Transcripts For CSPAN3 Violent Domestic Extremism And International Terrorism Discussion 20240714

Thank you for coming, my name is steph jones and director of the transnational threats project for the center for strategic and international studies. We have a fantastic two sets of panels on what is an important subject. Part of the motivation i think from Suzanne Spaulding and i and looking at this. It was to look at some of the recent attacks, including el paso and the synagogue attacks. There has been a dialogue, debate within the u. S. , about how to respond to it. What the degree of threat and how serious it is and how to respond. What we would like to do is move in the following sense. We will begin with a discussion about the evolution of the threat and how domestic terrorism, i know some of the terminology for some of these groups in the government is the racially motivated violent extremist groups. I cannot promise that panelists will use that term. Just be aware, we are talking about roughly the same subject. Will move into a second panel which we will debate and discuss some of the implications and ways lord and some of the issues that we have to grapple with. And wont read through the bios. We have tried to include a combination of people on the first panel with experience in looking both at violent extremist ones that have been motivated or worked with al qaeda in the Islamic State. And the Counterterrorism Programs at the mccain institute. Many of you also know him based on government work, most recently as the former director of the National Counterterrorisms center. Within have to write is rebecca weiner. The commissioner for intelligence analysis. If you havent taken a look at it, there was an oped published last week from a standpoint that looks at this issue. Than the Senior Vice President of programs at the Anti Defamation League and former director of the office for Community Partnerships at the department of Homeland Security. There is a range of different views on the subject. A couple of points of order, one is, we will have a discussion for about 40 minutes. Then we will open it up to questions from you. Please remember, this is about question. If you start giving a monologue i will cut you off and ask where that question is. Speak into the microphone. Raise your hand and we will call on you. You can identify yourselves and then ask your question into the microphone. That would be great. Be one, ts to move to the National Geograph as emergency, is an we dont expect one. The policy is to move over to the National Geographic museum which has a fantastic cafeteria and is located next door. That was not an indication to go there before or after but you can always do that if you want. We will start and i will sit down. Thank you for coming. Want you start us off. What would be helpful if too drastic. The government focuses a lot on the threat from al qaeda than the Islamic State. We have now added other threats into the u. S. Tax from the far right, including white supremacist groups. Threats from the far left and others. How you see this issue evolving over time . Thank you for the opportunity. I will use the broadest of russias and offering thoughts. On how the threat picture has evolved. I will do that mindful of the fact that there is quite a number of people sitting in the audience and have their hands on various National Intelligence estimates and other key documents that have crystallized. Some of those folks might end up shaking their heads. About the nature of the threat. The period right after 9 11, the first several years, we were al qaeda focused. That is not surprising. That was the terrorism threat and most proximate to the United States, in terms of the homeland. We still in our mind, had a model in mind of an organization that was trying to penetrate the United States. Trying to infiltrate operatives sleeper cells. Think clandestine covert operations to get individuals inside the United States to carry out terrorist attacks. A strong capability protecting mitigate against that threat. As they metastasized and has al qaeda become not just an organization dealing with in south asia but a Global Organization with a series of potent and lethal Affiliate Group is. The challenge and pressure placed on Homeland Security, got quite intense. I would argue, the threat began to shift. To one that actually became in some ways more challenging of the threat dynamic. That of the homegrown violent extremist. The idea that we were not as threatened day today by that sleeper cell from abroad but instead most likely the individual who will be inspired and be motivated to be encouraged and propelled into action by an ideology or in some cases the actual individuals overseas, connecting with them. That became a much more difficult and challenging problem for Law Enforcement. Identifying those individuals in the absence of the usual communication patterns you see, that was not going to be easy. That was already a problem at the time, isis came onto the scene and i would argue at least for a period al qaeda is a principal terrorism concern overseas. The isis phenomenon, i would argue only accelerated those. In terms of the extremist problem becoming the principal homeland terrorism problem. You all know exactly how effective and capable the Islamic State was. That model is one that i would argue translates very well to this new kind of threat we are talking about. Again, most likely to be individuals operating outside of the Group Structure dermal structure theyre not trying their direction or even capability in most cases from some kind of playbook that republishes. I think i belong to this group. It follows the structure. Its interesting to hear rebeccas comment that she looks at the caseload inside new york city. Going by what the icing publicly. The caseload that the fbi is managing on the domestic terrorism concerns has come to be at par with the international terms. When im in the overseas environment, but you all spun up over domestic terrorism . Sas we are. We should be. Dont forget, he cant go a day or two or week or two without also reading in the past somewhere of an arrest and prosecution involving what we Call International terrorism or a tie to the ideology propagated by isis or al qaeda. Is not as if one went up and went down, it means we are dealing with the problem of. C turning from the overview, to new york city that you take a look at, two questions. One is, how are you seeing this play out, the international and domestic terrorism play out in new york. Including domestic groups far right extremists for example. How are they structured and how informal is it . Have you characterize it. Thanks to everyone for having me here. It is great to reflect on the threat collectively. Nypd has a slightly different but relevant position on the matter. If we want to understand the threat, whether we call it racially motivated violent extremism or white supremacist plastic, we have a toolkit available to understand it. What we are seeing looks very similar to the homegrown violent extremist landscape. There angry often disenfranchised. In some way or another and are seeking an ideology that justifies the violent intentions rather than in a formal way like we thought years ago with al qaeda, driven by the ideology. Also demographically more diverse than one might imagine. Our textbook examples are slightly broader spectrum. The radicalization process began is somewhat similar to what we are seeing. Online subcultures that are spending from open to closed forums like twitter and instagram to forms like wired, and that stick and are increasingly plastic. Individuals are consuming propaganda that looks like propaganda that we are used to seeing from isis. The formal aesthetic similarities as well. In terms of defining, ideological pillars, there are plastic that drive, whether it is the actor or the formal group or to what we are seeing for years in active al qaeda and drastic world. Obviously the plastic and my company not milestones, it is a difference that is there are more similarities than differences. Also bearing similarities. Tactically you are seeing the same doityourself style tactics that you see among drastic, if we look back to unite the light, vehicle ramming with the Mass Shootings that was on el paso and christchurch. Also in pittsburgh. I would say what this means for Law Enforcement is we need to rely upon the tools that we have developed, starting from 9 11. In the 2010 timeframe work shifted radically to the hbe, the actor from within. This is a conventional suite of Law Enforcement tools. A give context, this goes back to your point about numbers. Some form of disruptive or successful plastic against new york city since 9 11. We have seen a couple shift over that timeframe. If you separated into two phases, the first nine years and second nine years, you see 12 incidents in the first nine years after 9 11. The actor has changed quite dramatically. Of the 12 in the first nine years, two were homegrown. 10 external. Since the 2009 timeframe theres been 15 we would think about in the homegrown context. Two were white supremacist extremism. That shift in actor, the acceleration in pace in terms of trying to Way International or hve versus domestic, we are seeing more of the international hve, we have begun looking a lot harder like when James Harris Jackson traveled to new york city to fatally stab an africanamerican man. He did this because new york he thought of as the Media Capital where his attack would be amplified by the media which would help to drive the more recent incident, which is less formally what we would think of as white supremacist violence. This is a spectrum of activity. Given the similarities, we should not be surprised to see what we have started to see in terms of individuals we would not characterize as one or the other. If you look at the person who killed his roommates in florida, fascinating example of somebody who switched allegiance from a Violent White Supremacist Group to isis. This case is cited for a lot of different points. We have to remember that people who are looking for ideology to justify violence will often look for multiple, conflicting ideologies. We will continue to see this rring of and blu ideologies. Rebecca, can you talk so we get a lot of the cards on the table, to what degree are you seeing in the new york area threats, intent, and capabilities from antifa or some of the environmental groups like the environmental liberation front and the anarchists . Some of these groups are networks that feed off of each other. Absolutely. We do see that in new york. New york has been a center of gravity for the Anarchist Movement for quite some time. What we tend to see, the concern we are focused on is this idiosyncratic opportunistic lone actor threat. We are also interested in the formal groups and we see this cycle of violence. That tends to take place in terms of street violence. If you look at the proud boys, that brawl that happened after the Republican Club a year and a half ago, that is the threat we have to take note of as lawenforcement. We need to make sure the streets are safe. We view that as reciprocal and important. We view that as less likely to result in the same kind of mass shooting, copycat subculture of more profound ideological hate than some of these other actors. They are important. In terms of threats, that is a much more familiar pattern for us. George, from your perspective, where you are now and where you came from, how do you see adl has a lot of data on the domestic threat front. How do you see that . And picking up on what everybody is saying, how do you compare and contrast to the threat we dealt with in the first decade and a half after 9 11 . Thank you for convening this really important set of conversations. It is great to be with colleagues i worked with a long time. In terms of laying down the data, three points i want to make sure we understand, the first is that calendar year 2017, we saw a 57 increase in antisemitic incidents across the country. You might wonder, why is that relevant . That same year, there was a 17 increase in hate crimes across the country. The reason i lead with this statistic is because we know across the country, and we have seen this, incidents of antisemitism are the canary in the coal mine. If you have an incident of antisemitism, there is likely an incident of islamophobia or racism, homophobia that happens in that same municipality. We know we have seen a marked increase in bias and hate motivated violence and crime across the country. In calendar year 2018, over 90 of murders and homicides attributed to ideological motivated violence were at the hands of white supremacist White Nationalist ideologies. Over 50 murders and homicides. That is in the context of the past decade of data that shows 73 of violent murders and homicides, actual killing of people, was at the hands of rightwing white supremacist associated ideology, not jihad terrorism. As we look at the indicators of hate and bigotry, coupled with what we see overall, with murders and homicides, we know we have a combustible mix. To the point nick started to allude to on what we have seen in the post 9 11 era and in new york, the tools and infrastructure of the federal government that had been building from the bush to the obama administration, the infrastructure, for prevention and tools for state and local governments to prevent and intervene in the process of radicalization, in the Current Administration have been plusated in the last two years. When we look at the staffing and the programs, we look at the authorities, there has been a cut in those. When you look at the data of the threat and the resources applied to prevent or intervene, they do not add up. You have spent your last job in government looking at the terrorism threat from a global perspective. What is striking if you look at the last couple of years from the far right threat, we have seen attacks in christchurch, the mosque attack in the u. K. , the assassination of an mp. To what degree is this becoming or was a much more serious global issue . Or one that moves across europe and australia and new zealand . I want to be cautious about that. Theres a lot we need to learn. What i can say, there is an International Dimension to this problem. We need to do more to understand that. Does that mean it is going to look like isis, like al qaeda . Of course not. There may be a transnational and International Dimension. What we learned in the aftermath of christchurch suggests that individual had international contacts. He had traveled internationally. He was engaged internationally. He found himself among likeminded travelers in this movement. To me, that argues for doing more to understand that nature. That means opening a conversation with partners that is broader than it has been in the past. I say this not with any sense of pride, but for all of the years where i have been across from other countries, senior counterterrorism officials, talking about terrorism, not once did it include a conversation about this dimension. What we would call domestic terrorism. That was because of the way our system is architected as opposed to what fell within other agencies. It is a feature of the landscape. The idea we would not try to maximize the kind of intelligence and information we could get by talking openly about our challenges and wanting to learn about the set of challenges that our partners feel, that is an obvious step we should be taking. I imagine we are. I am glad and i hope those expand. I want to be careful. I dont want to assume because the problem is pressing and at the top of our agenda right now it looks the same way as our post 9 11 concerns. Lets dig into it and find out if those individuals who are connecting with likeminded individuals overseas, are they going to be on that, engaging in the sharing of tactics and technology and other tools that allow them to be more effective in their homegrown activity . Or are they dabbling and sharing frustrations . Or is there a network here . I dont think we know the answer. To what degree is it a challenge when we deal with the subject of domestic terrorism and sharing information across agencies . We are talking about u. S. Citizens potentially operating in the u. S. We know with individuals with the rise above movement, a number of them before arrest traveled to ukraine, to italy, to celebrate adolf hitlers birthday in germany, i suspect when people leave the country, there are tools available to monitor their activity. How is this different from an International Terrorist organization in terms of sharing across Government Agencies . It is a complicating factor. That would have been true even talking about sharing information on u. S. Nationals in the context of International Terrorism. For example, i used to point this as a silver lining, and there are not many Silver Linings in the isis experience. Agencies to be more willing to share with our partners overseas. We certainly needed that reciprocal cooperation from them. When we had cases involving u. S. Nationals traveling to fight for isis or the conflict zone in iraq and syria, that was information we were now prepared in ways we were not previously to share with partners and in ways that did elicit greater cooperation from foreign partners talking about their nationals. That is always a sensitive subject. I am not sure the same phenomenon or dynamic applies in this space because it is a challenging set of circumstances. In many cases youre talking about an individuals perceived political activity and political views. How much of that should we be willing to share, or in a position to share with foreign partners overseas . I recognize the kind of dilemma that may pose for Law Enforcement and intelligence agencies in terms of figuring out what is appropriate to share. Seth rebecca, im wondering if you can unpack what the potential threat looks like. In terms of the plots that have been disrupted or even attacks that have been successful the last couple of years, what are you seeing some of the trendlines in terms of the types of tactics that individuals are using, or how they are attempting to recruit individuals for an audience like this, what should, what should people be concerned about in the direction of this in terms of the nature and the degree of the threat . Rebecca it is interesting, hearing nick talk about the transnational element, while we do see a lot of similarities tactically, structurally, ideologically even in some ways between the white supremacist extremist and the the transnational picture is quite different. When we think about transnational we think about former hierarchical command and control and that is not what we have been seeing in this landscape to this point. We do see transnational links and they tend to be more fluid. The Group Structures tend to be more fluid. One of the perils of the leaderless resistance mode of structuring yourself is that you open yourself up to factionalism, which is something we see frequently in this landscape. Groups that fight with each other, divide, reconstitute, and with these activities happening online with these subcultures, it is easy to imagine the links you are forging, the travel, the training, the idea and generation and all of that. I would go back to the do it your self tactics and techniques. The Mass Shootings. We do see a preoccupation among this group of individuals with making explosives, sharing bomb making instructions. This is not fundamentally different than the threat from hves since 2009. That is something that has dominated. The timeline is going up, all of us know this and that is why we are here. Part of it is the attention we are giving to these threats begets more of the threat. Part of it is the more you look, the more you find. We are increasingly seeing these drivers. Some of the factionalism you see within the group is playing out within contests for attention. You mentioned antifa. That is something we have seen play out in the new york landscape. Groups vying for attention and relevance in an increasingly noisy echo chamber online and in the real world. I think, again going back to what we are doing about it, it is a familiar problem set in many ways. It requires similar tools. We wrote an oped last week about the statutory framework. I know there will be a fantastic Panel Following us that deals with some of the legal issues. New york has a terrorism statute that is ideologically agnostic. We have used it in the context of homegrown violent extremism as well as in the context of white supremacist extremism. We will be increasingly looking to tools familiar, tools a little bit out of the box in figuring out how much we need to resource this threat. Seth george, from your perspective, rebecca just noted concerns about a rise in activity. What is your sense about some of the factors causing that rise . How important, based on your background, how important have been the social media and other aspects in contributing to radicalization . What have been the main factors . George one of the most significant factors we have seen in the isis case study of online radicalization and mobilization is we see what many of the counterterrorism experts referred to as a flash bang period. In the white supremacist context, this term of accelerationism has been something we have seen be a key motivating factor in the past 24 to 36 months. That is in the context of if you are an individual who believes the white race is under attack, that black, brown, muslim, or other minority people are coming into this country and will soon become the majority, that i need to do something now. I cannot wait a month, a year, two years, i need to take action today. We have seen this concept of accelerationism at play in the pittsburgh tree of life synagogue attack, that if you adhere to this technology, you will not wait to see how the demographic game plays out. You will take action immediately. To the extent we see some of the utilization of social media platforms at play here is absolutely a key factor. One of the differences is the connection with gaming and other platforms. The 4chan, 8chan gap. Folks who have followed this issue have seen how this issue has played out and that connection and sharing of ideas and the proliferation of these types of hateful ideologies, and the sentiment of accelerationism and the need to take action that have infected the minds of people that have committed these domestic terrorists attacked. S. That has been a key motivating factor. There is a Senate Hearing this wednesday on this issue. Nicholas i will jump on something george said. This is where the parallels end up being so striking. It is a case where individuals have a particular view of history, a particular read on Current Events through the prism of that history that drives them to feel there is no choice. They are compelled to take action. What george put his finger on is that is not something marinating over years and years. That is happening in a much more accelerated fashion. That may be the factor that differentiates this particular part of the problem from our in some cases our hves did have a very quick flash to bang but in other cases it played out over a long period of time. If it plays out in a more compressed timeframe, that will put more pressure on Law Enforcement to identify indicators that can serve as Warning Signals and more on the requirement to engage in the prevention agenda that george alluded to. I know we are the problem panel and the next panel is the solution panel, but lets play solution a little bit. You certainly have to argue that investment in the prevention set of initiatives going on in prior administrations would make sense given the size and scope of the problem. George in terms of the best practices and lessons learned, we know, and it has been documented that White Supremacists and White Nationalists in this country have absolutely looked to Foreign Terrorist Organizations to look for operational best practices. Filesharing, encrypted apps, the use of social media, the marketing and dissemination of their message, that is a page out of the playbook of Foreign Terrorist Organizations. Those same measures have been applied at home on u. S. Soil for the past number of years. Individuals who adhere to an ideology that subscribes to applying an act of violence or terrorism on u. S. Soil to achieve some type of political gain or clinical motivation is something that, irrespective of what the ideology is, they are watching and learning from one another. Our toolset has to be ideologically agnostic moving forward. Seth one question, to nick and george, there is a Law Enforcement and intelligence challenge. This is not new. If you look back at the post civil war period, ulysses s. Grant have multiple efforts on multiple fronts against klan activity, particularly in the south. There have been a range of groups in the 1900s, the color of the sort, the arm of the lord, the order. Obviously timothy mcveigh. There is an effort of gathering intelligence on individuals prepared to conduct violent acts in the United States, and to arrest those people and charge them and if there is evidence, convict them. What is new about this is some of the technological means they have to use the social media dimension, which also brings in the private sector. Having seen private sector, including facebook officials last week, i know this has been a challenge for what they do on their platforms. To what degree is this also a private sector issue . Any thoughts before we get to the Solutions Panel on how to deal with hate is free speech. How do we think about the threat on these Online Platforms . Nicholas adl has had a pretty active set of engagements with the private sector. George, i will let you go first. George the solution is not government should do this in the private sector should do that. The solution package is partnership. Partnership to find a shared risk, shared reward. Platforms are at risk for exposing other innocent users to bigotry, hatred, antisemitism, xenophobia on their platforms. The american public, in the form of communities across this country, el paso, dayton, pittsburgh, poway, the list goes on, have lost sons, daughters, fathers, husbands. The solutions that cannot be the government needs to do this and the private sector need to do that. The solution set here is partnership in a very integrated model where government, Law Enforcement, at the state and local and also local communitybased actors, Mental Health, social services, education providers, we need to apply a comprehensive set of solutions to this issue set. When it comes to National Security issues, that is a new way of thinking that makes a lot of people both in congress and in the executive branch uncomfortable. From where i sit is the only way we can move forward. Seth rebecca, last question. Then we will open it up. There are people who have expressed concern at the absence of a domestic terrorism statute. I would be curious from your perspective, and as part of that there are folks who have complained, understandably, that even individuals plotting what looked like probably attacks, it would have to arrest them for weapons charges or steroids across state boundaries. Or drug trafficking. How serious are some of these issues in the new york area . This gets to a comment you made earlier. How much do you feel like you have enough of the tools in place right now to deal with this . Rebecca obviously we will delve deeply into this in a few moments with the second panel. I mentioned the new york state statute that has served us quite well because it is ideologically agnostic. What it does do is places the moral, ethical privacy on terrorism as a crime and as a special one we need to think about carefully without applying International Domestic to it. While we have a suite of federal laws and other state laws at our disposal, what you lose when you charge somebody with steroids across state lines is not necessarily the jail time, although that can be a factor. It is all of the other authorities and resources and the importance placed on the threat issue in general. It is important we look at the threat holistically instead of these very specific ways. The point i want to make which leads back to the conversation earlier, mobilization to violence is happening faster than ever across many ideological sectors. You have added to this an important element of the threat, which is the contagion factor. We see this in Mass Shootings, in the white supremacist environment. The manifestoes referencing each other. I think while you do not have the formal structure of an isis and al qaeda in many of these examples, you have some of the same drivers creating these legions. People are sanctified after committing an attack. That is why you have to get in quickly with some of these Public Private tools. Deplatforming, given the role the online environment is playing becomes incredibly important. It has taken a little but of a little bit of time for the private sector to catch up to the white supremacist environment, starting aggressively in the International Terrorism context. These kinds of efforts to make sure people are not able to engage online become crucial. Seth we will turn it over to you. We have microphones in the back. If you could just raise your hand and then please identify yourself and keep it to a question. We will start here. Good morning. Im with catalyst omni media. My question is about connecting the dots. What is missing is the religious political connection. I think it is undeniable that there is some religious ideology, ethical morals that is missing. With all of us looking at the symptoms, symptoms, but we do not look far enough to see the connections. There is islam, there is judaism. Seth what is your question. My point is what you think about that . Why do you think you are missing some of the point of connecting the dots . Nicholas it is difficult to offer a datadriven set of observations about the kind of question you just described. It is probably inarguable that the Political Climate we are living in contributes to the kind of apocalyptic view of the sort that george described earlier. The sense that we are at this moment in history where something must happen or else, or where my particular subculture, my particular sub community is at risk because if x or y does not happen or i do not take steps against it. The kind of political environment we are in is producing the kind of rhetoric that contributes to that. Rather than saying it is something the president or the other politician said is responsible front attack, i think that is pointless and does not contribute to the debate. I would instead flip it around and say lets put responsibility on all of our politicians to play more productive roles in terms of bringing down the temperature and not trying to speak in ways that serve as dog whistle comments to the kinds of individuals george was alluding to. It is hard to make that case in a datadriven way. It is more of an impression. Seth next question . Right here. Wait for the microphone, please. George washington university. People who engage with radicals in online spaces say there is not only parallels between how White Nationalists and jihadists radicalized, but there is also symbiosis. They are radicalizing each other. I was wondering what you are thinking about, first about Online Engagement in those spaces during the radicalization process and about that symbiosis between the sides going after each other and how to break that . You might add an issue i may follow up on. Immigration appears to be an issue that has come up. George i will start and then im curious for rebecca to weigh in. To answer your question directly, there is a connectivity and one playing off the other to some degree. There have been a lot of cases where we see the documentation and it has been thoroughly noted by countless folks who i think are mostly right. What i am not sure is how much we can extrapolate that to. Can we draw that on every case . I dont know how we cull that down to a percentage. I have seen it, it is true. It has been noted by good scholarship and research. I do not know how broadly to extrapolate that. Rebecca i would agree. It is something we are seeing. It makes sense. These are tactics that work in this context. They are not revolutionary. They are not terribly complicated. Their simplicity is what gives them power. If you go back to the leaderless resistance, these are concepts that have had a lot of play in both of these worlds. It makes sense that if your entities operating in small cell context, you would use some of these tools available, you would be active online. I do not see direct partnership between jihadists and White Nationalists in this specific forum. It is more of a generalized impression that these are the tools that are best suited to todays violent environment. [inaudible] rebecca that is absolutely true. Seth to what degree has the immigration issue been a facilitator in the radicalization process . It is certainly a major theme in some of the other attacks. It was a theme in the new zealand attack with immigration in places like france. To what degree are you seeing immigration as an issue. We are talking about extremism. How important do you see that as an element . George as an issue cited as a grievance or driving factor, it is foundational. I do not know if it is more or less important than other contributing factors, but it is a key pillar when you look at the elements of acceleration is ism, when you look at what white supremacist perceived to be a threat against the white anglo majority in this country. Refugee asylumseekers to this country, and the quotas the u. S. Allows in and as those numbers continue to fluctuate, it is the foundational element of their argument. Nicholas that is what i was alluding to earlier, george chose to use better words. Seth great. Right here with the glasses on. Hello. I am an Exchange Student from berlin. I have a more european view on this. We see in europe there is a problem with foreign fighters in the ukraine coming back to their home country and we see mixed martial arts fighting clubs radicalizing their members and training fighting skills. Do you have the same problem regarding the states . How much of a problem is that . I think our problem here in the states is smaller, especially from the new york standpoint. That is where i would be best positioned to offer opinion. There are elements of that, and the question they have is how important are those elements, and how weak are they to whats been going on in europe. That is for us a bit of a gap. We are seeing these traces and not understanding the full effect of whether there is an actual footprint. There are some fundamental psychological connections. The coast guard officer who was arrested on weapons charges, and interstate steroid issue at play, the alleged perpetrator of the pulse nightclub, mixed martial arts association. There are associated psychological traits, but nothing that connects these issues writ large yet. One of the things that strikes us, this came up at a panel i was at in the middle east, where the number of european officials it is how much some of this movement in the United States and in some areas of europe has also started to change their profiles, so that visually they are not the single skinhead, steel toed they may encourage each other to where, military style haircut as opposed to shaved. , or ashakis and shirts weve seen some in jims style clothes, including sweat suits. Much like we saw with the islamic extremist groups and individuals preparing for attack , i do think we see going back to nicks comment earlier, theres a lot of avenues of cooperation across countries, including what they are seeing and sharing, information and best practices lets go back out to the audience for questions. We have one right here. Thank you. Statute thateral defines domestic terrorism what would it take to change that, to start charging american citizens with domestic charges, without them having any affiliation with foreign terrorist groups. You will get to this to some degree in the next panel so you may want to reask your questions at the next panel. You willreview of what hear more expert than i, i think there are some on the hill who are exploring the idea of what value domestic terrorism statute criminalizing activity there is some effort underway to determine what that would do in the way of giving Law Enforcement more tools than they currently have and how do you balance that against any concern that might exist about how it constrains free speech, viewed as a tool that could be used against other forms of political expression. I suspect when you see legislation introduced on this it will spark healthy debate. From the outside it must be considered. This will solve the problem in the argument has been this needs to be looked at because this is a tool we havent been using that might have value. Other questions . Lets go to the side of the room. The microphone is coming. You. Ank consular of the Russian Embassy in washington. Name of thering the events, can you please specify the difference between violence extremism and terrorism, if there is any. In the second question you mentioned the International Dimension of White Supremacists. That in theink second world war, it is just to say loud and clear that revisionism is not allowed, considering that in some European Countries we can see collaborators in nazis marching in the streets and cheered by others. Your question the difference between extremism and terrorism if there just toand the second, an understandable signal that nazis are not allowed right now and we to what wasme back brought to the biggest trajectory of the 20th century. In the fall of 2011, the u. S. Government and the strategy define violent extremism is ideologically motivated violence to further political goals. The textural difference was the webster definition of terrorism, the role of ideological inspiration as opposed to political ends. Its the role of the ideological motivating factors, whether it be of religion or some other view that is the key difference. Evolution ofen the radicalization and recruitment by Foreign Terrorist Organizations, as we see that itnomenon evolve over time, is driven the National Security community not just to label things as terrorism alone, but understand the full spectrum of violent extremism that has ideologically motivated factors, mobilization elements, that more fully depicts the picture of radicalization and mobilization. I think rebecca may want to into your other question about remembering the legacy of the nazi era, absolutely. Enough thatnot long we should not have to be reminded of where we have come and where we need not go back. Right here. Thank you. In terms of the internationalization question, i understand we are ought the very beginning of our understanding of what that looks like. What is your understanding in terms of who are the major exporters of this extreme right wing terrorism . As we seeing it as the canrnational movement for we start to increasingly be considered exporters of this terrorism . I dont know that i can point to a specific part of the uniquer, i think the party gives rise to the phenomenon that george described earlier where some group is defined as other and some are threatening, and that grew up with a similar or analogous set of grievances in another nation, which is where that commonality comes. Headline yes, i have the same set of concerns about my society one quick plug on wednesday of this week, adl will be releasing a paper that looks at White Supremacy across the globe, and we methodically document across europe, north america, where we have seen import and export of and theology significant ideological hubs within north america and we track this across western europe. Answerr a more detailed on wednesday of this week. Digestible. 30 pages. Rebecca, you get the last word if you want it. As we have learned over the last hour and 15, this is obviously a global problem, and we are confronting it together. I look forward to hearing the continuation of the conversation. Thank you. If you could join me in thanking our panel. [applause] we have tried to keep this up to answer all the tough questions that we have raised. Seated, we areay going to transition over to suzannes panel, and this should be an interesting, frank discussion of how to think through these issues. Thanks, guys. All right. Well, that was terrific. I want to thank the panelists for setting the stage so beautifully for this followon conversation. Seth has been such a tremendous colleague. I thought that was a terrific introduction. We are going to move now to talking in greater depth on the things that were touched on in the first panel, so how do we go about confronting this challenge, whether it is racially motivated violent extremism or other ideologically motivated domestic terrorism. Lessons that we appropriately learn from our years of experience with , thatational terrorism are appropriately applied, and where are some of the things we need to be thoughtful about. Tarted thinking about this i was immediately taken back to 1985, when i was a relatively new lawyer working on capitol hill for senator arlen specter, then republican of pennsylvania on the judiciary committee. Terrorists had seized a cruise ship. ,he pennsylvania resident confined to a wheelchair, was murdered and pushed off the deck of this cruise ship. Specter immediately reached out to the doj and fbi to prosecute this crime and was promptly informed that there was really no good legal jurisdiction over a criminal attack against an american overseas. Our criminal laws generally dont have extraterritorial and so we set to the terrorist attacks against americans abroad to fill a true legal gap in our ability to bring all of the tools that we had at our disposal against a very serious threat. Over the years, quite a robust Legal Framework grew to tackle International Terrorism, in particular after the attacks of was a repeatede effort to make sure that what we have in our normal context could be brought to bear in that National Security and intelligence context. I testified quite a bit in those days that as we migrated those authorities over to this more secretive context, that would not always result in a Public Prosecution often not that we recognize that there is a lot that could come from public scrutiny and Public Prosecution and rules about the fruit of the forbidden tree. Apply it meant we had to be thoughtful about what safeguards we would put in place. So now today, here we are. Looking at this rising concern , usuallyomestic threat with acontained different ideological premise, which we have grown to see in the International Terrorism context, where a lot of the authorities that were built up overnight 11 were based on the seriousness of a Global International threat. Now we are talking about importing those authorities into the criminal context with a domestic threat. It immediately brought to mind another memory of mine when i was a kid. She always wanted to trim my and she would trim them but they were a little uneven so she had to even them out on the others, a little uneven, i would wind up with bangs up to hear. As we listen to the conversation, i thought about this lurching backandforth. The need to be thoughtful as we do that. And we our goal today, are off to a great start and we have a terrific panel today to help us be thoughtful and inform the discussion of the debate that is rightly happening now and will continue to happen on the hill. To help us do this today, we have jim baker, director of National Security, formerly general counsel of the fbi, and a number of years as a strategic advisor, and we are really pleased to have him today. We have mary mccord, who serves as the senior litigator for practice at the institute for constitutional advocacy and protection as well as a visiting professor of law at georgetown university. She was acting assistant attorney general for National Security at the doj and served as the Principal Deputy assistant from 2014 to 2016. She worked 20 years at the u. S. Attorneys office in the district of columbia stop we also have a former colleague from the department of Homeland Security, where he was for 10 years, including the seven years as the senior counsel in the intelligence and law division at dhs. He oversaw a lot of these relevant issues. He was also deputy Legal Advisor at the National Security council. And we also have the counsel for the liberty and National Security program. Before that, he was a litigation associate at bartlett in new york city. To haveeally pleased this distinguished group to help us, thinking through these issues in a thoughtful way. Oped intly penned an which you proposed some changes, both to law and jurisdictional institutions, that you thought might help us to get our arms around and address this growing extremism the violent , so maybe you would like to kick us off by talking about the changes you think we ought to be thinking about. Event ofs the third the day where ive been talking about this issues, which shows how important they are to so many constituents. I am thrilled that this issue is getting attention so we can give it some serious thought and take the pulse and the temperature of how we should approach this problem. Suzanne used terms like domestic and international. Those come from our legal regimes. Always saying wait, the government thinks that International Terrorism occurs domestically in the u. S. , is it done in furtherance of the goal of fighting Foreign Terrorist Organization. Based on further intent to, based on intimidate and coerce, to intimidation or coercion not related to a Foreign Terrorist Organization. Confusing and that is how it works for this discussion. I first started writing about this after charlottesville, virginia when they plowed into a group of counterprotesters he had been there with the White Supremacists who were marching and he killed Heather Heyer and seriously injured scores of other people. He was ultimately prosecuted under state law for murder and was convicted and given multiple life sentences. It was also prosecuted by the federal government for a hate crime and was convicted and given a life sentence. So clearly why do we need a domestic threat with acts of terrorism that are not based on a terrorist Organization Ideology when we have statutes that already cover these crimes. Theres a few things i was writing about one of them is the double standard. Take for example the el paso shooting. If the el paso shooter had declared a buyout before he committed his mass shooting, he would be charged with multiple crimes of terrorism. He would be called an International Terrorist and would be charged with mountable counts of terrorism. But because he did his mass shooting based on his desire to create a white snow state and to others,e the country of there is no terrorism statute that applies. Statutes terrorism that apply in very specific situations. There are over 50 that apply to specific situations like a bomb used, biological dispersal device, nuclear dispersal device, when you were shooting down an airplane or attacking the u. S. Government official. But when you commit an mass shooting or you use your vehicle to kill somebody and you do so based on intent to intimidate or coerce that is not related to a Foreign Terrorist Organization there is no crime of terrorism that applies. Butow that time is limited i was thinking should we change the double standard not only for the same moral equivalency, which is important it sends a message of societal condemnation and itrorist activity can also build some trust with communities and educate the populace that terrorism does not equal islamic extremism. Terrorism can be committed based on extremism of any sort left, right, middle. Coerces to coordinate or that his extremist violence and terrorism. Part of it is that equivalency but another reason ive written this this and talked about to actually bring resources into it. What the u. S. Counterterrorism program is about his suspension, and people often say why dont we more rigorously investigate hate crimes. Butink thats a great idea, structurally the system is set up differently. Investigated are as hate crimes. Terrorism cases are investigated theounterterrorism within National Security Investigation Division and by terrorism prosecutors at doj. Way weers because of the think about it and approach it. They use aggressive techniques that some might criticize, such as going undercover online and engaging with people about committing acts of violent jihad. People were talking about committing acts of violence and White Supremacists these are , this isd by the fbi how we prevent sexual exploitation. Officers setting up sting operations. Part of the discussion ive been ising when i talk about this thet ways to integrate investigation and prosecution of domestic terrorism into the Counterterrorism Program and focus on prevention and not seeking justice after the fact. Butow i have talked to long i know one of the biggest concerns about this is based on distrust of Law Enforcement in this country and rightfully so. History always have a of good relationships between lawenforcement enforcement and marginalized communities. One of the things i look forward wayslking about is what could the government bake into any type of domestic terrorism protocol from satisfactory oversight that would assure marginalized communities, civil rights groups, that any new investigations will not be abused. The fbi will go for the priority and we know there are more deaths from white supremacist violence than islamic extremists in the last couple years how do we ensure they are prioritized . What kind of levers are there to ensure that. Thanks. They made some interesting points about new legal authorities being important from a messaging standpoint, not just messaging for messaging sake but Building Trust with communities and bringing resources and attention. You have some personal both the legal and practical issues that come up when you are talking about a holy domestic threat so do you want to talk to us about how you see those elements . Sure. With respect to investigating these types of matters, there are a number of different aspects of legal, operational policies that present challenges. They are not insurmountable challenges but they are definitely challenges. Bit toback up a tiny talk about the role of the fbi. The role is to protect the American People and uphold the constitution and that matters to people who try to do that every single day. Government the federal powersent has certain that it can utilize depending upon what it is trying to deal with. In the International Terrorism arena under the constitution, the government has certain powers to deal with those kinds of threats and certain limitations. They are different from what applies in the constitution, meaning a different thing as a practical matter inside the United States. Fbi, the way to think about how the fbi operates is that when it confronts any situation, it comes with all of its powers and authorities and oversight and regulation, it is less important what particular box you put something in in certain ways, because once it starts to figure out what it is it is dealing with, then it can implement those powers accordingly stop so dealing with the domestic terrorism investigation, some of the most difficult challenges are of legal and operational. Yes, alegal side, domestic terrorism statute would be another tool that would congresshe intent of with respect to what the fbi should be doing in dealing with these problems. It would simplify in certain framework thathe the fbi would apply to these particular situations. Yet there would still be a requirement to assess the notion that this was a domestic terrorism offense. Experience, the main issue the main legal issue the fbi has to deal with as it tries to deal with this is the First Amendment. It is not unlawful to have extremist views in the United States. What is unlawful is committing crimes, articulated in the federal context by congress and the statutes set forth their, as well as the crimes that the fbi supports. In my experience they are very conscious of the toitations on the fbi not investigate people solely based on their First Amendment activities they really dont want to do that. It is a challenge to figure out in certain circumstances is this a lawful activity protected by the First Amendment, are they moving into some kind of unlawful activity . Case, that isrd the hard legal question at the core of all this. Operationally, these are very challenging cases to investigate and in my mind it is an established organization with the structure and hierarchy and a lot of members. And in the middle you have some ad hoc group of people who coalesce around a particular grievance or issue or philosophical perspective that is extremist in nature. Then you have the loan actor. All of them present challenges theerms of investigating, First Amendment issue runs through all of them. But figuring out how you appropriately investigate and organize a group that has First Amendment rights how do you do that . Do you have undercover officers go there . . O you try to recruit somebody with the smaller groups it is a significant problem with respect to detection how do you figure out that they are up to something that is not only extremist but also potentially criminal . Those are some of the practical realities that still exist and will exist even if we change the law to facilitate these investigations. Its really interesting. I often talk about the need to disaggregate terms that we use like cybersecurity i think it encompasses too many Different Things to be useful. How important do you think it is for us to disaggregate this, whether it is domestic terrorism and or racially motivated violent extremism or whatever catchphrase into these different kinds of categories as we talk about authorities or process or policy changes . Do you think its an important thing for us to think about Going Forward . In terms of the different tools we can bring to bear . To me, the biggest differential legally, the biggest difference is between International Rules and domestic. , it isblem there sometimes hard to figure out whats going on, especially in the individual context. Do you have somebody who was working at the behest of isis, who has been in contact with isis . Been, theres a different set of investigative tools that apply that you dont always know about or what it is they are up to when they First Encounter them. Ascertaining of enough facts so you can figure out what box to put it in that will deliver clarity to the investigators and help them figure out what kind of tools they can use. So we may hamstring ourselves if we think about authority right. Up, someone who is alleged to be doing something then trying to figure out exactly what they are up to and then you can use the authorities that seem appropriate based on the facts that support it. A big part of that is intelligence, an area of your expertise. That, but to touch on also weve been very heavily focused on the lawenforcement approach to this problem and as we know from years of work on International Terrorism, this really requires a whole of nations response that goes beyond a lawenforcement approach. You have some familiarity with the efforts of Community Partnership and so maybe you can touch on those. Some of the challenges if you dhs had inable that trying to bring attention to and raciallyic motivated violent extremism. Thank you. I will start piggybacking off something jim said. The Intelligence Community is not the fbi. And law intelligence enforcement as well. The majority of them are regulated by u. S. Intelligence activities that really puts focus on priorities in the precursor, there was an executive order that came out in the carter administration, created in response to Law Enforcement and surveillance activity in the United States, that came to like after the Church Commission hearings. You have an executive order that has been put in place by committee that regulates the Intelligence Community, and the goals for the structure of that executive order is to have the Intelligence Community focus on foreign threats. If you look to the structure itself, part one talks about authorities, what the Intelligence Community can and cannot do, what the goals are, generally focused on foreign intelligence, transnational organized crime, the proliferation of wmds. Focused and if you peel 1. 7 back, primarily section , they talk about the specific authorities of the Intelligence Community. If you look at cia, their job is to analyze and disseminate counterintelligence. Analyzeir job is to intelligence for a foreign intelligence mission. This is really the structure of the Intelligence Community. The majority cannot bring to bear lawenforcement authorities that the fbi has when they are starting an investigation. I will say the outliers going to be dhs. The department of Homeland Security one is the office of intelligence and analysis. The difference between ina and the other Intelligence Community elements is they have a very comprehensive statutory regime that outlines what information they can collect. The definition of terrorism, it is different than title 18. To itok specifically says ina can collect information to support national and departmental missions. It is not limited to foreign intelligence. If you move to title vi of the u. S. Code, their mission is to collect information related to threats of Homeland Security and terrorism. This is where the definition of terrorism is different. Istitle vi, terrorism defined as politically motivated violence, similar to title 18. But there is no distinction when it comes to where the acts of violence take place. There is no distinction in terms of jurisdiction. 2002omeland acts from looked at terrorism through a lens it is especially agnostic in terms of what the threat is or where it takes place. They collected and analyzed the information. We are talking about one department and one agency, it has the authority to engage in these activities. The last panel talked about flagging the white ring extremism, from the obama administration. People know the department has been engaged in analytical activity regarding domestic terrorism. If i recall correctly, the pushback on that report wasnt that dhs wasnt doing intelligence analysis i think that is well understood that whichave this authority, allows them to collect information on u. S. Citizens if it is purely in the context of domestic terrorism. Lack ofback was a analytical rigor that went into it. When you see a wave that followed on whether or not this should be the priority, the limited resources could be limited to domestic terrorism, bombingwing attempted on whether the focus should go back to isis and al qaeda. Havelimited sense, we do authority to release the Intelligence Community, to bring a holistic approach to the issue. Are two intelligence elements altogether, and i know that is something mary has written about. Considerething to whether we want to bring the resources from the Intelligence Community at greater length. I want to come back to that issue. I know this is something you thought about, and i want to come back to that issue, but i none of ourd other panelists have suggested that there is a legal need, and Authority Gap that needs to be statute, that new there could be others, compelling reasons to go forward in that direction. I wonder what your thoughts are in terms of the pros and cons and the risks we need to be think abouts we this rising threat. Certainly. As themportant to note, events in el paso and other bad incidents were happening, in public discussion it was framed as a gap of authority and i know that is what certain members have said in public statements, but as mary has pointed out, statutes toughly 50 domestic terrorism that take place inside the United States, and congress has traditionally prohibited material supporting those crimes. Those statutes dont differentiate between domestic and international activity. I appreciate jim mentioning the First Amendment issue. That is obviously a very tricky dynamic. Has attorney general guidelines that put out a significant amount of Authority Even without a factual predicate to initiate investigations to a certain scope. If you look at recent plots that have been disrupted, there have been a couple plots one with like these it looks authorities have been used and actually had the effect of potentially preventing bad things before they were to happen. Agree it is not a gap in legal authority, in terms of being able to take action to either prosecute or prevent these acts before they happen. In terms of the risks, what the seek tos in congress do is add a number of predicate to attach predicate offenses to what is currently defined in statute as domestic terrorism. And i think the elements that it potentially adds, some are much more damaging than others. I dont think we would have a huge objection to murder. Theres also crimes that incorporate things like property damage. In light of recent and even the lawal impacts that enforcement activity has had on protesters and civil rights communities i think a lot of people were skeptical about extending that kind of authority in a way that would make it easier to label folks as thatrists, in the event there would be a decision to prosecute someone. That is definitely something folks are concerned about. One additional thing i would point out, this distinction between international and domestic terrorism, is that le it is certainly true what we need to keep in mind is that some of the white supremacist and White Nationalists that have committed or planned attacks around the it is not an ideology that knows any sort of boundaries. It cross pollinates. We most recently saw that in the christchurch attacks in new zealand, in which the shooter cited a number of influences, including those in europe and the United States. That has been happening for a really long time. It is not something that just happened to emerge in 2018 in 2019. In terms of psychologically associating, being less likely to look at White Nationalists he was associated with a group that has known links in europe to other white supremacist groups. Someone does a Google Search about isis, automatically morect to a broader, aggressive array of statutes not that we would advocate for that, but there is an asymmetry there. Thank you. There is a gap i think currently in the statutes in the sense of an ineffective tool for preparation with respect to the stockpiling of and precursors for building a bomb. The investigation could be based of lets take the example christopher pohl, the coast guard lieutenant who was recently found as a result of the fact that because he was a to doovernment employee some of these things remember that banner . [laughter] on a virtualck arsenal of assault rifles in his writings show a clear intent to commit acts of mass shooting to create a white ethnic state. He started to google various targets for that mass violence. Because there was no terrorism statute that would apply, the u. S. Attorneys were able to cobble together some three different, lowlevel crimes. Unlawful possession of a and unlawfulgs, possession of a firearm via drug addict. Is the guy who was plotting he was working toward this attack, he had a yearbyyear plan about what he was going to do. Somebody whots, presents a huge danger. But at the magistrate judge said prior to trial, he you have not yet even charged it with a violent crime. These are fiveyear offenses and under the law i have to give him the benefit of the doubt. The district judge overruled that, it shows you one of the vulnerabilities of offenses that dont match up to what he was doing. Out to a fewted other situations, where there were interventions by Law Enforcement to prevent what could have been terrorist attacks but in most of these cases unless theres a bomb threat you are usually cobbling together state laws whatever Law Enforcement can find. Law enforcement does that and other threats as well and even International Terrorism. They will charge them whatever just to disable the person and get them off the street but it is less than ideal when you are talking about integrating the investigation into the counterterrorism regime. You have a terrorism crime im talking about crimes of violence committed with the intent to intimidate or coerce destruction of property where it presents substantial risk of bodily injury. Still, it is very different from murder. Crime had a terrorism that applied to crimes of violence with the intent to intimidate. This could be one of the terrorism crimes listed in the state. Material support to terrorists. Not to be confused with support for terrorist organization. Criminalizes providing support or resources for disguising the nature of knowing and intending that those resources are to be used during the commission of this long list of offenses. If the person youre helping is yourself. I dont see why it wouldnt be. Theres lots of things we can talk about with these precursors, it is fairly important to think about. I would just say on that , theion of stockpiling terrorism frame is not the only of course guncontrol legislation has been stalled in congress for quite some time now and media reports suggest that the el paso shooter had failed a background check and used a loophole to get the weapon he used to murder 22 people. In terms of the statutory gaps and options, if we are going to look at all of them, we should look at guncontrol figures as well. Beyond potential legal gaps or even just additional tools that could assist in addressing this challenge, you have also institutionalsome changes we might think about, both in terms of the National Counterterrorism centers jurisdiction, which as nick and others pointed out has been traditionally very focused on foreign intelligence and terrorist activity, or at least with some connection to foreign terrorists, but also you talk about potentially state Department Entity listings that might be relevant. We can put those on the table. From these organizations in europe and Southeast Asia and elsewhere, that are terrorist organizations that are white supremacist. Right now there are 68 organizations on the Foreign Terrorist Organization must, not one of them is a white supremacist, White Nationalists, or f known nationalist. It is viewpoint neutral. The vast majority are islamic extremists. Theres a handful of others. But the criteria are the Organization Must be foreign because they dont have First Amendment rights. They must engage in acts of andorism, or attempt to, must present a threat to u. S. National security. Im not an expert on these groups but i do know that there are certainly some foreign organizations that would seem to meet that criteria that do advocate specifically for and engage in acts of violence to further their ideology. The state department should at least be looking at those groups. Just to designate some of those groups would turn them into poison pills. They are prevented from engaging in attacks on their behalf. Ctc, i want to an to be clear that we dont start using foreign intelligence correction for domestic terrorism but if you have a designated fto, that would open up those authorities, with one aside,a putting that just in terms of regular information searing, they have been a phenomenal clearinghouse for taking in, analyzing, and distributing foreign intelligence information. If i sayhand up something wrong. They established government to government connections around the world and they regularly meet and share information that allows the entire world to better prepare to combat the terrorist threat. At least while i was government, they really didnt do that same government to government sharing when it came to the white supremacist threat, notwithstanding that is not unique to the u. S. It hasnt been for a long time. It is a problem worldwide. To go ahead and ensure there has been some reporting that it has already happened but it hasnt been corroborated, to allow that to expand, just government to government, the way please share information between local police, that kind of information sharing, it should at least be reconsidered. I know i certainly participated in discussions among the five countrymen at the ministerial level. There was a lot of talk about information sharing which could also be a good vehicle for this kind of information sharing. Did you see anything along those lines when you were there and what are your thoughts haveen though dhs and ina broader remit than the rest of the community to collectivistic intelligence, the tools available are much more limited. They are generally limited to collecting information overtly or from publicly available sources while other members can use clandestine means, electronic surveillance. What that leaves you with his dhs collecting information from those who collected directly from the source. You have dhs collecting information overtly from state and local Law Enforcement, participating in Fusion Centers that have other state and local agencies involved. This is something that has been open to congressional oversight for many years now. When it comes to information sharing and congressional oversight, the numbers are not great. Usually when congress is involved it is because the record is not great. It comes down to what type of information you can get from other sources what resources do they have put into this type of threat . It is going to be much more limited than what the federal government could be, and a possible avenue for increasing with foreign governments. Last panel, one primary area you could focus on is the tactics, techniques, and procedures. That doesnt care if you are leftwing or rightwing, what are trying to prevent is that information sharing is generally easier to come by because of all the rules and regulations regarding First Amendment activities. A natural place for information sharing to evolve. One of the things i think is interesting that came out in the Previous Panel and certainly over the years as others have looked at the radicalization process and what drives people week, ournel last friend and colleague was talking about her new book in which she reminds us that a lot of the radicalization that she has studied has grown out of a desire for a sense of identity a sensenging, and from of isolation and not belonging. I couldnt help but be struck with the parallels weve seen as weve looked at russian Information Operations. I had Michael Bennet up here last week talking about his new ink dividing america, which he depicts very graphically with lots of images the ways in which russia is using Information Operations to tie to try to drive wedges and exacerbate existing divisions within our country. Grievance andsive works to build or infiltrate affinity groups around that sense of grievance and build a sense of identity around the grievance that is stronger, that they want to make stronger than your sense of national identity. It seems to me there are parallels, lessons that we can learn from years of looking at how we counter that kind of messaging. But it also is a reminder that russia is also a player here. We can do plenty of damage ourselves. If russia went away tomorrow, this issue would not go away. But they are here stirring the pot in a very significant way. Including, as was mentioned in the last panel, about pitting groups against each other. So they take the racially motivated violent extremist affinity groups online and they take the islamic groups online and they try to pit them, they drive them against each other. Weve seen this. We see they set up fake affinity groups on each side, call for people to come out into the streets at the same place at the same time. So my question, jim, is, does are there additional legal tools or authority that we can bring to bear to look at the russian exacerbation of this problem, or are there things that we ought to be thinking about, are there gaps there that we could perhaps fill that would help at least that one aspect of the problem . Jim so youre going to make me talk about russia again, right . Suzanne yes. [laughter] jim been trying to escape from that. Suzanne i try not to get up on this stage without bringing up the russia operation. Jim russia is, in this sense, a chaos actor in the United States that just want to benefit their own National Objectives which are not consistent with the longterm Strategic Interests of the United States. They are a threat to the United States, and theyre a bad actor. In as we were saying before , in a situation where they are involved, if we, we the f. B. I. Or another investigative agency, can ascertain that they are involved, then that will bring to bear other investigative tools, but with respect to them and their agents. Right . So the constitution and laws of the u. S. Allow the f. B. I. To use foreign intelligence tools when dealing with a foreign actor. That doesnt necessarily mean that you can use those same tools against an american because of the legal analysis youd have to go through and so on. But it potentially opens up an avenue to try to thwart their activities. But if i could just maybe amplify one part of what you were saying in terms of the domestic discord and pick up on a couple of other threads that weve been talking about here, when youre emphasizing with respect to what we do to ourselves is a critical point. At the end of the day, when there is a horrific attack, whether its a mass shooting or some type of domestic terrorism, specifically domestic terrorism activity, it represents, it does represent a failure by Law Enforcement, a failure by the intelligence authorities, but it really, if you think about it most fundamentally, its a systematic failure. Its a failure of society to be able to deal with these types of situations. Its a failure in the family, in the community, at schools, in the Mental Health arena, and all of the other the social Services Agencies that should be trying to steer people away from this type of activity, the kinds of issues that allow or result in people lacking this sense of identity that you were referring to. So i think its really important to think about, as we think about how to most effectively solve these problems, it is not it will not be effective to just dump all this in the lap of Law Enforcement or intelligence agencies. This is a much broader problem. I think we all intuitively know that. Im not probably not saying anything thats not obvious, but it actually is true, i think. And it needs emphasizing from time to time. To follow up on what george said in the last panel, the government doesnt own these platforms. Its a social media platform problem as well. Its how much tension there is between the government and social media platforms and dealing with foreign terrorist threats. We havent begun to discuss what would happen if we start identifying domestic terrorist threats and what to do with social media platforms in terms of taking down that content. That just adds to the complexity of this issue. Suzanne harsha, taking down inauthentic accounts is one thing, right . Relatively easy. But beyond that, what are your thoughts on how we handle the role of social media in exacerbating potentially divisiveness and potentially leading to violent activity . Harsha i think on the question of taking down inauthentic accounts, i think its a little bit more complicated than it seems. There are sort of sophisticated technical questions that go into determining essentially what is called the attribution problem. That involves an assessment that is more than what computer does this come from, but might involve other factors. Definitely any time theres a broad effort to take down inauthentic activity, we should be cognizant of the potential overbreadth of those kind of efforts. From the platform perspective, of course and some of this is connected to the russia inquiry , and some of this, i think, is just, you know, percolating as issues in society more broadly. I think a good step that they could do rather than enacting really kind of broad rules that take down certain kinds of content or certain kinds of speech are just to be transparent about what theyre doing. So it would be great to see, you know, how many pieces of content did you take down . What rule was it taken down pursuant to . Are there particular groups that are being affected more than others . These would help kind of have us get a clearer picture of how the content moderation process is working. I think a second important principle is due process. For a lot of people, social media is maybe the primary way that they communicate in the Public Square and on the internet. Its important that if theyre an activist or theyre just even talking with their friends about an issue that they want to talk about, if something that they say gets taken down or their or they are banned from the platform, they should at least have the opportunity to find out why and present a case for whether or not that was appropriate. The second point that ill make. That ill make is that fundamentally, there was russian activity on social media platforms, to some degree the impact is incommensurable. We dont know how much, whether it swayed the election or how its impacting public discourse. What we do know is that it emerges in a moment in this country where political discussion is very polarized. These are just those exact topics that, as you pointed out, caught on those divisions. Interestingly, its not unprecedented. Russia, in the decolonization of africa, so while there was a cold war going on with the United States and the soviet union, one of the things and themes that they had kind of built up was how bad of an issue racism was in the United States. In fact, even if you look at the amicus briefs in brown v. Board of education that were filed by the administration, they said, you know, separate but equal has got to go because were getting killed by the russians in other parts of the world. Maybe one thing that we should never lose sight of it is actually some of the problems that are coming up are very real ones that we need to address. We should keep that in mind as we talk about sort of projecting blame or responsibility on to a foreign power. Suzanne it is absolutely the case that russia exploits vulnerabilities of our own making. The other advantage to transparency, of course, is that i think its really important that if the platforms start taking down some of this hate speech, that, as you say, that they tell us the nature of what theyre taking down. I think its important that we not allow ourselves to pretend that this level of hate doesnt exist in this country. So its really important at least to kind of let us know this appeared, if youre going to go to the step of not just providing transparency, but actually taking things down and tell us what youve done. So i want to open it up now for q a from all of you. I know some of you asked questions about the solution set to the first panel, but feel free to ask your question again of this panel. Weve got another question right off the bat here in the front. Hi. My name is angelina. My question for the speakers is about the political will among the branches of the government. I mean, for one, boston had a very good treatment of the al qaeda i dont know if you remember the Boston Marathon bombers. It took 45 days, i think, for them to get it. And then during the charleston, virginia white supremacist rally, boston did that very effectively. So my point is, there are best practices. I dont know if its being shared. But the question is, the unity of the political will between the executive, judicial, and the legislative bodies in the u. S. Government, and then internationally, it applies the same way. The u. S. Is pretty much playing the global police, except that theres russia, which is kind of the villain. And it is also getting to be a rival for interpol. Then theres the commission on human rights, but who does the enforcement of the universal laws . The philippines appealed for the south china seas territories. Is overtaken by russia mean by china. China ignored it pretty much. Because they dont have a power to enforce the Court Decisions anyway. My point is suzanne yes. The question about unity of effort. Both among the in terms of political will across the branches in the u. S. , but also internationally, to deal with this challenge. Anybody want to take that one . Mary id like to address your best practices question. Because so my organization , after the charlottesville you the right the charlottesville rally, brought litigation against 23 of the altright, white supremacist, White Nationalist groups and the militias. The selfprofessed militias that were there. We brought the litigation to prevent them from returning because immediately after the unite the right rally, the groups were saying, our civil rights were violated because we didnt get to have our rally, it got shut down, so were going to be coming back again and again. I dont think anyone in the world wanted to see another act of violence the way we saw on that day. So we used state antimilitia and antiparamilitary activity statutes that exist in most of our states across the country. Yre entirely contentneutral. Theyre based on actually banding together like militias and engaging in the organized, armed use of force, or projection of ability to use force. And we ended up getting 23 court orders against all 23 defendants, prohibiting them from returning to engage in that activity. Why do i bring that up . Because weve used that now i just spent the last two weeks consulting with city officials in georgia, which had a White Nationalist rally on saturday, two days ago, that was had a big counterprotest as well. And they were able to use their state antimilitia, antiparamilitary activity statutes as the basis for reasonable time, place and manner regulations that would apply to that rally, which meant creating a restricted zone, that weapons couldnt be brought in to having check points and separate entrances for protesters and counterprotesters , self designated because the government cant ask you your ideology. But using best practices of keeping a green zone in between, under First Amendment, they have to be able to hear each other, because theyre protesting and counterprotesting, but you can have a green zone in between and not allow people to go from one area to the other unless they go out and come back in the checkpoints. It went off without there being any violence. There was a massive Law Enforcement presence, like 500 Law Enforcement in a town of about 7000, so im sure people criticized it as being overmilitarized, but there was no violence. Weve consulted with cities big and small, ever since charlottesville, portland, oregon, berkeley, small cities in tennessee, also in dayton, who have used these tools. So i mention this because communities have got to be able to have tools they can use to prevent what are billed as free speech events, but are really a kind of guise to engage in open violence. Theyve got to be able to have tools to protect Public Safety while preserving First Amendment rights. Those who want to come and speak, speak out about whatever their point of view is, ought to be able to do that. But they ought to be able to do that without the threat that its going to devolve into violence. Hello. Id like to reask two of the questions asked to Previous Panels to see if harsha in particular has a different answer. But i would also open it up to the whole panel. One was, when the federal government goes into spaces where radicalization is going on, first of all, what is the legal context with this . What are the legal considerations when theyre doing a preventative, preaction movie in the radicalization space . Preaction move in the radicalization space . And the second question is naziism. I wondered if naziism is some special category . Is the law just settled on that . For a long time, the Supreme Court decision on freedom of speech, or is there something we should be thinking about terms of particular groups and ideologies and the legal issues surrounding their activities . Harsha on the second question, its interesting because when i think about the Civil Liberties implications of a speech regulation, i kind of think about two things. The first thing is, who is the Decision Maker thats going to be deciding whether this speech should stay up or not or whether this group should be banned . Another thing that i think about is how broad is the regulation . Right . How much latitude and how many other things that maybe shouldnt fit in there can fit in there based on how its drafted . Thats just the nature of the language kind of issue. Often, what you see is that wellintentioned regulations end up impacting the people that theyre supposed to be protecting from really bad things. And one potential workaround as youve noted is that people have suggested just designating particular kinds of groups. I think that, based on my understanding of where constitutional law is right now on that, i dont think its a particularly tenable solution. And theres also the question of , just because you use the word naziism or use one kind of white supremacist group, you know, especially now, identities are sort of fluid and things move around really quickly, so youre going to be constantly playing catchup. [indiscernible] harsha i cant speak so much to legal considerations, but i know that research that has been done by my colleagues at the place that i work at, the brennan center, weve been very skeptical of the effectiveness of countering violent extremism programs because there arent sort of wellformed, empirically validated criteria by which you can evaluate whether someones going to become radical or not. Often the countereffects can be just reduced trust within communities that basically the government is spying on them. Steve i think one of the underlying ideas is a partnership. We mentioned it in social media platforms. Its a partnership between the government and the individual community. In order to really directly preempt and prevent any type of domestic terrorism, its not something thats happening in an isolated environment. Is after that a discussion on the similarities between International Terrorism and domestic violent extremism. For the House Climate Crisis Committee and the House Foreign Affairs subcommittee help this joint hearing with Young Leaders of organizations