Veterans are facing federal charges after protesting Ice sweeps and Trump’s national guard deployments. The justice department claims the veterans were violent
US military veterans increasingly face arrest and injury amid protests overDonald Trump’s deportation campaign and his push to deploy national guard members to an ever-widening number of American cities.
The Guardian has identified eight instances where military veterans have been prosecuted or sought damages after being detained by federal agents.
The latest incident occurred in Broadview, outside Chicago, where 70-year old air force veteran Dana Briggs was charged with felony assault on a federal officer on 29 September.
A widely shared video on social media shows a masked US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) agent advance on and knock over the elderly veteran during a protest outside an Ice detention center.
Federal prosecutors claim Briggs committed assault when he “made physical contact with an agent’s arm while the agent attempted to extend the safety perimeter”.
Briggs pleaded not guilty and was released on an appearance bond.
Jose Vasquez, a former US army staff sergeant and executive director of the progressive veterans’ organization Common Defense, which counts Briggs as a member, said veterans like Briggs “have stood up at Ice protests and faced arrest because we recognize a pattern of state-sanctioned abuse”.
Another veteran, John Cerrone, was arrested while protesting outside the Broadview Ice detention the day before Briggs. A social media video shows a group of masked agents tackle the 35-year-old marine corps veteran, who served as a combat infantryman in Afghanistan, as teargas floats in the air.
Cerrone says he was held for nine hours at the Broadview facility, alone in a cell with walls covered by blood, hair and mucus. He says that while he was behind bars he was visited by an Ice agent who boasted that he had shot Cerrone in the head with rubber bullets and exclaimed: “Where is that pussy!”
“Their conduct was completely unprofessional in my experience in combat infantry,” Cerrone said. “Even in Afghanistan, we had very clear rules of engagement. The conduct of these agents was such that if it occurred in Afghanistan, they would be removed from the front line. They would be court-martialed.”
Cerrone was released after receiving a citation for “exhibiting disorderly conduct on federal property”, a misdemeanor under federal law, which he plans to contest.
White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson told the Guardian: “Anyone who assaults or otherwise harms law enforcement officers will be held accountable to the fullest extent of the law.” Jackson added that “Ice officers are facing an 1,000% increase in assaults because of unhinged rhetoric from activists and Democrat politicians smearing heroic Ice officers.”
Jackson and a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) spokesperson did not provide data to back up the claim about a 1,000% increase.
In a brief reply to questions from the Guardian, a Department of Justice spokesperson said: “Under this Administration, we follow the law and have a one-tier system of justice, and this Department of Justice will relentlessly uphold the rule of law to protect our nation.”
“What drives so many veterans into action is not only the injustice faced by immigrants and protesters, but also the larger threat to democracy rooted in government brutality and militarization,” Vasquez, the Common Defense leader, said. “The disturbing escalation in arrests and violence signals that the basic freedoms we once swore to protect are under attack.”
Not all of the veterans discussed in this story indicated their military service at the time of the incidents or their arrests.
On Thursday, the US district judge Sara Ellis issued a temporary restraining order restricting federal agents from “using riot control weapons” against journalists, protesters and religious practitioners in Chicago unless there is probable cause that the individuals have committed a crime.
In a statement in the wake of Briggs’s arrest, Demi Palecek – an Illinois army national guard member who is running as a Democrat for a state legislative seat in Chicago – criticized Ice agents for their lack of training.
“As a military member, I can tell you – the way they handle weapons is reckless and dangerous,” she said. “I’ve seen Ice agents with their fingers on the trigger of real M16s, pointing M9s directly at people. Trigger-happy. No trigger discipline… with this level of escalation and incompetence, people will die.”
An DHS spokesperson countered that “Ice and other federal law enforcement are using proper force with professional training to protect the public as well as federal buildings from violent Antifa-aligned terrorists.” Those arrested assaulted Ice officers, the spokesperson said.
Veterans have also protested Ice’s use of a Chicago area VA hospital’s parking lot as a staging ground for immigration raids.
Senator Tammy Duckworth – a former US army helicopter pilot who lost the use of both legs when she was shot down over Iraq – offered her support to demonstrators on 17 September, demanding that secretary of veterans affairs, Doug Collins, evict agents from the Edward Hines Jr VA Hospital.
“It adds injury to insult when VA surrenders resources in support of reckless, paramilitary activities that do nothing to enhance Veteran care – and even worse, are actively harming Veterans and US servicemembers by rounding up these patriotic Americans, along with their family members, and deporting them with little or no due process out of the country they were willing to risk their lives to defend,” she wrote.
“We have veterans who are staying away and not getting healthcare or coming in carrying their passports,” said Aaron Hughes, an Iraq war veteran and former Illinois national guardsman, who is a member of the anti-war veterans group, About Face, which organized the protest.
Nicholas Podjasek, a 34 year-old US air force veteran born in Honduras, told the Guardian he cancelled a primary care appointment at the Hines VA which had been scheduled for Thursday.
Though Podjasek, like nearly all veterans is a US citizen, he said many are nonetheless worried about being detained by Ice “because we are brown”, citing a Trump administration policy that legalized racial profiling in immigration enforcement.
“These people are masking themselves and they zip tie children,” he said. “They’ve broken into people’s homes and apartments. They could easily detain me on public transportation on the way to the VA or right outside the gate.”
In an email to the Guardian, VA press secretary Peter Kasperowicz denied such fear exists. Kasperowicz said the VA was “proud to support its federal partners in the fight against illegal immigration” and that there “has been no impact on veteran care or facility access” from Ice agents’ use of the Hines VA parking lot.
In Portland, Oregon, US marine corps veteran Daryn Herzberg II, who served in Afghanistan, is seeking $150,000 in damages after he was hospitalized after being tackled from behind by Ice agents while protesting outside a federal facility in Portland on 13 August.
A video posted on social media shows an agent grabbing Herzberg by the hair and slamming his face into the ground multiple times while saying, “You’re not talking shit anymore are you?” according to a Federal Tort Claims Act complaint filed by his attorney.
A DHS spokesperson countered that the former marine corps sergeant, who was honorably discharged in 2012, “is well known for acts of violence outside the Ice facility in Portland, including throwing rocks and other objects at the building and personnel.” The spokesperson also said Herzberg has “used fake blood to falsify injuries” and “perpetuated and encouraged violence” against Ice.
Herzberg has not been charged with a crime. His attorney, Michael Fuller, denied the spokesperson’s assertions and said “the Ice assault video speaks for itself.”
“The fact that DHS won’t attribute its slander of a US marine to an actual witness speaks to the baseless nature of its allegations,” the attorney said.
As previously reported by the Guardian, Afghanistan war veteran Bajun Mavalwalla II faces federal conspiracy charges after participating in a 11 June protest that sought to block the transport of two Venezuelan migrants who were in the country legally seeking asylum when they were detained by Ice.
In Washington DC, attorney general Pam Bondi announced on 14 August that she was charging Afghanistan war veteran Sean Charles Dunn with felony assault after he allegedly threw a sandwich at a Customs and Border Patrol agent. However, prosecutors were unable to secure an indictment from a grand jury.
Other notable veterans arrested, include:
Iraq war veteran and US citizen George Retes, 25, was arrested on 10 July by Ice during a raid on a cannabis farm in Ventura county, California where he worked as a security guard. He was held in federal custody for three days.
Retes is seeking damages under the Federal Tort Claims Act, alleging wrongful arrest. In an op-ed in the San Francisco Chronicle, he wrote: “If it can happen to me, it can happen to any one of us.” In a social media post on X, the Department of Homeland Security alleged he was arrested for assault. As of this writing, no charges have been filed.
A DHS spokesperson told the Guardian that the justice department was reviewing the case, “along with dozens of others, for potential charges related to the execution of the federal search warrant in Camarillo”.
On 25 August, 20-year army combat veteran Jay Carey – who served in Iraq, Bosnia and Afghanistan – was arrested and faces two federal misdemeanor charges after burning a flag in front of the White House. Carey, from western North Carolina, was part of a small group of veterans who came to Washington to protest the national guard’s deployment to that city.
On 13 June , an 87-year-old disabled veteran in a walker was arrested after he traveled from an assisted living facility in Florida to protest Donald Trump’s military parade. John Spitzberg, whose service spanned the army, air force and air national guard, was among dozens of veterans arrested for protesting what they said was the politicization of the armed forces and Trump’s authoritarian instincts. Spitzberg is a member of Veterans for Peace.
Growing number of US veterans face arrest over Ice raid protests
Veterans are facing federal charges after protesting Ice sweeps and Trump’s national guard deployments. The justice department claims the veterans were violent
Militant, nationalistic, white supremacist violent extremism has increased in the United States. In fact, the number of far-right attacks continues to outpace all other types of terrorism and domestic violent extremism.
This is the complete text of a Department of Justice study regarding right-wing extremism that the Trump administration has tried to remove from the Internet.
Militant, nationalistic, white supremacist violent extremism has increased in the United States. In fact, the number of far-right attacks continues to outpace all other types of terrorism and domestic violent extremism. Since 1990, far-right extremists have committed far more ideologically motivated homicides than far-left or radical Islamist extremists, including 227 events that took more than 520 lives.[1] In this same period, far-left extremists committed 42 ideologically motivated attacks that took 78 lives.[2] A recent threat assessment by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security concluded that domestic violent extremists are an acute threat and highlighted a probability that COVID-19 pandemic-related stressors, long-standing ideological grievances related to immigration, and narratives surrounding electoral fraud will continue to serve as a justification for violent actions.[3]
Over the past 20 years, the body of research that examines terrorism and domestic violent extremism has grown exponentially. Studies have looked at the similarities and differences between radicalization to violent domestic ideologies and radicalization to foreign extremist ideologies. Research has found that radicalization processes and outcomes — and perhaps potential prevention and intervention points — vary by group structure and crime type. In addition, research has explored promising and effective approaches for how communities can respond to radicalization and prevent future attacks.[4]
The National Institute of Justice (NIJ) has played a unique role in the evolving literature on terrorism and violent extremism. NIJ has promoted the development of comprehensive terrorism databases to help inform criminal justice responses to terrorism, address the risk of terrorism to potential targets, examine the links between terrorism and other crimes, and study the organizational, structural, and cultural dynamics of terrorism. In 2012, the U.S. Congress requested that NIJ build on these focal points by funding “research targeted toward developing a better understanding of the domestic radicalization phenomenon and advancing evidence-based strategies for effective intervention and prevention.”[5] NIJ has since funded more than 50 research projects on domestic radicalization, which have led to a better understanding of the processes that result in violent action, factors that increase the risk of radicalizing to violence, and how best to prevent and respond to violent extremism.
This article discusses the findings of several NIJ-supported domestic radicalization studies that cover a range of individual and network-centered risk and protective factors that affect radicalization processes, including military involvement and online environments. The article also explores factors that shape the longevity of radicalization processes and their variation by group structure and crime type, and examines factors that affect pathways away from domestic extremism. It concludes with a discussion of how these findings can inform terrorism prevention strategies, criminal justice policy, and community-based prevention programming.
The Characteristics of U.S. Extremists and Individuals Who Commit Hate Crimes
Over the past two decades, research that seeks to understand individual-level engagement in violent extremism has grown tremendously. However, as the research field has developed, a gap has emerged between the increasingly sophisticated arguments that scholars use to explain extremism and the availability of data to test, refine, and validate theories of radicalization.
In 2012, NIJ funded the Empirical Assessment of Domestic Radicalization project to address the data gap in radicalization research.[6] The project created the Profiles of Individual Radicalization in the United States (PIRUS) database, a cross-ideological repository of information on the characteristics of U.S. extremists. In 2017, NIJ supported a follow-on project[7] that sought to replicate the PIRUS data for individuals in the United States who commit hate crimes. This project yielded the Bias Incidents and Actors Study (BIAS) dataset, the first data resource for researchers and practitioners interested in understanding the risk and protective factors associated with committing hate crimes.
PIRUS and BIAS are designed to provide users with information on a wide range of factors that can play a role in a person’s radicalization to criminal activity.[8] These risk and protective factors can be divided into four domains:[9]
The situational characteristics of the crimes, including whether the acts were premeditated or spontaneous, involved co-conspirators, or were committed while under the influence of drugs and alcohol.
The characteristics of the victims, including whether targets were “hard” (for example, military bases, secure facilities) or “soft” (for example, businesses, public areas, private civilians) and whether the individuals had prior relationships with their victims.
Factors that produce the social bonds that may protect against mobilization to violence, such as marriage, military service, work experience, and advanced education.
Factors that may act as radicalization mechanisms and risk factors for violence, such as previous criminal activity, membership in extremist or hate groups, substance use, and mental illness.
The PIRUS and BIAS data have been used to generate insights on a range of important topics related to hate crime and extremism; however, there are three overarching findings common to both datasets: diversity in beliefs, diversity in behaviors, and diversity in characteristics.
Diversity in Beliefs
Although it is not uncommon for a particular ideology to dominate the public discourse around extremism, the PIRUS and BIAS data indicate that U.S. extremists and individuals who commit hate crimes routinely come from across the ideological spectrum, including far-right, far-left, Islamist, or single-issue ideologies. These ideologies break down into particular movements, or sub-ideologies. For instance, in 2018, the PIRUS data identified extremists associated with several anti-government movements, Second Amendment militias, the sovereign citizen movement, white supremacy, ecoterrorism, anarchism, the anti-abortion movement, the QAnon conspiracy theory, and others.[10] The prevalence of particular movements can ebb and flow over time depending on political climate and law enforcement priorities, but at no point in recent U.S. history has one set of beliefs completely dominated extremism or hate crime activity.[11] Furthermore, the PIRUS and BIAS data reveal that U.S. extremists and individuals who commit hate crimes are often motivated by overlapping views. For instance, it is common for individuals from the anti-government militia movement to adopt views of white supremacy or for those from the extremist environmental movement to take part in anarchist violence. Nearly 17% of the individuals in PIRUS were affiliated with more than one extremist group or sub-ideological movement, and nearly 15% of the individuals in BIAS selected the victims of their hate crimes because of multiple identity characteristics, such as race and sexual orientation.[12]
Diversity in Behaviors
Although radicalization to violence has been a primary topic in extremism and hate crime research, the PIRUS and BIAS data indicate that U.S. extremists and individuals who commit hate crimes often engage in a range of violent and nonviolent criminal activities. Indeed, 42% of PIRUS and nearly 30% of BIAS individual actors engaged exclusively in nonviolent crimes, such as property damage, financial schemes, and illegal demonstrations.[13] Moreover, the violent outcomes represented in the PIRUS and BIAS data vary in scope and type. For instance, approximately 15% of those in BIAS committed or planned to commit mass casualty crimes, while the remaining subjects targeted specific victims.[14] Similarly, nearly 50% of those in BIAS did not premeditate their crimes but rather acted spontaneously after chance encounters with their victims.[15]
Diversity in Characteristics
One of the more common conclusions of recent research on radicalization is that no single profile accurately captures the characteristics of the individuals who commit extremist and hate crimes.[16] The PIRUS and BIAS data support this finding, revealing that background characteristics vary considerably depending on ideological affiliations. For instance, white supremacists in PIRUS tend to be older and less well-educated and are more likely to have criminal histories than those who were inspired by foreign terrorist groups, such as al-Qaida or the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or those associated with the extremist environmental or anarchist movements.[17] Despite these differences, some risk and protective factors tend to separate violent from nonviolent individuals, regardless of ideology.[18] In the PIRUS data, individuals with criminal records, documented or suspected mental illness, and membership in extremist cliques are more often classified as violent, while those who are married with stable employment backgrounds are more likely to engage in nonviolent crimes.[19] Similarly, in BIAS, violent individuals are more likely to co-offend with peers, have criminal histories that include acts of violence, and offend while under the influence of drugs or alcohol.[20]
Military Experience and Domestic Violent Extremism
According to current statistics, individuals with military backgrounds represent 11.5% of the total known extremists who have committed violent and nonviolent crimes in the United States since 1990.[21] Although this percentage seems small, there has been a growing trend of (former) military members engaging in extremist offenses in recent years. An average of seven people with U.S. military backgrounds per year committed extremist crimes between 1990 and 2010. That rate has risen to an average of 29 people per year over the past decade. Also worth noting is that more than half (52%) of extremists with military experience are identified as violent.
Given the growth of violent domestic extremism among military personnel, the relationship between military service and radicalization has become a major concern. Prior NIJ-funded studies have identified military experience as a potential risk factor for attempted and actual terrorism.[22] The likelihood of radicalization and radicalization to violence increases when individuals have already left military service.[23] This research suggests that military service is not a social bond that inhibits extremist violence.
NIJ studies have also shown that individuals with military experience may be susceptible to recruitment by domestic violent extremist groups due to their unique skills, which an extremist group may perceive as contributing to the success of a terrorist attack.[24] Also, transitioning from military to civilian life appears to be a pull factor for engaging in violent extremism.[25] Indicators for potential involvement in extremism may include a lack of a sense of community, purpose, and belonging. If these indicators are identified early, community stakeholders — in partnership with military agencies — could have an opportunity to intervene. Although such knowledge is valuable, the role of military service in radicalization to violent extremism still requires study.
Differences in Violent Extremist Characteristics Between Military Veterans and Civilians
In 2019, NIJ funded researchers at the University of Southern California to study the link between military service and violent domestic extremism. They are also examining the differences between military veteran and civilian extremists in terms of their characteristics and social networks.[26] Although this study is ongoing, preliminary findings have been drawn from a secondary analysis of the American Terrorism Study data, which contain information on people federally indicted for terrorism-related crimes by the U.S. government between 1980 and 2002.[27] With these data, the researchers compared the demographic and homegrown violent extremist characteristics among military veterans and civilians. The demographic characteristics considered were age, race, sex, marital status, and education level. The homegrown violent extremist characteristics consisted of the length of group membership, type of terrorist group, role in the group, mode of recruitment into the group, primary target, and the state of indictment.
The research team observed significant differences between military veteran and civilian extremists across both demographic and homegrown violent extremist characteristics. First, they found that military veteran and civilian extremists differed with respect to age, sex, and marital status. Specifically, individuals with military service who engaged in homegrown violent extremism were more likely to be older, male, and in marital or cohabiting relationships than civilians who engaged in homegrown violent extremism. Second, analyses revealed that, compared to civilian extremists, military veteran extremists had greater affiliations with right-wing terrorist groups (versus left-wing, international, or other terrorist groups) and were more likely to hold leadership positions within these groups and either initiate a terrorist group or unite groups together. Finally, other than government/federal officials or buildings, which were the primary targets across all groups, the primary targets of veterans were diverse social groups, such as those belonging to racial, ethnic, and religious minority groups.
Implications of Transitioning Out of Military Service
The University of Southern California researchers intend to supplement these results by interviewing members from the social networks of military veterans and civilians who committed homegrown violent extremism between 2003 and 2019. The findings produced thus far are important, especially because the association between military experience and terrorism is understudied. Ultimately, these results suggest that people who transition from active duty to veteran status experience a nuanced, complex, and potentially lifelong process. Veterans who encounter difficulties during this transition and desire — but lack — a sense of community, purpose, and belonging after leaving the military may be attracted to the pull of domestic extremist groups. In these groups, veterans can lead and collaborate with others of similar ideologies to accomplish a shared mission akin to what they did in the military. For example, the military veterans in this study largely endorsed right-wing values; thus, perhaps something about the narratives of right-wing extremist groups compensates for the void felt when leaving military service. With such insights in mind, researchers recommend forming partnerships among civilians, the military, and veteran communities to identify and prevent violent extremism among U.S. veterans.
Longevity of Terrorist Plots in the United States
A major question for researchers and counterterrorism officials is how to prevent the next act of terrorism or violent extremism from occurring. As such, much attention has been paid to disrupted plots and successful interdiction tactics that ultimately led to arrest and indictment. Less attention has been given to what those responsible for acts of terrorism and violent extremism do to successfully evade detection and arrest. In other words, the focus has not been on what terrorists and violent extremists are doing “right.”
In 2013, NIJ funded researchers at the University of Arkansas’ Terrorism Research Center to study the sequencing of precursor behaviors for individuals who have been federally indicted in the United States for charges related to terrorism and domestic violent extremism.[28] Based on preliminary analyses, the researchers somewhat serendipitously observed lifespan differences between lone actors and those operating in small cells or more formalized groups. Consequently, it warranted a more comprehensive examination of the factors that increased the likelihood of terrorists and violent extremists evading arrest. NIJ funded the researchers to identify behaviors that improved the chances of plot longevity — or the ability for terrorists to commit acts of terrorism and evade capture by law enforcement — for individuals federally indicted on terrorism-related charges.[29]
Data on the longevity of terrorism and violent extremism plots come from the American Terrorism Study, the longest-running project on terrorism and violent extremism in the United States. With NIJ funding that began in 2003,[30] the American Terrorism Study maintains the most comprehensive dataset on temporally linked precursor behaviors and outcomes of terrorism and violent extremism plots. To examine plot longevity, the Arkansas researchers[31] limited their analyses to 346 federally indicted individuals who were linked to the planning or completion of a terrorist attack in the United States from 1980 to 2015. Longevity, or duration of their “terrorist lifespan,” is based on the date of a person’s involvement in their first preparatory activity and their “neutralizing” date (usually the date of arrest).
One of the key findings from this research is a correlation between significant declines in the lifespan of individual terrorists and major changes to the U.S. Attorney General guidelines established to combat terrorism and violent extremism in the United States. For example, those who began in the mid- to late 1970s, following Watergate, COINTELPRO, and the Privacy Act, had a median longevity of 2,230 days. In contrast, the median lifespan of terrorists who began operating in the mid-1980s decreased to 1,067 days. Later, in the early 2000s, it fell even further to 99 days, which reflects the FBI’s tighter focus on terrorism and violent extremism and guidelines granting law enforcement more discretion in the investigative techniques employed.
The researchers also found that the lifespans of terrorists and violent extremists vary significantly depending on key attributes, such as ideology, sex, and educational attainment. For example, environmental and extreme left-wing violent extremists tend to sustain themselves for relatively long periods of time (5.4 and 4.3 years, respectively), while the longevity of extreme right-wing and radical Islamist terrorists is, on average, two years or less.
Females federally indicted on charges related to terrorism and violent extremism also tend to have increased longevity compared to male terrorists and violent extremists, perhaps because of females’ disproportionate representation in longer-lasting extreme left-wing and environmental movements, as well as increased representation in left-wing group leadership roles. Females involved in terrorism and extremism are usually more educated, which is also associated with extended longevity. Further, females who play support roles in terrorism and extremist groups — as is more often the case for right-wing extremists and radical Islamist terrorists — also appear to have longer lifespans. In contrast, males have been more likely to engage in overtly criminal preparatory behavior and actual incident participation than females. Both types of behavior are significantly more likely to attract the attention of law enforcement and would be expected to shorten the longevity of both male and female terrorists and violent extremists.
Finally, longevity also depends on a plot’s sophistication and the extent of the planning required to carry it out. Less sophisticated plans or executed plots, or those using simpler and less advanced weapons, are generally associated with longer lifespans for terrorists and violent extremists. More sophisticated plots may provide greater potential for missteps by terrorists and violent extremists and leads for law enforcement. Additionally, more sophisticated plots are associated with more meetings with accomplices and necessitate extra preparation. Importantly, both the number of meetings and preparatory activities have been found to be negatively related to the successful completion of terrorist incidents, suggesting that early intervention or arrest are also linked to these two factors.
How Domestic Terrorists Use the Internet
Terrorists and terrorist groups use the internet to share propaganda and recruit new members. The internet provides a platform to strengthen their members’ commitment to the cause, encourage radicalized individuals to act, and coordinate legal and illegal activities. A recently published meta-analysis concluded, “Exposure to radical content online appears to have a larger relationship with radicalization than other media-related risk factors (for example, television usage, media exposure), and the impact of this relationship is most pronounced for the behavioral outcomes of radicalization.”[32]
In 2014, NIJ funded a study to develop a deeper understanding of what domestic terrorists discuss on the internet.[33] The study analyzed 18,120 posts from seven online web forums by and for individuals interested in the ideological far right. The research team read each post’s content and coded it for either quantitative or qualitative analyses depending on the project’s objective.
The project provided several important insights into terrorist use of the internet. First, the web forums included discussions about a variety of beliefs, such as gun rights, conspiracy theories, hate-based sentiments, and anti-government beliefs; however, the intensity of ideological expression was generally weak. The nature of the online environments that far-right groups use likely facilitates the diffusion of ideological agendas.
Second, the amount and type of involvement in these forums played a key role in radicalization. Posting behaviors changed over time. Users grew more ideological and radical as other users reinforced their ideas and connected their ideas to those from other forums. (It is important to note that the study focused on online expression and not conversion to offline violence.)
Third, far-right extremists were primarily interested in general technology issues. Discussions focused on encryption tools and methods (such as Tor), internet service providers and social media platforms, and law enforcement actions to surveil illicit activities online. These far-right extremists appeared more interested in defensive actions than sophisticated schemes for radicalization or offensive actions such as criminal cyberattacks.
The study used social network analyses to visualize user communications and network connections, focusing on individuals’ responses to posts made within threads to highlight interconnected associations between actors. The social network analyses indicated that far-right forums have a low network density, which suggests a degree of information recycling between key actors. The redundant connections between actors may slow the spread of new information. As a result, such forums may inefficiently distribute new knowledge due to their relatively insular nature. They may also be generally difficult to disrupt, as the participants’ language and behaviors reinforce others and create an echo chamber. These networks are similar to others observed in computer hacker communities and data theft forums,[34] which suggests that there may be consistencies in the nature of online dialogue regardless of the content.
The study also indicated that extreme external events usually did not affect posting behaviors. However, there were significant differences associated with conspiratorial, anti-Islamic, and anti-immigrant posts after the Boston Marathon bombing. It may be that violence or major disruptive events inspired by jihadist ideologies draw great responses from far-right groups relative to their own actions. The same appears to be true for the 2012 presidential election; the study observed increases both in the number of posts in the month after the election and in overt signs of individual ties or associations to far-right movements through self-claim posts, movement-related signatures, and usernames. These findings are consistent with other recent work comparing online mobilization after the 2012 and 2016 presidential elections.[35]
Entering and Exiting White Supremacy in the United States
An NIJ-funded research team led by RTI International examined the complex social-psychological processes involved with entering, mobilizing, and exiting white supremacy in the United States.[36] The researchers conducted in-depth life history interviews with 47 former members of white supremacist groups in 24 states and two provinces in Canada.[37]
For this project, white supremacy referred to groups that reject essential democratic ideals, equality, and tolerance. A key organizing principle is that inherent differences between races and ethnicities position white and European ancestry above all others. Those interviewed were authoritarian, anti-liberal, or militant nationalists who had a general intolerance toward people of color. They had used violence to achieve their goals and supported a race war to eradicate the world of nonwhite people.[38]
The study led to several key findings about entering and exiting white supremacy in the United States.
Hate as Outcome
The study found that most people do not join white supremacist groups because they are adherents of a particular ideology. Rather, a combination of background factors increases the likelihood that someone will be susceptible to recruitment messaging (for example, propaganda).[39] Previous research has highlighted that hate or adherence to racist violence was an outcome of participation in white supremacist groups.[40] The commitment to white supremacist groups lacked a preexisting sense of racial grievance or hatred that motivated an individual to join the racist movement.[41] One former member reported having “no inkling of what [Nazism] really was other than what you saw on TV.”[42] The NIJ-funded study found that people joined white supremacist groups because they were angry, lonely, and isolated, and they were looking for opportunities to express their rage.[43]
Vulnerabilities as Precondition
The former white supremacists had various personal, psychological, and social vulnerabilities that made them strive for what psychologists have framed as developing a new possible self.[44] High levels of negative life experiences — including, but not limited to, maladjustment, abuse, and family instability — potentially make a person imagine a new, different, and more fulfilled self.[45] They can imagine an empowered future self with friends and a purpose. Extremist recruiters prey on these desires. The former white supremacists indicated high levels of physical, sexual, and psychological abuse as children; strained personal relationships; and general difficulties throughout their lives. These struggles made white supremacy seem like an improvement to their sense of self, as the group came with a ready-made set of friends, social events, and camaraderie among individuals with similarly rough pasts. Besides these social benefits, white supremacist groups provided members with a deeper sense of belonging and explanation for their life troubles, rooted in a sense of racial pride and empowerment.
Gradual, Nonlinear Exit
Most white supremacists in this country do not remain members for life. Rather, group membership is often temporary (but not always short-lived), and many become disillusioned and burnt out over time. The study showed that the exit process is gradual, as the former white supremacists reported slowly becoming dissatisfied with the ideology, tactics, or politics of a group.[46] They described an identity that became filled with negative encounters with other members, even breeding distrust. White supremacy requires the development of a totalizing identity that results in isolating members from nonextremists. This marginalization fosters a sense of social stigma that makes white supremacy less attractive and further supports disengagement and deradicalization processes.
This research reported that emotional dynamics create trajectories of development and decline in white supremacy and the role of disillusionment among the reasons why members exit the organization.[47] These analyses offer an explanation for how white supremacist organizations maintain solidarity even though many individuals stay in groups after losing their ideological commitment. They also demonstrate that exit from a group is a nonlinear process.[48] Meanwhile, in other analyses, the study team reported that, even after an individual exits a group, their white supremacist identity lingers with a residual effect.[49] That research likened hate to an addiction that creates an uncontrollable emotional, social, and cognitive hold over adherents, which has the ability to pull former members back into hate almost against their will.[50] The former white supremacists shared experiences in which music, environments, and images created desire, longing, and curiosity about their old lifestyle within the organization.
Opportunities
The NIJ-funded study found several blind spots in terms of identification and awareness among criminal legal system practitioners and other responders. This resulted in several missed opportunities for intervention and practical solutions. Exhibit 1 details four areas in which the study findings can contribute to criminal justice policy and practice.[51]
Exhibit 1. Missed Opportunities for Intervention and Practical Solutions
The results of the NIJ-funded studies discussed in this article have several implications for policy and practice. First, they illustrate that extremism is complex and that successfully countering it will require a unified response that bridges law enforcement, community partners, health officials, and concerned citizens. To facilitate a shared understanding of the extremist threat, stakeholders engaged in counterextremism efforts routinely use findings from these studies to provide training to concerned family and friends about potential radicalization warning signs and how best to respond. They also use the findings to educate law enforcement, corrections and probation officers, and mental health professionals on the complexity of radicalization so they can accurately gauge and respond to extremism in their communities. These types of training initiatives will remain critical to counterextremism efforts as the threat continues to evolve.
Second, the studies highlight the importance of focusing criminal justice resources on domestic extremism. Although international terrorist organizations remain a threat, these studies show that domestic extremists continue to be responsible for most terrorist attacks in the United States. Historically, far fewer resources have been dedicated to the study of domestic extremism, leaving gaps in our understanding about terrorist trends, recruitment and retention processes, and online behaviors. Due in large part to NIJ’s commitment to funding research on domestic radicalization, considerable progress has recently been made in addressing these topics. But this work will need to continue if we hope to keep pace with the rapidly evolving threat landscape.
Finally, the studies highlight the need for communitywide partnerships that link government and nongovernment organizations in support of community-level prevention and intervention programs. Law enforcement and criminal justice resources for countering extremism are finite and scarce, making it imperative that we focus our research and support efforts on understanding what occurs before a crime takes place. As the studies reviewed in this article show, there is often an opportunity to intervene to help individuals exit extremism before they engage in criminal activity. Similarly, prevention efforts are needed in digital spaces where extremist narratives often flourish. Achieving these goals will require community members, policymakers, and practitioners to commit to supporting counterextremism efforts.
About This Article
This article was published as part of NIJ Journal issue number 285. This article discusses the following awards:
Opinions or points of view expressed in this document represent a consensus of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official position, policies, terminology, or posture of the U.S. Department of Justice on domestic violent extremism. The content is not intended to create, does not create, and may not be relied upon to create any rights, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law by any party in any matter civil or criminal.
[note 8] The PIRUS and BIAS datasets are based on the same data collection methodologies and share similar goals. Both contain random samples of individuals who committed crimes in the United States that were motivated by their extremist ideologies or hate beliefs. The PIRUS dataset includes 2,225 individuals from 1948 to 2018, and BIAS is based on 966 cases from 1990 to 2018. Both datasets are collected entirely from public sources, including court records, online and print news, and public social media accounts. Both seek to capture individuals who promoted a range of extremist ideologies and hate beliefs. PIRUS, for instance, includes those whose crimes were associated with anti-government, white supremacist, environmental, anarchist, jihadist, and conspiracy theory movements. Similarly, BIAS includes individuals who selected victims based on their race, ethnicity, and nationality; sexual orientation; religious affiliation; age; or disability.
[note 21] Unless otherwise noted, all data reported in this section originate from Michael Jensen, Elizabeth Yates, and Sheehan Kane, Radicalization in the Ranks: An Assessment of the Scope and Nature of Criminal Extremism in the United States Military, College Park, MD: START, January 2022. In this project, extremists with military backgrounds consisted of active and nonactive personnel from all military branches and reserves, aside from the Space Force and Coast Guard Reserves. Individuals who were honorably discharged, dishonorably discharged, or otherwise violated the Uniform Code of Military Justice were excluded from the study. Also excluded were those discharged through court martial unless information about their criminal proceedings was publicly available.
[note 34] Thomas J. Holt and Adam M. Bossler, “Issues in the Prevention of Cybercrime,” in Cybercrime in Progress: Theory and Prevention of Technology-Enabled Offenses (New York: Routledge, 2016), 136-168.
[note 37] The project included three human rights groups (Anti-Defamation League, Simon Wiesenthal Center, and Southern Poverty Law Center) and Life After Hate, an organization that assists white supremacists in exiting the movement. The project partners helped develop a semi-structured interview protocol and provided contact information for initial interviewees. The study used a snowballing technique from these initial interviewees to identify former white supremacists who were in the public sphere to determine if they were interested in being interviewed. The interviews were conducted in places where the individuals would be comfortable, including hotel rooms, homes, places of work, coffee shops, restaurants, and parks. The interviews were in-depth accounts (lasting 6-8 hours each) of individuals’ backgrounds (for example, how they grew up), entry into white supremacy (for example, how they learned about the movement), mobilization (for example, rank and use of violence), and exit process (for example, initial doubts and barriers to exit). The completion of the project was a collaboration with equal contributions from Kathleen Blee, Matthew DeMichele, and Pete Simi and support from Mehr Latif and Steven Windisch.
NIJ-funded research projects have led to a better understanding of the processes that result in violent action, factors that increase the risk of radicalizing to violence, and how best to prevent and respond to violent extremism.
What NIJ Research Tells Us About Domestic Terrorism
Militant, nationalistic, white supremacist violent extremism has increased in the United States. In fact, the number of far-right attacks continues to outpace all other types of terrorism and domestic violent extremism.
Justice Brett Kavanaugh, in his opinion, wrote that citizens or lawful residents would be free to go after brief encounters with immigration agents.
But this veteran’s experience shows the opposite. The officers didn’t check his documents when it would have taken only two minutes. Instead, they arrested him based on where he worked and his appearance.
On July 10, a 25-year-old U.S. citizen and Army veteran was on his way to work as a security guard at a cannabis farm in Camarillo, Ventura County, California. He never expected that his day would take a drastic turn. As he approached the farm, he noticed traffic piling up with cars stuck bumper-to-bumper. Protesters were walking along the sides of the street. He soon saw masked federal immigration agents blocking the road.
A terrifying encounter with immigration officers
He tried to explain that he was a U.S. citizen, a father of two, and an Army veteran who had served in Iraq. But the immigration agents didn’t seem to care. Their focus wasn’t on his identity or service record but on blocking his way.
As a contract worker, missing his job meant losing his paycheck. He got out of his car and tried to explain again. The immigration officers ignored him. When they started walking toward him, he got back inside his car to avoid confrontation.
The situation worsened when immigration agents began using tear gas to disperse the nearby protesters. The gas filled his car, making it difficult to breathe. He panicked but still tried to comply with the officers’ orders. However, they gave contradictory instructions like “pull over to the side” and “reverse” while also trying to open his car door.
Before he could react, an immigration agent smashed his window and sprayed pepper spray into the car. He was dragged out, and one agent knelt on his neck while another pinned his back. Despite holding valid identification in his wallet inside the car, the officers refused to check and confirm his citizenship.
He was zip-tied and made to sit in the dirt with other detainees for four hours. He overheard immigration agents questioning why he had been arrested but received no answers. After that, he was thrown into a jail cell without charges or explanations.
Inhumane Conditions in Immigration Detention
His first night in jail was unbearable. His hands, coated with tear gas and pepper spray, burned constantly because he wasn’t allowed to wash them off. Over the next three nights and days, he remained locked up without being allowed to make a phone call or speak to a lawyer.
He missed his daughter’s third birthday. Still, no explanation or apology was offered. After three days, he was released with no charges against him. He was simply let go, with immigration officials providing only a vague statement about cases being reviewed for “potential federal charges.”
This ordeal shook him deeply. He served his country wearing the military uniform, standing watch in dangerous conditions abroad. He believed in the values of fairness, respect, and dignity that are supposed to be guaranteed to every citizen in America.
However, despite proving his citizenship and military service, he was stripped of his rights. He was treated like an intruder, forcibly detained and isolated without cause.
The Broader Warning: This Could Happen to Anyone
The Supreme Court recently allowed immigration enforcement officers to continue their aggressive tactics in California. Justice Brett Kavanaugh, in his opinion, wrote that citizens or lawful residents would be free to go after brief encounters with immigration agents.
But this veteran’s experience shows the opposite. The officers didn’t check his documents when it would have taken only two minutes. Instead, they arrested him based on where he worked and his appearance.
This is not an issue about political sides or voting patterns. It’s about basic rights. If a U.S. citizen can be detained by immigration agents, silenced, and dehumanized despite holding valid identification, then anyone could be next.
This veteran’s experience has now become a warning signal. He is taking legal action with the help of the Institute for Justice under the Federal Torts Claim Act. However, he must wait six months before filing a lawsuit.
He stresses that justice should not be restricted to one group or one viewpoint—it must be accessible and fair for all.
His case highlights how immigration enforcement policies, without proper checks, can strip citizens of their dignity and rights. It raises important questions about oversight, accountability, and fairness in immigration enforcement.
This is not just one person’s story—it’s a cautionary tale that underscores the importance of protecting every citizen from wrongful treatment by immigration authorities.
U.S. veteran detained by immigration officers in California over identity despite valid ID
On July 10, a 25-year-old U.S. citizen and Army veteran was on his way to work as a security guard at a cannabis farm in Camarillo, Ventura County, California. He never expected that his day would take a drastic turn. As he approached the farm, he noticed traffic piling up with cars stuck bumper-to-bumper. Protesters […]
President Trump was operating within his constitutional powers as commander in chief when he ordered the U.S. military to destroy a vessel in the Caribbean, administration officials said, describing the drugs it was allegedly smuggling as an imminent national security threat.
But that claim was sharply disputed by legal experts and some lawmakers, who said that Trump exceeded his legal authority by using lethal military force against a target that posed no direct danger to the U.S. and doing so without congressional authorization.
The disagreement since Trump announced the deadly attack Tuesday underscored how much of a departure it represents from decades of U.S. counternarcotics operations—and raised questions about whether drug smugglers can be treated as legitimate military targets.
“Every boatload of any form of drug that poisons the American people is an imminent threat. And at the DOD, our job is to defeat imminent threats,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told reporters Thursday during a visit to an Army base in Georgia. “A drug cartel is no different than al Qaeda, and they will be treated as such.”
Trump administration officials said Tuesday’s strike, which killed 11 people on the boat, was just the opening salvo in an expanded campaign to dismantle the drug cartels they say pose a major threat to Americans.
But in importing tactics from the post-9/11 war against terrorist groups to use against drug cartels, some former officials said, Trump is trampling on longstanding limits on presidential use of force and asserting legal authorities that don’t exist.
The casualties “weren’t engaged in anything like a direct attack on the United States” and weren’t afforded a trial to determine their guilt, said Frank Kendall, who served as the secretary of the Air Force during the Biden administration and holds a law degree. “Frankly, I can’t see how this can be considered anything other than a nonjudicial killing outside the boundaries of domestic and international law.”
Unlike the interdictions which are usually conducted by the U.S. Coast Guard, the strike was carried out without warning shots, and no effort was made to detain the ship, apprehend its crew, or confirm the drugs on board. “Instead of interdicting it, on the president’s orders they blew it up,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in Mexico City on Wednesday.
Trump said U.S. forces “positively identified” the crew before the attack as members of Venezuelan crime syndicate Tren de Aragua, calling them “narcoterrorists.” Tren de Aragua is among the Latin American cartels and gangs that Trump has designated as foreign terrorist organizations since February.
The White House has provided no further information on the operation against the boat or detailed the legal arguments that it claims support it. Nor have officials disclosed where the strike took place, the identities of the casualties or the weapons used.
Some Trump administration officials suggest that by designating the drug cartels as foreign terrorist organizations, the Pentagon has the leeway to treat the groups as it would foreign terrorists. As commander in chief, Trump has the power to order military action against imminent threats without congressional authorization, they said.
The strike “was taken in defense of vital U.S. national interests and in the collective self-defense of other nations,” White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly said, adding that the strike occurred in international waters and “was fully consistent with the law of armed conflict.”
But Geoffrey Corn, a retired lieutenant colonel who was the Army’s senior adviser on the law of war, said: “I don’t think there is any way to legitimately characterize a drug ship heading from Venezuela, arguably to Trinidad, as an actual or imminent armed attack against the United States, justifying this military response.”
Corn, a law professor at Texas Tech University, noted that critics have condemned U.S. drone strikes since 2001 against militants in Afghanistan, Iraq and other countries as extrajudicial killings, but those strikes were legitimate, he said, because the U.S. was engaged in an armed conflict under the laws of war against al Qaeda and other terrorist groups.
Brian Finucane, a former State Department lawyer who is now at the International Crisis Group, said that designation of drug cartels as terrorist groups doesn’t authorize the use of military force against them. Rather it enables the U.S. to levy sanctions and pursue criminal prosecutions against individuals who support the groups.
Nor can military action be justified under the law Congress passed authorizing the use of force against al Qaeda and related terrorist groups following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, experts said.
For the military to use force, “there needs to be a legitimate claim of self-defense in international waters, an action that is necessary and proportional in response to an armed attack or imminent armed attack,” said Juan Gonzalez, who served as the National Security Council’s senior director for Western Hemisphere affairs during the Biden administration. “That clearly didn’t happen.”
The attack was the U.S. military’s first publicly acknowledged airstrike in Central or South America since the U.S. invasion of Panama in 1989. The White House released a grainy black-and-white video that showed the destruction of a small boat, which it celebrated as a blunt warning for drug traffickers throughout the region.
Trump administration officials have offered conflicting accounts of the episode. On Tuesday, Rubio said the drugs the vessel was carrying “were probably headed to Trinidad or some other country in the Caribbean” and could “contribute to the instability these countries are facing,” differing from Trump’s statement that the vessel was “heading to the United States.” On Wednesday, Rubio suggested that the shipment was “eventually” headed to the U.S.
No state in the region has publicly appealed for the U.S. to take military action against the cartels as an act of collective self-defense, Corn said.
On Thursday, two Venezuelan F-16 jet fighters flew near one of the U.S. Navy warships that have been positioned near the county. The Pentagon criticized the apparent show of force as a “highly provocative move” and warned Venezuela not to interfere with its “counter narco-terror operations.”
In the past, some U.S. counternarcotics strikes have ended in tragedy. In 2001, Peruvian and U.S. counterdrug agents mistook a small plane carrying American missionaries over the Peruvian Amazon as belonging to drug traffickers. The Peruvian Air Force shot down the plane, killing a 35-year-old woman and her infant daughter.
The U.S. has limited intelligence on small drug boats leaving Venezuela, from which the Drug Enforcement Administration was expelled in 2005 under then-President Hugo Chávez, said Mike Vigil, a former DEA director of international operations.
“The United States doesn’t really have the capability to develop good intelligence about these embarkations,” he said. “You don’t just send a missile and destroy a boat. It is the equivalent of a police officer walking up to a drug trafficker on the street and shooting him.”
In Quito, Ecuador, on Thursday, Rubio announced the designation of two more criminal groups—the Ecuadorean Los Choneros and Los Lobos—as foreign terrorist organizations. He said U.S. partners in the region would participate in operations to use lethal force against drug cartels.
A senior Mexican naval officer with decades of service and experience boarding drug vessels said actions like the one taken Tuesday by the U.S. would never be allowed by its Mexican counterpart, which has been trained in interdiction procedures by the U.S. Coast Guard.
“There is never a direct attack unless you are attacked,” he said. “As commander of the ship, I would get into serious trouble. I could be accused of murder.”
Did a Boat Strike in Caribbean Exceed Trump’s Authority to Use Military Force?
Legal experts said the president exceeded his legal authority by using lethal military force against a target that posed no direct danger to the U.S.
The number of Americans missing work for National Guard deployments or other military or civic duty is at a 19-year high, adding disruption to a labor market that’s already under strain.
Between January and August, workers reported 90,000 instances of people missing at least a week of work because of military deployments, jury duty or other civil service, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That is more than double the number of similar absences in the same eight-month period last year, and the highest level since 2006, when President George W. Bush deployed the National Guard to Iraq, Afghanistan and the Southwest U.S. border in large numbers.
The absences are due at least in part to a growing military presence in American cities. Since taking office in January, President Donald Trump has sent thousands of National Guard service members — civilians, many with full-time jobs — to Los Angeles and Washington, D.C. He has suggested expansions of those efforts to at least seven more cities, including Chicago, New York, Baltimore and New Orleans, and called for the creation of a new military unit that can quickly mobilize anywhere in the country.
The ramp-up is happening at a vulnerable time for the labor market. Job openings have dropped in recent months, layoffs are picking up and businesses are slow to hire. Companies added just 22,000 new jobs in August, well below economists’ expectations, while the unemployment rate edged up to 4.3 percent.
Military-related absences so far make up just a sliver of overall workplace disruptions. In August, for example, more than twice as many people reported missing work because of labor disputes, and seven times as many said they were out because of bad weather. Economists also caution that the data are calculated using a small subset of responses, which can distort the numbers. Even so, with the president considering expanding National Guard presence to other parts of the country, they warn the burden on workers and employers could deepen.
“Uncertainty over whether you or your employees might be called to National Guard duty and how long that deployment might last is just adding to the chaos” for families and businesses, said Michael Makowsky, an economist at Clemson University whose work focuses on law enforcement. “Anything that makes it harder to make a plan is generally bad for the economy.”
The White House says its efforts are improving the U.S. economy by combating crime and unrest in major cities.
The “President has rightfully deployed the National Guard to cities like Los Angeles, which was ravaged by violent riots … and Washington, DC, while strengthening small businesses and revitalizing our economy,” spokeswoman Anna Kelly said in a statement. “These deployments saved small businesses from further destruction and preserved great American jobs.”
Although military-related work absences tend to fluctuate throughout the year, spiking during hurricane season, for example, they have been consistently higher than in 2024 almost every month this year.
“You can see an elevation in the data, that’s for darn sure,” said William Beach, who headed the BLS during Trump’s first term and is now a senior fellow at the Economic Policy Innovation Center. “It’s more than likely because of a military influence — an increase in reserve duty or an increase in military service.”
The data come from the Current Population Survey, a monthly federal survey that asks Americans whether they missed work in a given week each month, and why. Civil or military duty-related absences include jury duty, Armed Forces reserve duty, National Guard duty or “a similar obligation,” according to the BLS.
National Guard recruitment has recently picked up after years of decline. In an executive order last month, Trump called for the creation of an online job portal to encourage more people to apply to join federal law enforcement efforts, saying they are needed in “cities where public safety and order has been lost.”
Deployment orders are expected to accelerate as the president leans on the National Guard to crack down on what he calls rampant crime in U.S. cities. Although a federal judge last week ruled that the Trump administration’s use of troops to carry out domestic law enforcement in Los Angeles was illegal, he did not require that the administration withdraw the 300 service members who are still in the city.
The Trump administration has appealed that ruling and suggested that it will not hamper plans to send troops to other cities. The White House is also expected to extend the National Guard’s deployment in D.C. — where it has faced criticism for relying on troops for landscaping and trash removal — from mid-September to Dec. 31.
For those who are being deployed, assignments require stepping away from duties at their day jobs. Despite federal protections, some National Guard members say they have trouble finding or keeping work, especially in a labor market weighed down by uncertainty.
“Companies say they’re veteran-friendly until it’s time for you to deploy or there’s a natural disaster, and they realize your time out of the office is going to cost them productivity or they’re going to have to hire someone to cover for you,” said Charlie Elison, a noncommissioned officer in the Army National Guard who also works a day job as an executive director for the city of Philadelphia.
Elison, who until earlier this year worked for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, said his career options have been “very limited” because of growing military responsibilities. He spends about 90 days a year out of the office in uniform, and he usually does a year-long deployment overseas every four years. Adding crime-related domestic duties to that list, he said, could add new challenges for troops and employers.
“There’s this unfunded mandate across our country, where Guard and reserve members are asked to do more and more every year,” he said. “And there’s this unfunded requirement for our civilian employers to shoulder that burden.”
Military-related work absences at a 19-year high amid deployments
‘I Thought We’d Have That Settled Easier’: Trump Demonstrates His Incompetence, Defends His Failed Negotiations With Russia During Press Conference
During his remarks at a press conference in June, President Trump defended his failed negotiations with Russia. Trump stated, “I thought we’d have that settled easier.”
The defense secretary’s flip-flopping on a key promotion led a top general to step in.
Chaos in the Pentagon over Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s indecision and flip-flopping prompted a “rare intervention” from President Donald Trump’s favorite general.
The latest debacle in Hegseth’s tenure as defense secretary was his decision to torpedo the promotion of Lt. Gen. Douglas Sims after previously signing off on it, insiders toldThe New York Times.
Sims is a 34-year Army veteran who led troops during five tours in Iraq and Afghanistan and has been awarded numerous medals, including a Distinguished Service Medal.
“He’s the type of person you would want your kids serving under—extremely dedicated, selfless, and loyal,” Brynt Parmeter, who was until June the Pentagon’s chief talent management officer, told the Times.
His promotion to a four-star general seemed all but certain, insiders said, until this spring, when Hegseth alleged without evidence that Sims had leaked information to news outlets.
Sims was cleared of the allegation, and Hegseth for a time agreed to promote him. But Hegseth eventually reneged, this time arguing that Sims was too close to Gen. Mark Milley.
Milley is a former Trump Joint Chiefs chairman whom the president now loathes—Trump has suggested that Milley deserves execution, while Milley has called Trump a “total fascist.”
Hegseth’s refusal to promote Sims prompted what the Times called a “rare intervention” from Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Dan “Razin” Caine, of whom Trump is a big fan. Caine challenged the defense secretary’s decision, urging him to reconsider, the insiders said.
While Hegseth agreed to meet with Sims one more time, it didn’t matter. Hegseth stood firm, and now Sims is expected to retire in the coming months. Nineteen out of the last 21 generals of Sims’ rank were promoted, according to the Times.
Asked for comment on the situation, the Pentagon sent the Daily Beast a statement from chief spokesman Sean Parnell thanking Sims for “his decades of service in the United States Army.”
Hegseth’s tenure as defense secretary has been marked by chaos within the Pentagon.
Over the past several months, reports have emerged about infighting among Hegseth’s top aides, his paranoia about leaks, and a struggle to hire and retain staff.
Nevertheless, Trump has continued to stand behind Hegseth, as a White House spokeswoman told the Times that the defense secretary still has the president’s “full confidence.”
Memo & reminder to future presidents:
Don’t put an inept washed-out O-3 in charge of the Pentagon. If he can’t get past the O-3 pay grade, he’s not Defense Secretary material.
Hegseth’s Frantic Clash with Chair of Joint Chiefs Revealed
The defense secretary’s flip-flopping on a key promotion led a top general to step in.
The White House has become a superspreader of AI-generated videos.
Franklin Roosevelt mastered the use of radio. John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan were top of the game on TV. And Donald Trump is the first AI slop president.
Since January, Trump’s administration has used artificial intelligence to churn out a steady stream of fake images on social media, from alligators in ICE hats to crying members of Congress,while the official White House account on X has used it to portray the president as Superman, the pope and a villain from “Star Wars.”
Earlier this week, Trump used his account on his personal social media platform, Truth Social, to share an AI-generated clip showing former President Barack Obama being forcibly detained by the FBI. As bizarre as it was, it fit in with his other nonsensical memes, which included various Democrats in orange prison jumpsuits as the “Shady Bunch” and a fake-looking video of a woman in a bikini catching a snake with her bare hands.
There’s a term for someone using social media this way that can’t be repeated in polite company, so let’s just call it slop-posting. It’s usually done by a 14-year-old boy, or someone who still acts like one, and it’s mostly just absurd or mildly offensive. It’s not harmless, necessarily, but it’s mostly just lame trolling.
To suggest that our President has the maturity of a 14-year-old boy is generous. Let’s not insult the kids, most of whom are more mature and better behaved than King Donald.
But when the president does it, it’s something else entirely. Even in the most harmless AI-generated memes, Trump is muddying the waters on what is real, encouraging his supporters to believe everything and nothing. Did a woman in a bikini really catch a snake? Is Obama really going to be arrested? To a Trump supporter steeped in these memes, the answer may not even matter.
…
Opinion | Trump is the first AI slop president. That’s not good for democracy.
The White House has become a superspreader of AI-generated videos.
NPR reports the Trump administration is now canceling a program designed to help veterans behind on home loans get new, low-interest mortgages. And veterans are furious.
“My social media posts have not been nice to the director of the VA and have not been nice to Trump. And I voted for the guy!” said Jon Henry, who served in Iraq during the first Gulf War.
Last month, the Veterans Administration abruptly killed its VA Servicing Purchase (VASP) safety net program, which has helped more than 33,000 veterans and service members, according to the VA. But this most recent service cancellation is only the latest in a VA mortgage roller-coaster leaving service members confused about what help the federal government actually provides, if any.
‘You just turned your back’: Pro-Trump veterans furious after he cuts critical VA program
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth clashed with Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) during a Wednesday hearing over the 2026 budget requests. Ultimately, it devolved into Hegseth laughing at the senator before she elevated her voice.
Slotkin recalled during Hegseth’s confirmation hearing that she asked whether he would agree to deploy American soldiers to fire on protesters. At the time, Hegseth called it “hypothetical,” despite former Secretary Mark Esper being asked to do the same thing. Hegseth has since deployed the National Guard and Marines to oppose protesters.
“Does the uniformed military have the ability to arrest and detain protesters?” asked Slotkin.
“It’s bemusing the extent to which the speculation is out there. These troops are given very clear orders,” Hegseth claimed.
“Then what is the order? Then list it out for us. Be a man. List it out!” she asked. “Did you authorize them to detain or arrest. That is a fundamental of democracy. I’m not trying to be a snot here. I’m just trying to get the actual — did you authorize them to do that?”
“All of these orders and what they are sent to do are public,” said Hegseth.
“Ok, so say it, say it. Yes or no,” she said.
“I’d like to,” he said.
“Please. Yes or no,” she repeated.
“I’ve said time and time again, through interruption, they are there to protect law enforcement,” Hegseth continued, still refusing to answer her question.
“Do they have the ability to arrest —” Slotkin began with Hegseth talking over her.
“To do their job deporting illegals allowed in by the previous administration,” Hegseth continued.
“So, they cannot arrest and detain citizens of the United States? The uniformed military, is that right?” she said.
“As we stated, if necessary, in their own self-defense, they can temporarily detain and hand over to ICE, but there’s no arresting going on, and you know this better than — you’re trying to play political games,” Hegseth glared.
Slotkin is likely asking the question due to reports that U.S. Marines detained a man outside of a federal building, the Military Times reported. The man did not hear their commands to stop.
Slotkin moved on, asking questions about using cybersecurity before she and Hegseth clashed again.
“Have you given the order to be able to shoot at unarmed protesters in any way?” she asked.
Hegseth laughed at her.
“I’m just asking the question. Don’t laugh,” she said. “The whole country — and by the way, my colleagues across the aisle —”
Hegseth cut her off to ask, “What is that based on? What evidence would you have that an order like that has ever been given?”
“It is based on Donald Trump giving that order to your predecessor, to a Republican Secretary of Defense who I give a lot of credit to because he didn’t accept the order. He has more guts and balls than you because he said, ‘I’m not going to send in the military to do something that I know in my gut is not right. He was asked to shoot at their legs. He wrote that in his book. That’s not hearsay. So your pooh-poohing of this, it just shows you don’t understand who we are as a country. And all of my colleagues across the aisle, especially the ones that served, should want an apolitical military and not want citizens to be scared of their own military.”
Hegseth is a slimy snake who never seems to give a straight answer to any Congressperson or Senator, no matter how many times & ways they rephrase their questions.
‘Be a man’: Senator shouts at Pete Hegseth as he refuses to answer questions
