attacks from far-right violent extremists. And at the same time, we’ve seen the number of people held in ICE detention grow. 

In the aftermath of January 6th, it briefly felt like there was enough political will to do something to address the threat of violent extremists, but as time marches on, the calls seem to get softer and softer. And in their place, the same old debate that played out after the Oklahoma City bombing, the same pivot back to the national security threat posed by immigrants, plays out once more. 

Former President Donald Trump: They’re poisoning the blood of our country. That’s what they’ve done. They just come in. The crime is going to be tremendous. The terrorism is going to be, terrorism is going to be and we built a tremendous piece of the wall and then we’re going to build more. 

United States Senator John Hoeven (R-ND): With what’s going on in the world, people coming from more than a hundred different countries crossing here illegally. You don’t even know how many of them are still here. You came here today without that information. Do you think that creates a risk of a terrorist attack in our country?  

DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas: Senator, um, you mischaracterized my testimony. What I sh- what I shared with— 

Senator Hoeven: Yes or no? Do you do you think that creates a ri- Millions of people come here …

President Joe Biden: It’s time to act. And my first day as president, I introduced a bill. I sent to Congress a comprehensive plan to fix the broken immigration system. It’s the toughest set of border security reforms we’ve ever seen in this country.

[Music out.]

Maren: It’s a pattern. An endless cycle of violence and abuse and more violence that we can’t seem to get out of. 

Here’s César again.

The Ohio State University law professor and author César Cuauhtémoc García Hernández: There’s not all of a sudden a moment in which we decide, oh, look actually the, the history of being racist and, and a white supremacist and embedding those values into immigration law or into domestic law are regretful moments that we ought to move away from. No, they, they very much we’re still wedded to those ideas.

Maren: You may remember earlier in this season, Crystal Sandoval took me to migrant shelters in El Paso. That’s where I met Diego and Ouderwuil, and they told me about the hole. Crystal regularly visits the shelters on the border where many migrants go after they’ve been released from DHS custody. She said she often meets people who have run-ins with DHS. 

Las Americas Director of Cross-Border Strategies Crystal Sandoval: Um, I, I personally think that there is not one person I have interviewed that has not mentioned some sort of um, verbal abuse by government officials. “Why are you here? What are you doing here? Go back to your country. Learn the language. This is, you can’t speak Spanish here. Your kids can, can never go to school here. Um, you’re being a burden. Um, stop asking. Stop crying.”

Maren: As I spent time talking to Crystal and the people she’s working to help, I kept thinking about the reason DHS exists in the first place — to stop national security threats. These are people who’ve seen firsthand what it is to come to the U.S. looking for opportunity or safety, only to face verbal abuse from government agents and, in some cases, to be thrown into detention facilities. Earlier, Crystal told me she helps more than 2,000 people a month working through the immigration system. So I asked her whether she’s ever seen evidence of terrorist threats amongst the people she works with.

CrystalSandoval: I would be more — I, I am more concerned in the mornings to take my daughter to school and for me to receive a call that there’s a shooting at the school than for me to take her, um, into a shelter. [Crying.] I pray every day I don’t get that call. Like Uvalde. Sorry, I didn’t mean to. 

Maren: No, it’s okay.

Crystal Sandoval: I pray every day I don’t get that call, just because we’re Latinas.

Maren: Over the past 10 months, I’ve heard from extraordinary people, just like Crystal, who are fighting every day to help those who come here in search of a better life, to make the system more humane, and to hold those who abuse the public’s trust accountable.

Arely Westley: And it was not easy for a trans person of color to be in that detention center, specifically on immigration. It was not easy. It was really tough situation than I can remember. And I still remember then, the thing is, that’s what’s pushing me and keeping me doing this work.

And I think more than, than ever it’s a callout to people to actually support our work and to in support and be in solidarity with people in detention centers and to keep ICE and CBP accountable for all this injustice happening inside detention centers.

POGO Senior Paralegal Lance Sims: We went through five years of litigation, but when it’s time and you get the opportunity to show that we are  of the people, for the people, and by the people, we learn quickly that there are different types of people and not all of them are entitled to the same level of treatment, the same care, the same rights. And that’s where we ended up. After five years.

Former POGO Senior Researcher Freddy Martinez: In my view, it’s like a real, like active denial of people’s humanity. And I think we should talk about it that way.

Berto Hernandez: I have been able to help so many folks and in a lot of ways, you, you carry the people that you come in contact with you. And for you to, like, listen to me for, like, you know, this time and be like, oh, wow, like, you know, I cried, I laughed, I thought about, like, the, you know, what the U.S. was because of my 10-year-old self, right? Given the space to narrate this story, right, and bring you with me, it’s so wild to me, but it’s also very fulfilling. And I often think that as queer people of color and especially when you’re directly impacted and you’ve been in contact with the system, like, you don’t get that.

[Music out.]

Thank you for listening to season 2 of Bad Watchdog. Please rate and review the podcast wherever you listen; it really helps. And if you have any tips you’d like to share with POGO’s Investigations and Research team, reach out via Signal or Proton Mail. You can find both in our show notes.

[Theme music.]

Bad Watchdog is a production of Investigations and Research at the Project On Government Oversight. It’s co-written and produced by Padmini Raghunath and me, Maren Machles, and based on investigations by Nick Schwellenbach, Freddy Martinez, Mia Steinle, Andrea Peterson, and Katherine Hawkins. Additional research by Julienne McClure. Edited by Julia Delacroix, Brandon Brockmyer, and Henry Glifort. Fact checking by Amaya Phillips. This episode was mixed by me. This episode was mastered by Verenda Lowe. Our theme music was written and recorded by Will Wrigley. POGO’s director of Investigations and Research is Brandon Brockmyer. POGO’s editorial director is Julia Delacroix. Find out more about our work to investigate and improve the federal government at www.pogo.org. 

[The Democracy Group audio.] 

This podcast is part of The Democracy Group.