THREAD: Here’s the deeper story of how Donald Trump unleashed a domestic terrorist movement—and what national security experts say must be done to defeat it motherjones.com/politics/2021/…
2/ This story goes to the heart of Trump’s impeachment trial—he conducted a campaign of stochastic terrorism. It's the strategic incitement of violence using veiled language, a method historically known to counterterrorism experts from ISIS, al-Qaeda and anti-abortion extremists
3/ Remarkably, veteran national security experts came to see Trump literally as a terrorist leader. As @JulietteKayyem put it, “He tells them where to go. He tells them what to do. He tells them why they’re angry.” motherjones.com/politics/2021/…
4/ Evidence of Trump’s deliberate campaign of incitement was building long before his grim rally the morning of January 6—not only with his speeches and tweets, but also with deranged videos he promoted on social media and even a wifi password his campaign used
5/ Alarm bells were blaring by late December when the Proud Boys—some of whom stormed the Capitol—vowed to put “boots on the ground” and “turn out in record numbers.” Trump, one Proud Boy leader said, had given them “the green light” motherjones.com/politics/2021/… (photos: Nate Gowdy)
6/ “Historically, within right-wing extremist movements, leadership has produced rhetoric to spin up their members, increase radicalization and recruitment, and then stand back and let small cells or lone offenders follow through with violent action” washingtonpost.com/national-secur…
7/ It’s crucial to recognize that the Trump-fueled insurrection at the US Capitol was not an ending but a beginning. That’s been the consensus among the half dozen national security experts I’ve spoken with, as well as others quoted in the Washington Post and elsewhere
8/ What to do about this rising domestic terrorism threat? In 2017, Trump moved to gut an anti-extremism program at DHS led by counterterrorism expert George Selim—who says the resources now needed could be tenfold greater. An "all of government" approach. motherjones.com/politics/2021/…
9/ So much ink was spilled during the Trump presidency trying to understand his voters' grievances, but as @juliettekayyem points out, violent far-right extremism also requires a starkly different solution—starting with accountability for the Terrorist in Chief himself
10/ The world also learned something important after the siege of Congress in terms of combatting the enormous ripple effects of Trump's incitement: #deplatforming works motherjones.com/politics/2021/…

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More from @markfollman

6 Nov 20
How much longer do Mitch McConnell and other GOP power brokers want to say and do nothing? How much more damage do they want to watch Trump do to American democracy? Their complicity in this only grows more historically damning by the day
When something like this goes down — and it will if Republicans with power don’t help put a stop to the Trump madness soon — then the blood will be on their hands too 6abc.com/amp/pennsylvan…
“police got a tip about a group, possibly a family, driving up from Virginia in a Hummer to unleash an attack at the Convention Center where votes are being counted in Philadelphia,” reports @6abc
Read 5 tweets
4 Nov 20
We’re watching the nation’s electoral system under attack in real time by a US president. No surprise from Trump, who made clear long ago he would do this, but still a stunning moment in history
Trump has done only one thing so far on Twitter since Election Day: push disinformation and conspiracy theories aimed at undermining legitimate voting. (With some throttled by Twitter as violations.) Again, we are watching an unprecedented attack by him on American democracy ImageImage
"what Trump has already done is what the Russians have always tried to do: cast doubt on American elections and destabilize the United States....He may hug and kiss American flags and pretend to be a great patriot, but this is a betrayal of our country." nytimes.com/2020/11/04/opi…
Read 4 tweets
30 Sep 20
Trump looks and sounds mostly sour, defensive and angry. His base will of course celebrate it, but he'll persuade no one else. He's losing.
Biden is quietly landing punches, especially on the Covid 19 disaster. His talking directly to the audience is also effective. He sounds mostly prepared, cogent, presidential. Meanwhile Trump just keeps interrupting, making petty insults, badgering him and Wallace...
"I don't want to pay tax." —Donald Trump, on his life before becoming president
Read 6 tweets
15 Sep 20
A person who behaves dangerously unhinged like this has zero business working in a high-profile *communications* role in the US government. Michael Caputo should resign immediately bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
The details on Caputo’s freakout are quite disturbing. If he doesn’t resign the House Democrats should act — his incitement is dangerous nytimes.com/2020/09/14/us/…
Caputo: “And when Donald Trump refuses to stand down at the inauguration, the shooting will begin. The drills that you’ve seen are nothing.”
Read 4 tweets
2 Sep 20
Early warnings on Trump inciting white supremacist violence: A brief story in 5 parts

Aug 2017: “A disaster. There are real concerns about where it leads the country.” —A senior U.S. law enforcement official on Trump’s response to Charlottesville 
motherjones.com/politics/2017/…
1/5
Sept 2017: “I hit ’em with neo-Nazi. I hit them with everything. I got the white supremacists, the neo-Nazi. I got them all in there, let’s see. KKK, we have KKK. I got them all.” —President Trump, ridiculing the media during a political rally
motherjones.com/politics/2017/…
2/5
July 2018: “The racist rhetoric has empowered white supremacist groups to be much more public. It’s very dangerous because these people who have a history of violence now feel they have state sanction to commit violence.” —Ex-FBI agent Michael German
motherjones.com/crime-justice/…
3/5
Read 7 tweets
30 Jun 20
Stopped counting long ago how often Trump has feigned ignorance or claimed to be just "joking." If you haven't figured out yet that Trump is a racist who is glad to endorse "white power" in an ugly bid to cling to his own, you haven't been paying attention washingtonpost.com/politics/trump…
I feel like a damn broken record from re-upping this story so much — from **October 2016** motherjones.com/politics/2016/…
"Trump’s enduring campaign tactics—from calls for black protesters to be “roughed up” to circulation of racist, anti-Muslim, and anti-Semitic language and memes—is proof for them that white nationalism has not only arrived, but has found a champion in a nominee for US president."
Read 5 tweets

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