This was designed to be a mass casualty event. The bomb was situated on a bench that was surrounded on three sides by brick walls…so the blast would be focused outwards into the street, and it was a shrapnel bomb. It was meant to kill a lot of people. And the cop who I talked to, I spent a lot of time talking to the cop who disarmed it, he …told me, “Look, what I was looking at was an IED. That’s what it was. Exactly the kind of thing you’d find in Baghdad.” – Charlie Pierce being interviewed on the Stephanie Miller Show, July 26, 2011
Only that IED wasn’t placed on a bench in Baghdad. This happened in Spokane, Washington. My home state. It was set to explode during the annual Martin Luther King Day parade this past January. Kevin Harpman, the man who allegedly set the bomb, isn’t an Islamic Fundamentalist or one of those "radical revolutionary Socialists" Glenn Beck warned his audience about. Harpman is a thirty-six-year-old army veteran and a member of the Neo-Nazi group National Alliance. Thankfully, the bomb he created was spotted by three parade workers before it detonated.
In April, Glenn Beck lambasted Howard Dean for suggesting that right-wing extremism has become a significant problem.
After airing a clip of Dean's remarks, Beck stated that he hasn't seen anyone on the right "burning down buildings and targeting cops like [Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn] did in the 1960s." Beck later added: "In fact, I haven't even seen as much as a potato chip bag left at a rally let alone some shrapnel or dead bodies or burning buildings.
And it isn't just Beck. This has become the standard response of all right-wingers to violent right-wing extremism. When forced to confront it they either pretend that it doesn't exist or they dismiss it as a series of rare and "isolated incidents". They fall back on that old canard that most (if not all) acts of domestic terrorism are perpetrated by "radical liberals." While it's true that acts of domestic terrorism have been committed by left-wingers, to the best of my knowledge, in recent years their actions have not resulted in serious injuries or fatalities. The Justice Department will back me up on that, too.
Single Issue Terrorists...Of these Earth Liberation Front (ELF) and Animal Liberation Front (ALF) have been the most active in recent years. Neither of these groups has caused the death of any individual, although they have caused considerable property damage.
"Policing Terrorism: An Executive's Guide." U.S. Department of Justice. Office of Community Oriented Policing Services. (2007)
The right-wing may not have received the memo, but the Symbionese Liberation Army closed-up shop thirty-six years ago. These days, ELF and ALF are about as radical as the left gets. While I certainly don't condone their actions, one must admit, damaging property, however illegal and misguided, isn't the same as raping someone or murdering them in cold blood. And that is precisely what right-wing domestic terrorists are doing. You can repair property. You can't bring back the dead.
Earlier this year, David Neiwert at Crooks & Liars compiled a list of domestic terrorist attacks (and attempted attacks) involving physical violence that occurred between July 2008 and March 2011. There were twenty-four in all during that two-and-half-year period. Nearly all of them were perpetrated by individuals who were undeniably right-wing. I'm tired of the meme that these are just "isolated incidents." They aren't. Kevin Harpman isn't an anomaly. The recent terrorist attack in Norway should serve as a wake up call not only to Europeans, but to Americans, regarding the danger posed by right-wing extremism.
Unlike Norway, the United States has a lengthy history of domestic terrorism. Rather than speculate about the threat right-wing extremists pose in the future, I’d prefer to review the damage that’s already been done by highlighting some of the domestic terrorist attacks, and attempted attacks, committed during the last twenty years. Sadly, it's a long list, and I'm sure I've probably missed a few.
Just in case anyone wonders what qualifies as "domestic terrorism," here is the FBI's definition:
Domestic terrorism is the unlawful use, or threatened use, of force or violence by a group or individual based and operating entirely within the United States or Puerto Rico without foreign direction committed against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof in furtherance of political or social objectives.
April 1991 - Anti-IRS extremist, Dean Harvey Hicks, "launches a mortar attack" on an IRS building in Fresno, California. Investigators later find "a virtual bomb factory in his garage." Hicks carried out several other attacks on government buildings. In March 1987 he fired mortars on the Chet Holifield Federal Building in Laguna Niguel, CA. He placed a pipe bomb at the same location in 1988. In September 1988, he detonated a car bombing "in the basement parking garage of a building...which contains an IRS office." In March 1989, he exploded three pipe bombs tied to power poles a block south of the same IRS building. In 1990 Hicks allegedly attempted to detonate a truck bomb outside an IRS building in Los Angeles. The plan failed because the truck prematurely caught fire. "Firefighters quickly extinguished the blaze, unaware that the truck contained 2,000 pounds of ammonium nitrate that could have leveled two city blocks, killed hundreds of people and created a 40-foot-wide crater if the flames had detonated it."
July 1993 - American Front Skinheads carry out two bombings in Washington State targeting a gay bar in Seattle and the NAACP headquarters in Tacoma.
December 1994 - A member of the "pro-life" anti-abortion movement kills two clinic receptionists and injures five others during "a two-day shooting spree" targeting three different abortion clinics in Massachusetts and Virginia.
January 1995 - Judge Martha A. Bethel refuses to dismiss Montana Freeman Pete Miller's three traffic citations. She soon begins receiving threats and a contract is put out on her life by the Aryan Brotherhood in Texas.
“Your house will be burned to the ground. Your house will be riddled with gunfire,” she was warned. “You will be kidnapped and tried before a common law court for treasonous acts.” After one late-night court session a car followed Bethel to her remote home. On two occasions she returned there to find the doors of her home wide open. In March 1995 the police warned her to take her three children and leave town immediately because they feared for her family’s safety. “For three days I slept with a Mini-14 by my bed,” Bethel said. In June 1995 the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms informed her of a murder contract put out by the Aryan Brotherhood in Texas. “This has been very scary and very real. The whole thing has been a living nightmare.”
March 1995 - Two members of the Minnesota Patriots Council, an organization opposed to the Federal Government, were convicted for "conspiracy to use ricin...as a biological weapon."
19 April 1995 - White supremacists Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, both military veterans, carry out a truck bomb attack at the Murragh Federal Building in Oklahoma City killing 168 people and injuring 450 others, including nineteen children at a daycare center inside the building. Before the attacks McVeigh told a friend that he felt called to defend the Constitution from "Socialist Wannabe Slaves".
October 1995 -An Amtrak train is derailed by individuals describing themselves as "Sons of the Gestapo". One person was killed and twelve others were seriously injured. In a letter the Sons of the Gestapo stated that they'd carried out the attack to avenge those who died at Waco and Ruby Ridge.
December 1995 - Joseph Martin Bailie a "tax protester" places a fertilizer bomb outside an IRS building in Reno, Nevada. Thankfully, the bomb failed to detonate.
1996 - Between 1990 and 1996 at least seventy-three black churches were firebombed or vandalized by white supremacists in the states of Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia.
3 April 1996 - The FBI arrests the Unabomber. Between 1978 and 1995, Harvard Graduate and reclusive mathematician Ted Kaczynski sent letters bombs to academics and “various individuals particularly associated with modern technology” killing three people and wounding an additional twenty-three. He authored a 35,000 word manifesto that was published in The New York Times and the Washington Post, under the threat of additional bombings. In the manifesto Kaczynski blamed “leftists and scientists” for the “social and psychological problems of modern society.”
July 1996 - The Justice Department uncovers a plot by the Arizona Vipers, a militia group, to bomb buildings housing the police department, and the local branches of the FBI, the Secret Service, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, and the National Guard." Authorities seized "a witches' brew of explosives" and an "arsenal of firearms and ammunition".
July 1996 - Members of the Washington State Militia (WSM) are arrested for manufacturing pipe bombs. At trial it emerged that the FBI had videotaped many of the Militiamen's meetings; they were recorded "planning various acts of violence, including bombing a local reporter's home and a nearby train tunnel."
27 July 1996 – Christian Fundamentalist and anti-abortion activist Eric Rudolph detonates a bomb at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, during the 1996 Summer Olympics, killing 4 people and injuring 111 others. Like McVeigh and Nichols, Rudolph served in the US military. In 1997, Rudolph bombed abortion clinics in Sandy Springs, Georgia and Birmingham, Alabama. During the latter attack he maimed a nurse and killed a police officer. In 1998, he bombed a lesbian bar in Atlanta, Georgia, wounding 5 people.
October 1996 - Seven members of the West Virginia Mountaineer Militia are arrested for plotting to bomb an FBI fingerprinting facility and "several other government buildings." Before their arrest, they agreed to "sell blueprints of the facility to an undercover agent posing as a broker for a Middle East terrorist network." They were also seriously considering assassinating both Senator Jay Rockefeller and Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan in what they referred to as their "holy war against the federal government."
1997 - Militia members Bradley Glover and Michael Dorsett are arrested for plotting an attack on Fort Hood in Texas. The self-proclaimed "brigadier general" Glover believed that United Nations troops were stationed there.
1998 - A women's health clinic is bombed in Birmingham, Alabama, by individuals the FBI describes as "linked to right-wing sources."
1998 - The FBI arrests four members of "The New Order," a white supremacist group, for plotting "to commit numerous crimes, including killing the founder of the Southern Poverty Law Center, poisoning the water supply of East St. Louis as a diversion for a bank robbery, and attacking the New York office of a Jewish social service organization."
3 December 1999 - Three members of a California "anti-government group" are arrested by the Sacramento Joint Terrorism Task Force. They were caught in the middle of an attempt to bomb a propane storage facility. Two of the men were "in possession of a detonation cord, blasting caps, grenade hulls, and various chemicals—including ammonium nitrate—and numerous weapons." They were convicted in May 2002 for conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction and conspiracy to use a destructive device.
April 2001 - Leo Felton and his girlfriend Erica Chase, both members of white supremacist organizations, are arrested for counterfeiting. Afterwards, authorities discovered they had been plotting a bombing campaign. Targets included the United States Holocaust Museum, the New England Holocaust Memorial, Steven Spielberg and Rev. Jesse Jackson. The tragic irony is that Felton, who told authorities that he wanted to "rid the United States of...blacks, Jews, Asians and Latinos," is bi-racial, the son of black father and a white mother who were civil rights activists.
22 August 2002 - Robert J. Goldstein, his wife Kristi, Michael Wallace Hardee and Samuel V. Shannahan are arrested after police in Pinellas County, Florida, responding to a domestic dispute at the Goldstein residence, discover an arsenal of weapons, explosives, and a "mission statement" outlining plans to attack the Islamic Center in Pinellas Park on the anniversary of 9/11. All four pled guilty to their role in the plot.
12 February 2003 - Ku Klux Klan member David Wayne Hull is arrested by authorities in Pennsylvania. Hull had constructed numerous pipe bombs and IEDs on his property. He made numerous threats against abortion clinics and minorities, and was recorded "instructing individuals on how to place IEDs to cause maximum damages...(and) on procedures for creating destructive devices." He was also charged with witness tampering.
4 April 2003 - David Roland Hinkson a "constitutionalist and tax protester" is arrested by the FBI for plotting the assassinations of a federal judge, an Asst. US Attorney, and an IRS agent. He was being tried for tax evasion and blamed the three individuals for his legal difficulties. "Between December 2002 and March 2003, Hinkson offered two individuals $10,000" to commit all three murders.
10 April 2003 - The FBI arrests William Joseph Krar, member of a Texas militia group and "a potential weapons supplier associated with extremist militia activities," on fraud-related charges. He was attempting to provide Edward Feltus, a member of a New Jersey militia group, with "numerous false identification badges—including United Nations Observer Badges, Defense Intelligence Agency identification, and a Federal Concealed Weapons Permit." During a search of Krar's home in Texas authorities discovered "firearms, explosives, blasting caps, machine guns, over 100,000 rounds of ammunition, approximately 800 grams of sodium cyanide, and plans to weaponize the sodium cyanide."
11 November 2003 -Stephen Jordi, a fundamentalist Christian and anti-abortion extremist associated with the group "Army of God", is arrested in Miami, Florida, for plotting to attack abortion clinics. According to the FBI, Jordi had "set out potential targets and a specific time frame for the attacks, and had cased and videotaped numerous Miami-area abortion clinics. He had also purchased several items to carry out the attack, including containers of gasoline and propane, flares, starting fluid, and a silencer." He was convicted and sentenced to five years in prison.
20 January 2004 - David Nelson Hemphill and Bruce Metzler are arrested by the Birmingham Joint Terrorism Task Force in Alabama for possession of pipe bombs and a homemade silencer. They are anti-government crusaders and Eric Rudolph aficionados. "Subsequent searches of Hemphill’s person and property revealed a .45-caliber handgun, bomb-making materials, antigovernment and bomb-making literature, and components of an ammonium nitrate fuel oil (ANFO) improvised explosive device. Hemphill admitted that prior to his arrest he had been trying to construct ANFO bombs." A search of Metzler's property "revealed two .22-caliber handguns, a .233-caliber rifle, a .308-caliber assault rifle, a single-barrel shotgun, a .38-caliber revolver, literature related to the Waco and Ruby Ridge incidents, and photographs of an abortion clinic bombed by serial bomber Eric Rudolph. Also located were two empty 20 mm military ammunition containers, wire end caps, fuses, gunpowder, and a partially constructed silencer."
1 April 2004 - White supremacist Sean Michael Gillespie firebombs the Temple B'nai Israel in Oklahoma City, OK. Gillespie had actually set out to attack a Jewish person "whose name he had randomly discovered in a phone book", but being unable to locate the individual's address, he chose to firebomb the nearby Temple instead. "A search of Gillespie’s residence and truck revealed two videotapes, a baseball bat, brass knuckles, and a stun gun...(and) a videotape containing surveillance of a Las Vegas synagogue and a statement by Gillespie that he was on a “mission for the white race,” which was to involve a cross-country spree of unspecified terrorist acts. Concern for future attacks was also supported by Gillespie’s admission following his arrest to having previously committed random acts of vandalism and violence against minorities."
6 May 2004 - Following an "extensive investigation" by the FBI, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, and local police, six members of the Project 7 Militia are arrested for "violent plans targeting law enforcement officers and other government officials." They were apparently stockpiling weapons, including machine guns, in preparation for an attack.
25 October 2004 - White supremacist and anti-government extremist, Demetrius "Van" Crocker is arrested after he attempted to purchase C-4 explosives and Sarin nerve gas from an undercover FBI agent. Crocker was planning to use "dirty bombs, nerve gas, and conventional weapons against federal and state courthouses and the U.S. Capitol, while the House and Senate were in session; a plot that was foiled by an informant..."
April 2005 - White Supremacist Matthew Hale is sentenced to 40 years for obstruction of justice and soliciting the murder of Federal Judge Joan Lefkow. Judge Lefkow was targeted because she presided over the enforcement of an infringement case against the World Church of the Creator, an organization run by Matthew Hale. Earlier that year, on February 28, Judge Lefkow had returned home to find the dead bodies of her husband and mother. Both had been led down to the basement and shot multiple times. Their murderers have never been identified, though Neo-Nazi radio host Hal Turner has proudly asserted that his comments calling for Judge Lefkow's assassination may have inspired the murders.
7 July 2005 - Anti-abortion extremist Clayton Lee Waagner is sentenced to 19 years for "acts of violence" committed against abortion clinics in 2003, and for sending "several hoax anthrax letters" to reproductive health clinics in 2001.
27 July 2008 -Jim David Adkisson walks into the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church in Knoxville, Tennessee, and opens fire with a 12-gauge shotgun. One person died at the scene, another died later that day in the hospital, and seven others were injured. Like McVeigh, Nichols and Rudolph, Adkisson is a military veteran. In a sworn affidavit, Adkisson stated: "He had targeted the church because of its liberal teachings and his belief that all liberals should be killed because they were ruining the country... Adkisson made statements that because he could not get to the leaders of the liberal movement that he would then target those that had voted them into office."
October 2008 - Two Neo-Nazi skinheads are arrested in Tennessee for plotting to assassinate President Obama and "murder dozens of African Americans". As David Neiwert notes: "No, they almost certainly would never have reached Barack Obama...but they almost certainly would have killed innocent members of the public along the way."
December 2008 - In Belfast, Maine, white supremacist James G. Cummings is murdered by his wife. Investigators discover that prior to his murder, Cummings, who was "very upset" when Obama was elected, was planning to carry out a "dirty bomb" attack. A search of the Cummings' residence uncovered "a cache of radioactive materials...suitable for building a dirty bomb...four 1-gallon containers of 35 percent hydrogen peroxide, uranium, thorium, lithium metal, thermite, aluminum powder, beryllium, boron, black iron oxide and magnesium ribbon." They also found "literature on how to build dirty bombs and information about cesium-137, strontium-90 and cobalt-60, radioactive materials."
December 2008 - White supremacist Kody Brittingham, a lance corporal in the US Marine Corps, is arrested on charges of breaking-and-entering in Jacksonville, FL. Afterwards, Naval investigators discovered a journal allegedly written by Brittingham that "contained plans on how to kill the President as well as white supremacist material."
January 2009 - Twenty-year-old white supremacist, Keith Luke, goes on a killing spree in Brockton, Massachusetts. First he broke into the apartment of two young black women (they were sisters). He shot and killed one sister before raping and shooting the other (she survived). Two men - one black and one white - overheard the attack and came to the sisters' aid. After shooting at the black rescuer, Luke fled the seen, and a few blocks away shot and killed Arlindo Goncalves. He then shot at two policemen (he missed) before being successfully apprehended. He told authorities that "after he shot as many nonwhites' as he could...his plan was to head to a synagogue near his mother's Pleasant Street home and kill as many Jews as he could."
February 2009 - A former Republican Party campaign worker shoots several Chilean exchange students in Miramar Beach, FL. Before the shooting he remarked to a neighbor that he "wanted to start a revolution against Latino immigrants."
4 April 2009 – In Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, white supremacist Richard Poplawski kills three police officers and injures two others in a gun battle lasting four hours. “Poplawski was armed with a semi-automatic AK-47-style rifle and two other guns, protected by a bulletproof vest, and had been lying in wait for the officers.” Poplawski, a member of Stormfront, believed that the "Zionist-occupied government" was "pulling the strings,” controlling every aspect of our society. He also told friends that he believed President Obama was going to impose a gun ban and "infringe on his rights".
31 May 2009 - George Tiller, a Wichita physician targeted by Bill O'Reilly and Fox News for performing late-term abortions, is assassinated in front of his wife and children during Sunday morning service at his church by anti-abortion activist Scott Roeder. Roeder, a Christian Fundamentalist, was at one time a member of the Montana Freemen group and also the "Sovereign Citizen Movement," which believes that all existing government in the United States is illegitimate.
10 June 2009 - White supremacist and Holocaust-denier James von Brunn enters the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC, and opens fire, wounding Security guard Stephen Tyrone Johns. Mr. Johns later died as a result of his wounds. Von Brunn had been previously arrested for entering a Federal Building "with various weapons". He claimed that his intent was to place the Federal Reserve Board of Governors under citizens arrest for treason.
March 2010 - Seven members of the Michigan militia's Hutaree sect - “a Christian-oriented group” - are arrested on bomb-making charges and for plotting to assassinate local police officers. They had also threatened violence against Islamic organizations. They were hoping to reignite the Civil War.
March 2010 - Anti-government extremist John Patrick Bedell, inflamed by far-right conspiracy theories about 9/11 and other supposed instances of "government tyranny," walks into the Pentagon and opens fire, killing two police officers before being shot dead.
May 2010 - Darren Huff, a member of the "Oath Keepers" and the "Sovereign Citizen Movement", "an extremist anti-government group", is arrested in Tennessee."The troopers said Huff volunteered that he planned to travel to Madisonville to take over the courthouse, to arrest the people on Fitzpatrick's warrants - [people] who he termed "domestic enemies of the United States engaged in treason...Huff told agents there would be no violence unless they were provoked into violence. Still, he told agents he planned to travel with his Colt .45 handgun and AK-47 rifle."
May 2010 - In Phoenix, Arizona, racist Gary Thomas Kelley, harasses his neighbor, Juan Varela, using racial slurs and telling him to "go back to Mexico" or he would be killed. Not long after, Kelley shot Varela dead. This occurred just two weeks after Arizona passed its notorious "immigration bill."
May 2010 - Two members of the Sovereign Citizens Movement, an extremist right-wing anarchist group, kill two police officers and wound two others during a shoot-out after they were pulled over for a traffic violation. The Sovereign Citizens Movement doesn't recognize the legitimacy of the government or the laws it creates, which is why they felt the need to violently resist even a traffic citation. The shooters were also affiliated with a church run by members of the Aryan Nation.
10 May 2010 - A pipe bomb explodes while approximately 60 Muslims are praying at the Islamic Center of Northeast Florida in Jacksonville. Thankfully, no one was injured.
July 2010 - Right-wing extremist Byron Williams begins stock-piling weapons and plotting "to start a revolution by traveling to San Francisco to kill people at the ACLU and the Tides Foundation." He was intercepted by State Patrolmen before he could carry out the planned shooting rampage. Instead, he engaged in an armed standoff with the patrolmen, injuring two officers.
September 2010 - In Concord, NC, anti-abortion extremist Justin Carl Moose is arrested for plotting to bomb an abortion clinic. In a taped conversation...Moose referred to himself as the "Christian counterpart to (Osama) bin Laden." On his Facebook page Moose stated that while others might call him a terrorist, he considered himself "a freedom fighter," and then advocated shooting "abortionists".
2 September 2010 - Anti-abortion extremist Donny Eugene Mower firebombs a Planned Parenthood Clinic in Madera, CA, throwing a Molotov cocktail through the window. He also vandalized the Madera Islamic Center.
8 January 2011 - Jared Lee Loughner, a mentally-ill man with anti-government beliefs, shoots nineteen people outside a Safeway grocery store in Casas Adobes, Arizona, at a "Congress on Your Corner" gathering held by Democratic Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. Six people died, including a judge, and a nine-year-old girl. Among the thirteen injured was Rep. Giffords, who was the attacker's primary target. Some have argued that this isn't terrorism. I disagree. As David Neiwert states:
If you have any doubt that this was an act of terrorism -- and is thus inherently political -- just consider one of the basic criteria of the definition of the word: Were people -- not just the public generally, but the target group as well -- terrorized by the act? Clearly the answer is yes...It cannot be emphasized enough that the target of a political act is a powerful indicator of the perpetrator's intent. Terrorists always intend to send a message with their acts, and the message is conveyed in the persons who are are targeted and become victims of their violence. There's no doubt that Jared Loughner sent a message with these killings: The lives of government-coddling Democrats and their enablers are forfeit.
17 January 2011 - In Spokane, Washington, white supremacist Kevin Harpman places a backpack filled with explosives on a bench along the route of the annual Martin Luther King Day parade. It is discovered by parade workers before it detonates. Authorities later state that it was a "viable device" with the potential to cause "multiple casualties."
March 2011 - Five militiamen are arrested in Fairbanks, Alaska, for plotting to kidnap and murder Alaska state troopers and a federal judge. The investigation also revealed that "extensive surveillance" of two state troopers homes had been carried out by militia members. Militia members had also "acquired a large cache of weapons in order to carry out attacks", and many of the weapons in question "are prohibited by state or federal law."
June 2011 - In Turtletown, TN, an interracial couple has a cinder block containing a death threat thrown through the window of their home. About a week later their dog is lynched, and then placed outside their home for them to find, with the rope left wrapped around its neck.
June 2011 - In New York City, six teenagers are charged with murder as a hate crime for using gay slurs and then stomping to death a young man they believed to be gay.
June 2011 - Members of a high school wrestling team in Santa Monica, CA, chain an African American teammate to his locker and then lynch a "brown wrestling dummy" in front of him.
26 July 2011 - In McKinney, Texas, a Planned Parenthood Clinic is firebombed with a Molotov cocktail.
The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate. So it goes...Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., as published in "Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?" (1967)