Here’s question for everyone while Trump is in a big tizzy about how the FBI didn’t follow up on the tip they received about Nikolas Cruz’ impending violence — although Florida Child Protective Services did follow up and determined he “was at a low risk of harming himself or others” — what exactly does anyone think that the FBI would have done based on this tip?
Did they think they would send over a few agents and just decide to take his guns away from him even though they were absolutely obtained legally? Can anyone think of a moment or a case where the FBI has ever done that? The simple fact of the matter is that unless a court has made a determination of guilt for violence or incompetence, our current background check system will allow you to pretty much purchase any weapon you like and there really isn’t a system to “confiscate” weapons from someone who has yet committed a crime.
Here’s the even more surprising question: Could they have immediately arrested him for making a terrorist threat?
The most likely shocking answer to that question is : Probably not.
And that in itself my be exactly why the FBI didn’t really respond to the tip they received not because they were “Too busy investigation Russia” but in fact they’re actually far too busy investigating Muslims.
To start off we should think a bit about what difference terrorism or for that matter hate crimes charges would make. And I bring up hate crimes because in many ways they aren’t significantly different from terrorism as the FBI’s own description shows.
A hate crime is a traditional offense like murder, arson, or vandalism with an added element of bias. For the purposes of collecting statistics, the FBI has defined a hate crime as a “criminal offense against a person or property motivated in whole or in part by an offender’s bias against a race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, ethnicity, gender, or gender identity.” Hate itself is not a crime—and the FBI is mindful of protecting freedom of speech and other civil liberties.
These efforts serve as a backstop for investigations by state and local authorities, which handle the vast majority of hate crime cases throughout the country.
The only real difference is that a terrorism may be targeting multiple types of people because of their different ideology, religion or ethnicity all at the same time rather than just expressing hate for one particular specific group. As the FBI indicates these may be the same crimes as regular murder, assault, arson, vandalism or intimidation which are typically prosecuted by the states, but Federal government has taken this own partially because thru out our history we’ve seen that some local authorities may support and endorse the ideology of these criminals, and because these types of crimes aren’t really about the individual target they affect, they are all intended to have a larger effect on a broader community. They intended not just to harm the targets but to terrorize and intimidate anyone else who might be a potential target of these criminals.
And it’s not like these are rare occurrences according to the FBI Hate Crime Stats, and as you can see the categories that Nicolas Cruz specifically targeted — anti-Black, anti-Gay and anti-Jewish — are far ahead of the pack, although most of them aren’t cases of murder which is actually quite rare, they are mostly cases of intimidation and assault.
Bias motivation |
Total
victims1 |
Total
number
of
adult
victims2 |
Total
number
of
juvenile
victims2 |
Crimes against persons |
Crimes against property |
Crimes
against
society5 |
Murder and
nonnegligent
manslaughter |
Rape
(revised
definition3) |
Rape
(legacy
definition4) |
Aggravated
assault |
Simple
assault |
Intimidation |
Other5 |
Robbery |
Burglary |
Larceny-
theft |
Motor
vehicle
theft |
Arson |
Destruction/
damage/
vandalism |
Other5 |
Total |
7,615 |
4,311 |
565 |
9 |
24 |
0 |
873 |
1,687 |
2,109 |
18 |
163 |
138 |
253 |
21 |
51 |
2,122 |
65 |
82 |
Single-Bias Incidents |
7,509 |
4,254 |
558 |
9 |
23 |
0 |
866 |
1,677 |
2,074 |
17 |
160 |
135 |
249 |
21 |
49 |
2,082 |
65 |
82 |
Race/Ethnicity/Ancestry: |
4,426 |
2,685 |
384 |
7 |
10 |
0 |
548 |
1,002 |
1,320 |
5 |
92 |
83 |
164 |
15 |
24 |
1,051 |
52 |
53 |
Anti-White |
909 |
586 |
41 |
5 |
5 |
0 |
120 |
241 |
188 |
2 |
39 |
25 |
87 |
6 |
4 |
129 |
27 |
31 |
Anti-Black or African American |
2,220 |
1,297 |
261 |
2 |
2 |
0 |
273 |
455 |
782 |
2 |
16 |
17 |
16 |
3 |
13 |
624 |
5 |
10 |
Anti-American Indian or Alaska Native |
169 |
120 |
6 |
0 |
1 |
0 |
8 |
17 |
36 |
0 |
0 |
20 |
34 |
4 |
0 |
29 |
15 |
5 |
Anti-Asian |
137 |
83 |
5 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
15 |
40 |
45 |
0 |
2 |
6 |
5 |
0 |
0 |
22 |
0 |
2 |
Anti-Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander |
9 |
9 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
4 |
3 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
2 |
0 |
0 |
Anti-Multiple Races, Group |
190 |
99 |
12 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
17 |
36 |
49 |
0 |
5 |
5 |
0 |
1 |
5 |
70 |
2 |
0 |
Anti-Arab |
57 |
45 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
8 |
16 |
17 |
0 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
14 |
0 |
0 |
Anti-Hispanic or Latino |
483 |
302 |
46 |
0 |
1 |
0 |
91 |
129 |
140 |
1 |
28 |
2 |
5 |
0 |
0 |
82 |
0 |
4 |
Anti-Other Race/Ethnicity/Ancestry |
252 |
144 |
13 |
0 |
1 |
0 |
16 |
64 |
60 |
0 |
1 |
8 |
17 |
1 |
1 |
79 |
3 |
1 |
Religion: |
1,584 |
587 |
91 |
0 |
1 |
0 |
85 |
168 |
433 |
1 |
12 |
32 |
53 |
4 |
18 |
755 |
6 |
16 |
Anti-Jewish |
862 |
264 |
60 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
12 |
61 |
238 |
0 |
3 |
10 |
18 |
1 |
4 |
513 |
1 |
1 |
Anti-Catholic |
65 |
15 |
2 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
5 |
6 |
0 |
0 |
3 |
12 |
1 |
1 |
31 |
1 |
4 |
Anti-Protestant |
22 |
9 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
3 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
4 |
0 |
1 |
10 |
0 |
1 |
Anti-Islamic (Muslim) |
388 |
200 |
17 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
52 |
75 |
144 |
0 |
4 |
2 |
3 |
0 |
5 |
99 |
0 |
4 |
Anti-Other Religion |
91 |
29 |
3 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
13 |
10 |
8 |
0 |
1 |
6 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
50 |
1 |
1 |
Anti-Multiple Religions, Group |
48 |
26 |
4 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
2 |
4 |
21 |
0 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
2 |
15 |
0 |
0 |
Anti-Mormon |
8 |
4 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
2 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
0 |
1 |
2 |
0 |
2 |
Anti-Jehovah's Witness |
3 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
2 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
Anti-Eastern Orthodox (Russian, Greek, Other) |
30 |
15 |
2 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
4 |
2 |
1 |
0 |
4 |
9 |
1 |
0 |
5 |
1 |
2 |
Anti-Other Christian |
39 |
10 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
3 |
2 |
0 |
3 |
3 |
2 |
0 |
3 |
22 |
0 |
0 |
Anti-Buddhist |
1 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
Anti-Hindu |
12 |
4 |
2 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
2 |
6 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
2 |
0 |
1 |
Anti-Sikh |
8 |
5 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
2 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
2 |
1 |
0 |
Anti-Atheism/Agnosticism/etc. |
7 |
5 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
0 |
1 |
3 |
1 |
0 |
Sexual Orientation: |
1,255 |
819 |
65 |
1 |
9 |
0 |
197 |
414 |
289 |
4 |
44 |
10 |
18 |
2 |
6 |
251 |
4 |
6 |
Anti-Gay (Male) |
787 |
508 |
36 |
1 |
1 |
0 |
126 |
281 |
183 |
3 |
32 |
6 |
7 |
0 |
1 |
143 |
0 |
3 |
Anti-Lesbian |
147 |
87 |
7 |
0 |
4 |
0 |
23 |
46 |
37 |
0 |
0 |
2 |
3 |
0 |
2 |
29 |
1 |
0 |
Anti-Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, or Transgender (Mixed Group) |
271 |
192 |
18 |
0 |
4 |
0 |
45 |
71 |
59 |
1 |
12 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
3 |
71 |
1 |
1 |
Anti-Heterosexual |
23 |
16 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
2 |
7 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
5 |
0 |
0 |
6 |
0 |
2 |
Anti-Bisexual |
27 |
16 |
4 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
2 |
14 |
3 |
0 |
0 |
So these should be a priority I would think.
Unfortunately If the Federal government fails to show that they are making the protection of these targeted communities a priority, if they don’t act to deter these types of attacks, IMO they are essentially tacitly approving, enabling and endorsing these attacks just as some local authorities have done in the past. Unfortunately most of the time, that’s exactly what the FBI and Federal agencies tend to do with terrorism that happens within the U.S., especially when they fail to call it what it really is : Terrorism.
My justification for saying this happens to be the fact that Hate Crimes have been increasing lately.
More hate crimes were carried out in the United States last year, with an uptick in incidents motivated by bias against Jews, Muslims and LGBT people, among others, according to new FBI data released Monday.
There were more than 6,100 reported incidents of hate crimes in 2016, up from more than 5,800 the year before, the FBI said in a report based on data submitted by law enforcement agencies across the country. The number of hate crimes increased for a second consecutive year, and as was the case in 2015, the largest share of victims last year — nearly 6 in 10 — were targeted because of bias against the victim’s race or ethnicity.
Hate crimes motivated by hatred of a religion increased last year, with a rise in the number of crimes targeting Jews and Muslims. Of the incidents spurred by hatred of a particular religion, anti-Semitism was again the leading cause, motivating about 55 percent of those episodes, followed by anti-Muslim sentiment, which spurred about 25 percent. The number of hate crimes targeting lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people also went up last year.
Jews and LBGT, two of Cruz’ demographic targets.
Then again you have those who believe that a Hate crime — is nothing more than a “Thought Crime” because under most legislation of this type you are punished for, or that punishment is being extended, because of what you are “thinking.”
But then again, what exactly is the difference between Manslaughter, 2nd Degree Murder and 1st Degree murder? Why it’s your intent, it’s whether you had premeditated that act in question — which is exactly a matter of what you were thinking.
Your intent, and your thoughts, always matter.
(a) Manslaughter is the unlawful killing of a human being without malice. It is of two kinds:
Voluntary—Upon a sudden quarrel or heat of passion.
Involuntary—In the commission of an unlawful act not amounting to a felony, or in the commission in an unlawful manner, or without due caution and circumspection, of a lawful act which might produce death.
(a) Murder is the unlawful killing of a human being
with malice aforethought. Every murder perpetrated by poison, lying in wait, or any other kind of willful, deliberate, malicious, and premeditated killing; or committed in the perpetration of, or attempt to perpetrate, any
arson, escape, murder,
kidnapping, treason, espionage, sabotage, aggravated sexual abuse or sexual abuse,
child abuse, burglary, or robbery; or perpetrated as part of a
pattern or practice of assault or torture against a child or children; or perpetrated from a premeditated design unlawfully and maliciously to effect the death of any human being other than him who is killed, is murder in the first degree.
Any other murder is murder in the second degree.
The FBI currently desscribes terrorism as follows:
International terrorism: Perpetrated by individuals and/or groups inspired by or associated with designated foreign terrorist organizations or nations (state-sponsored).
--for example, the December 2, 2015 shooting in San Bernardino, CA, that killed 14 people and wounded 22 which involved a married couple who radicalized for some time prior to the attack and were inspired by multiple extremist ideologies and foreign terrorist organizations.
Domestic terrorism: Perpetrated by individuals and/or groups inspired by or associated with primarily U.S.-based movements that espouse extremist ideologies of a political, religious, social, racial, or environmental nature.
--for example, the June 8, 2014 Las Vegas shooting, during which two police officers inside a restaurant were killed in an ambush-style attack, which was committed by a married couple who held anti-government views and who intended to use the shooting to start a revolution.
So Mr. Cruz was Domestic. Check. He was inspired by hate and expressed religious, social and racial motivations. Check. However he is not currently charged with Terrorism even though his actions clearly fit within the definition. Similar Dylann Roof was not charged with Terrorism either.
Roof’s crime certainly seems to fit the federal description of domestic terrorism, which the FBI defines as “activities … [that] involve acts dangerous to human life that violate federal or state law … appear intended to (i) intimidate or coerce a civilian population, (ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or (iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping.”
…
It turns out there was one major obstacle in charging Roof with domestic terrorism: The crime does not exist.
“As you know, there is no specific domestic terrorism statute,” said Lynch during the press conference to announce Roof’s indictment.
Even when the USA Patriot Act, post 9/11, redefined terrorism to include domestic crimes, the provision simply allowed the government to investigate more broadly what it called “terrorism.” Actually charging someone with domestic terrorism remains a separate matter. Even criminals who use bombs or send money to ISIS — or Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev — are not charged with the crime of terrorism.
That’s right the surviving Tsarnaev brother who perpetrated the Boston Bombing in support of ISIS was not charged with Domestic Terrorism. Eric Robert Rudolph who bombed Centennial Park in Atlanta during the 1996 Olympics was not charged with Terrorism. Timothy McVeigh was not charged with Terrorism. Ted Kazinzski the “Unabomber” was not charged with Terrorism. And Terrorism charges will not be filed against James Alex Fields Jr. the man who killed Heather Heyer and injured 19 others last year in Charlottesville.
But according to the Justice Department and legal analysts, it's simply not possible for the government to file charges of domestic terrorism, because no such criminal law exists.
The Patriot Act does define domestic terrorism, and under this designation, the Justice Department has broad powers to investigate, said Neal Katyal, a Georgetown University law professor who served as former President Barack Obama's acting solicitor general and as the national security adviser to the Justice Department.
He said the government has three basic ways to approach the Charlottesville case.
"No. 1, this is a hate crime, under the hate crime statutes," he said. "The second is that this is a conspiracy to deprive individuals of civil rights."
"And the third is, this is an act of domestic terror, which isn't itself a crime," he noted. In short, the government can't file a criminal charge of domestic terrorism, but so defining the incident does allow it to investigate not only an individual suspect, but also any group the suspect may be affiliated with.
The reason this matters is because when the FBI does look at cases of International Terrorism they typically take a far more proactive stance. They keep an ear to the ground, they investigate thoroughly and in many cases they send in undercover agents or informants to derail or redirect the plans of the suspect as they did in the case of the Christmas Tree Bomb Plot after 19 year-old Mohamad Mohamud’s father reported him to the FBI.
On Nov. 4, 2010, a small cell of al-Qaeda operatives convened at a Starbucks in Corvallis, Oregon, to review the details of their plot to kill 25,000 people in downtown Portland. The cell had three members: Hussein, an explosives expert; Youssef, a businessman turned jihadi recruiter; and Mohamed Osman Mohamud, a 19-year-old Somali-American college student.
The would-be terrorists had met earlier that year, after one of Mohamud’s friends from the mosque recommended him to the Council, a secret jihadi organization that scoured the globe for potential operators. Hussein and Youssef flew to Oregon to meet the teen, whom they called “a jewel in the rough.” Together, the three conceived a plot to detonate an 1,800-pound bomb during Portland’s Christmas tree lighting ceremony, a yearly Black Friday tradition in Pioneer Square, the city’s main plaza. Mohamud chose the target. Hussein and Youssef designed and built the bomb.
…
After dropping off Youssef at the train station, Hussein and Mohamud parked in a nearby garage. The explosives expert handed the teen a cell phone. The teenager dialed the detonator number. Nothing happened.
“Why don’t you get out of the car and try again?” Hussein said.
Mohamud did as he was told. As he pressed the last button, he heard a group of people running at him.
“Don’t move!” someone yelled.
Suddenly, Mohamud was on the ground. He could hear Hussein screaming, “Allahu akbar!” — God is great — over and over again. After the third or fourth time, the 17 arresting officers started to laugh.
The bomb Mohamud had tried to detonate was fake. The test explosion was staged. There was no secret council of militant leaders seeking a gifted Somali-American teenager to wage jihad. Youssef and Hussein were undercover FBI agents.
That’s how the FBI responds to tips about a potential 19 year-old terrorist, particularly when that terrorist is a dark-skinned kid from Somalia. But then when another kid makes a not-fake firebomb and blows up Mohamud’s mosque in retaliation for his not-attack — he not only doesn’t get charged with terrorism, he doesn’t even go to jail. Not when he looks like this.
[Cody Seth Crawford] created his own homemade firebomb and used it on the mosque where Mohamud had sometimes prayed just two days after his arrest. He then went into an act of “mental illness,” which he later admitted was faked in order to reduce his sentence. Crawford was ultimately punished with just five years of probation, even though he had a long social media history of spewing violent anti-Muslim rhetoric. And yet somehow nobody thought to run a sting operation on him, did they?
And that probation has now expired.
Generally speaking sting operations like the one used against Mohamud are basically the primary way that potential terrorism plots are “foiled” — although it could be argued that the undercover FBI agents may have engineered that particular plot themselves. It’s debatable.
Clearly the FBI puts a much higher priority on doing sting operations with Islamic plots than others.
This is particularly true since there are in fact far more right-wing focused terror events — like that which occurred in Parkland — than left-wing or international/islamist inspired events and the percent of right-wing plots foiled or stopped ahead of time is much fewer.
- From January 2008 to the end of 2016, we identified 63 cases of Islamist domestic terrorism, meaning incidents motivated by a theocratic political ideology espoused by such groups as the Islamic State. The vast majority of these (76 percent) were foiled plots, meaning no attack took place.
- During the same period, we found that right-wing extremists were behind nearly twice as many incidents: 115. Just over a third of these incidents (35 percent) were foiled plots. The majority were acts of terrorist violence that involved deaths, injuries or damaged property.
Let’s say just for the sake a discussion that the FBI had been able to identify Cruz as the person who posted on youtube that he “wanted to be a professional school shooter” and/or they have bothered to call up the Miami Field Office when they received a tip about Cruz wanting to do a mass shooting. Based on their track record of only foiling 35% of right wing terror incidents there would still be about a 2 to 1 chance that they would have failed and the shooting would have still occurred.
In the best possible cases it goes down like this:
Police in California waited more than two weeks before arresting a man who posted an image of a homemade bomb on Facebook amid messages professing support for Donald Trump and opposition to Muslims, the Guardian can reveal.
William Celli, 55, was arrested on Sunday in Richmond, California, after police raided his house and discovered a suspected homemade bomb. He has been charged with two counts of suspicion of making criminal threats and possession of an explosive device.
Police were first warned about Celli more than two weeks ago, when one of his Facebook friends raised the alarm about anti-Islamic postings he had uploaded along with an image purporting to show a homemade device.
Or this:
Three Kansas milita members Allen, Stein and Wright allegedly plot to bomb an apartment complex that is home to Somali immigrants. According to the FBI, which infiltrated the group, they planned the attack for the day after the 2016 presidential election, called Muslims "cockroaches" and hoped to inspire other militia members. They face charges of conspiring to use a weapon of mass destruction.
Or this:
Two self-described white supremacist skinheads from Tennessee plot to assassinate then-presidential candidate Barack Obama as the climax of a cross-country killing spree. Cowart and Schlesselman plead guilty to threatening to kill a presidential candidate.
But usually that’s not how it goes down.
In Cruz’ case local sheriff deputies had visited his home 39 times over the last 7 years and they didn’t flag him as too dangerous to have a weapon or arrest him, child protective services visited his home and didn’t flag him as a danger to himself or others, so what makes anyone think that the FBI would have come up with a different answer? I can pretty much guarantee they wouldn’t have treated him the way they treated Muhomud in Portland, it would have been much more like the response that Crawford received.
And the primary reason why may be because of under the U.S. Codes — the only real difference between international terrorism and domestic terrorism is really the nation of origin of the perpetrator, however the criminal penalties only apply when the act is committed to U.S. nationals while they are overseas or otherwise outside the country under 18 U.S. Code § 2332.
(a) Homicide.—Whoever kills a national of the United States, while such national is outside the United States, shall—
- if the killing is murder (as defined in section 1111(a)), be fined under this title, punished by death or imprisonment for any term of years or for life, or both;
- if the killing is a voluntary manslaughter as defined in section 1112(a) of this title, be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; and
- if the killing is an involuntary manslaughter as defined in section 1112(a) of this title, be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both.
(b) Attempt or Conspiracy With Respect to Homicide.—Whoever outside the United States attempts to kill, or engages in a conspiracy to kill, a national of the United States shall—
- in the case of an attempt to commit a killing that is a murder as defined in this chapter, be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both; and
- in the case of a conspiracy by two or more persons to commit a killing that is a murder as defined in section 1111(a) of this title, if one or more of such persons do any overt act to effect the object of the conspiracy, be fined under this title or imprisoned for any term of years or for life, or both so fined and so imprisoned.
But then again, sometimes you can be surprised and there are cases where terrorism charges can be filed against someone domestic, white and right-wing all at once.
WASHINGTON ― Usually, when the FBI arrests a terrorist and the Justice Department charges them, it’s a big deal. Combatting terrorism is one of the Justice Department’s top priorities, and terror cases are a great way for federal prosecutors and agents to make names and build careers. The press and the public are very interested. Officials will typically blast out a press release, and, if it’s a big takedown, might even hold a press conference.
The Justice Department didn’t do any of that when federal prosecutors unsealed terrorism charges last week against Taylor Michael Wilson. The 26-year-old white supremacist from St. Charles, Missouri, allegedly breached a secure area of an Amtrak train on Oct. 22 while armed with a gun and plenty of backup ammunition. He set off the emergency brake, sending passengers lunging as the train cars went “completely black.”
...
But even when the federal terrorism charges were unsealed against Wilson last week, the case didn’t get a ton of national pickup. One key reason: The Justice Department didn’t tell anyone.
There was no press release on the case out of Justice Department headquarters in Washington, nor from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Nebraska. The reporter who broke the story of the terrorism charges on Thursday evening, Lori Pilger of the Lincoln Journal Star, told HuffPost that she spotted the unsealed case when checking the federal court docket online.
Apparently since the FBI couldn’t crow that they caught another “International” terrorist they didn’t even bother to issue a press release about these charges. This guy had been to Charlottesville as part of the “Unite The Right” protest in support of their confederate statues before staging the train attack but somehow Fields still hasn’t been charged with terrorism for ramming his car into a crowd of people. That was a tactic that was used by a terrorists in Barcelona, Spain and in Nice, France however when someone slams a van into a crowd outside a mosque in London it’s suddenly “not terrorism” — just like with Fields, but now it is “terrorism” when Wilson attacks a train?
If you’re having a hard time keeping up, I’m with you on that. This doesn’t make much sense.
The apparent solution to this conundrum is the fact that Wilson attacked a train and as such his charges were filed under 18 U.S. Code § 1992 Terrorist attacks and other violence against railroad carriers and against mass transportation systems on land, on water, or through the air where the requirement of the attack being to Americans outside the country doesn’t apply.
So there can be charges filed for domestic terrorism even when the targeted victims are inside the U.S., but only if they’re traveling on a train, plane or boat — and since people being shot or bombed in a school aren’t “traveling”, that kind of terrorism simply doesn’t count.
Certainly yes, it’s still murder and it might count as a Hate Crime, but it’s not — officially — Terrorism.
It seems to me that this is a much bigger problem than the FBI dropping the ball just this one time with the tip about Cruz, or the youtube post. They seem to have some fairly confused priorities here. In the years since Columbine over 600 people have been killed and over 1000 injured by mass shooters and various forms of domestic terrorism, which is far more than those who have been killed by international terrorism since 9/11.
Are they focusing on that? Are they really taking a stand against it — or is it just lip service and grand standing when they catch someone Muslim once in a while?
We need to get our priorities in order. Domestic Terrorism should officially be a crime and a priority. It should be taken exactly as seriously as any or form of terrorism or Hate Crimes.
But right now, it clearly isn’t. I think that, in and or itself, is a problem — a big one.