The Rise of Militias: Is the USA on the Brink of Civil War? | ENDEVR Documentary

So if you like an extreme if you look at like questions 15, 16, and 17. >> Jesus. So I'm looking at an intake questionnaire for a violent extremist group, and I'm going to read you three of the questions. Question 15. Are you in the military or a veteran? If so, which branch? [music] 16. If it comes down to it, would you go against the oath you took in the military and law enforcement? You could end up fighting against your military law enforcement brothers. I mean, I I I think you got to consider where somebody has

to be in order to say yes to those three questions and also some of the capabilities and training that some of these individuals bring. There are places in our military where we are trained uh to start [music] and fuel insurgencies. There are places in our military where we are trained to overthrow governments or or work with armed militias in order to do that sort of thing. I'm not saying this to be alarmist and I'm not I don't think we need to be afraid of our veterans. [music] What I do think is that we need to

have a solid understanding uh of of how badly this could escalate. We're not at the point where violence is the solution to our problems, but there are a lot of people trying to convince vets and others that we [music] are and that that is a very dangerous thing [music] today. Domestic terrorism is the greatest terrorist threat facing the United States. [music] The threat is real and we are all at risk. For decades, violent extremist groups [music] have sought to infiltrate our military to gain tactical training and access to weapons and explosives. [music] I do believe

the oath means something and I know that I'm going directly against people who think that they also are honoring their oath. >> [music] >> I I stand do solemnly swear support of the United States [music] against all enemies foreign and domestic. >> So help me God. >> So help me God. >> So help me God. [music] [music] Go [music] ahead and fill up this magazine. Asked a buddy of [music] mine. I said, "Hey man, can you uh can you get me some ammo? Some decent ammo? I can't find any." He said, "Yeah, man. I I

heard that there's a drug dealer down the corner. He's uh actually slinging ammunition now instead of drugs. So, bought some [music] ammunition from the drug dealer. When people look at these these guns, these rifles, and these handguns, so forth, you know, there's there's a lot of folks that see something [music] that causes violence. They see something that's dangerous and shouldn't be allowed in society and [music] so forth. What they don't realize is that this is what gave us our freedom. This is what won our independence. This is what protects us [music] from from attack. It's

not just our God-given right, you know, to defend oursel. It's our constitutional right. But it's also it's just right, you know, when you when you think about it. Uh this rifle will never hurt or harm anybody unless something that comes up against it. Baby's ready to rock and roll. [music] Being a Texan, we're supposed to be able to protect ourselves. You know, the stuff that they show you on the movies, that's our real life. That's who we are, the cowboy way. And the cowboy way is to be able to defend yourself. And uh you know,

I'm proud to say that I can do that, you know, pretty effectively. You know, I learned how to ride a horse when I was about six. The property that we lived at was a lot like this. Mosquite trees and so forth. My grandfather gave me my first BB gun and uh you know showed me how to aim, how to breathe and shoot. I was taught how to hone into a target and be able to actually execute with whatever tool I'm using. But what you learn in the military and the army is your scopes will fail

you, your red dots will fail you, the batteries will wear out, but your irons never ever will. So, I've never had anything on my rifles other than uh my iron sights. Not the best grouping, but from 60 yards, 50 yards, so it'll work. Up close, it all be in the center. Good boy. Come here. Hey, puppy. I spent my whole life wanting to join the military. I mean, there's a photo right behind me of me when I was probably like 5 years old wearing camouflage head to toe with a pair of dog tags. I feel

like most kids that I grew up with went through a phase of wanting to be a cop or a firefighter or an army man, [music] right? I never grew out of that. Then when I was 16 years old, September 11th happened and it kind of put a different spin on that desire to serve. I went to go out and find bad guys and find justice. So this when I was 18 years [music] old in basic training and it's the standard photo that you take before you know what anything on the uniform means. So, you notice

there's no ribbon, [music] no name tag, anything like that. It's a a barebones uniform. I was wearing a shirt, jacket, and tie that weren't mine. I mean, this is ignorance is bliss right here. That's that's what this photo is. >> The historical record is absolutely clear that the aftermath of warfare is a danger point for anti-democratic violence, for racist violence, for activity among clan and white power groups. There's no question that this is the case. All of us, men, women, people who have served or not, old people, children, everyone becomes more violent in the aftermath

of warfare. I think that what we don't know yet is what happens to that phenomenon when we're talking about a 20-year war. My career started as a enlisted soldier. I was private crow [music] and then almost a decade later it ended as captain crow. Over that period well over a 100 combat missions between Iraq and Afghanistan. And of course felt like I left that part of my life behind me. >> We will TAKE THAT DUTY AND >> WE'RE GOING TO STORM THE [ __ ] CAPITAL. [ __ ] YOU [ __ ] >> So on

January 6th, I had told all the members of my staff not to come in to the office. Um I had heard reports of Bugloo Boys and Proud Boys and others um filling flights to come into the capital. [screaming] >> I think as a lot of us watch things unfold on the 6th and then have have looked at a lot of the footage since you see things we recognize as veterans. On January 6th, 2021, US military veterans who had sworn an oath to defend the country were at the vanguard of a violent attempt to stop Congress

from certifying the 2020 presidential election. They were determined to keep Joe Biden from becoming president. >> You can actually see if you look at it, the militia groups, you the oath creepers, the 3enters, the Proud Boys, they're organized. They're behaving tactically. They understand that the the dynamics of a crowd and they're maneuvering to exploit that mass of bodies, you know, so you'll see an organized line of militia members with shields ready to go, ready to exploit a breach, pushing the crowd in certain directions. [cheering] >> The mob broke through into the capital. They evacuated leadership.

They evacuated the floor, but they had forgotten that there were about two dozen members up in the gallery. >> EVERYBODY STAY DOWN. Get down. The floor of the house was evacuated, but there was no safe evacuation route evidently um from the the gallery. >> There's no safe place in the United States for any of these [ __ ] Military principle 105, cave means grave. >> And that's why I realized we were trapped. There was no way out and we would likely have to make a stand or fight our way out. This was one of the

most shocking moments of my life. I made the decision to call my wife and let her know that I uh love her and tell the kids that I love them. >> The only time that the US capital had been breached before was in the War of 1812, and that was care of the British king. >> Here we ARE IN THE CAPITAL. >> NO LOOKING BACK NOW, BOYS. >> No looking back. >> This is what we [ __ ] lived up for. Everything we [ __ ] trained for. >> Wow. [screaming] This was the kind of

experience that I expected as a US Marine in Iraq, but could never even imagine [music] happening as a United States congressman in Washington DC. >> You know, many people have seen the pictures. They had barred the door [music] to the gallery. They were banging on that door and breaking the glass to that door. You know, I've often asked myself, how did I end up on one side of that door and [music] my fellow veterans who raised their same right hand and took the same oath that [music] I took, how did they end up on the

other side of that door? >> Nearly 150 law enforcement [music] officers were injured in the melee. [screaming] Five protesters [music] died and another four police officers later committed suicide. >> Donald Trump tweeted out a video. He said, "WE DID A GOOD [ __ ] JOB." >> Among those charged [music] in connection with the attack, a disproportionate number are US [music] military veterans. [music] >> [music] >> For me now, the capital is almost like walking around Gettysburg or Ant Tedum or going to Pearl Harbor. And my son Michael was killed in action in Afghanistan in June

14th, 2008. And when you join the military, there's a lot of lot of competing ideals of why you show up. And and for most of us, there's a there's a a large amount of patriotism. But you never lose focus and never lose sight that you know I'm here in this country maybe to give them a better chance [music] to experience what we have in America where it's not perfect. We are trying [music] to form a more perfect union every day and we want to give that chance to other people. My son died doing that in

Afghanistan only for us to to lose that sight here. [music] Veterans who swear that oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic, of all Americans. They should understand how dangerous [music] and unpatriotic this insurrection was. They were trying to overthrow Democratic election results. They shouted for the hanging of our own vice president. That's a coup attempt. Watching the insurrection happen, and we're going to call it that because that's what it was. >> [music] >> and watching veterans participate being at the vanguard of that insurrection. It just

it's mindboggling. But I I don't I don't have a really good answer for why why veterans would do that. Though I was trained to blow stuff up and run with the infantry, I became this unofficial on the ground intelligence reporter. May 15th, 2005, we got called to uh respond to a body that was found in a trash dump outside Solder City. When we got there, uh we realized that it wasn't a body, it was a bunch of bodies. And uh I had never experienced anything like it. And now, as I was taking photos, close-up photos

of these faces of victims of murder and torture, I was looking at their wounds and looking at the packaging tape that was wrapped around their eyes and imagining the terror that they felt. And every time I snap a picture, one of those faces freezes and the way that it froze on the screen, it froze in my head. But that was just a day of deployment. and I had 6 and 1/2 months, 7 months left of Iraq to deal with that. >> I went in as 11 Bravo to the Army. [music] I scored fairly high. So,

I went to airborne school, which was going to be my next >> [music] >> uh step of training for special forces. And uh during that time, I ended up getting injured really badly. When I came home, I had spent my entire adult life up to that point, you know, either training for combat or in combat. It was hard for me to think of anything positive in any way, whether it's for myself or for my country or for democracy or for the world. I couldn't help but base my beliefs and my feelings on my experiences, all

of which had been horrifically [ __ ] negative. When most come out of the military, they're coming out to a world that they no longer understand anymore. You really get lost in that life when you're in the military. And you know what happens is you have the camaraderie, the friendship, [music] all the good things that you have in the military. And then when you come out, you kind of have society that's undisiplined, incapable, and and just downright ugly. >> Good evening. I'm Jamie Yukas. [music] Massive police presence in Portland, Oregon today in anticipation of a

violent confrontation. >> I'm a proud boy. I'm a president of the Hellgate Bridge Crew chapter in New York City. I'm also an Air Force veteran. What we're going through right now is is a war on the US Constitution. Biggest reason why I joined the Air Force myself. You know, it's to give back to my country, to serve my country. I think a lot of that kind of came from my up upbringing, you know, the family that I grew up in, you know, very proud to be an American. Uh, very proud what America stood for, what

it represented around the world, very patriotic, and I think a lot of those things are what's lost today. >> Members of the Proud Boys and Antifa fought multiple times. >> Mayor Ted Wheeler just sent out a statement late today saying [music] this past weekend, quote, put innocent lives at risk. The Proud Boys were founded in New York in 2016. >> You want to keep on poking a sleeping bear? Guess what? [music] It's going to rise up and it's going to be 1776 up into this [ __ ] >> and are classified as an international terrorist

organization like Canada. >> We're a Western chauvinist. [music] What that essentially means is that we're the biggest cheerleaders for western values, western culture, [music] small government, maximum freedom, maximum liberty, pro- first amendment, pro- second amendment, glorifying the entrepreneur, venerating the housewife. We're not militaristic in any way, shape, or form. The fact of the matter is, you have good guys in this world, you have bad guys in this world, [music] and the only way to stand up to the bad guys is to fight them. They came to prominence in America in September 2020 during a presidential

debate between Joe Biden and Donald Trump. >> Would you like me to proud stand back and stand by >> when I saw the president of the United States telling an extremist violent organization stand by that was a chilling moment. That was a chilling moment for me. It wasn't any different than a president of the United States telling al-Qaeda or telling ISIS, "Look, I have a tough election. Stand by. Let me tell you what you need to do." >> Did we get a lot of notoriety? Absolutely. Of course we did. But at the very same time,

it's it's not because we're racist. It's not because we're white supremacists. >> If we think about what the militant right and white power movement looks like today, there are many of these groups. The specifics can change from group to group but the overall intent [music] is the same. >> The common ideology is simple. Uh we had power. We should have power. [music] Power is being taken away from us and by any means necessary we can get it back. >> Fascist groups, you have national socialist groups. You have southern nationalist groups. You have all types of

groups with all types of creeds. But ultimately we're all being united because we all believe in the same thing which is ultimately that white people have a right to exist. And whether the Wii is a white Wii, >> WILL NOT REPLACE US. >> Whether the Wii is an anti-government Wii, they're all intertwined. >> The more laws they pass, it's going to end up the people versus the government. Right now, we're being peaceful. In the future, nobody knows when that breaking point's going to hit. >> Should have hit a long time ago. personally believe >> a

lot of people think that ah you know these are knuckleheads and we shouldn't worry about them. Unfortunately we said the same thing about the jihadis prior to the events of 9/11. They live in caves in Afghanistan. They don't pose any threat to the homeland. But by the time we decided to go after them after 9/11 it was a little bit too late. >> [cheering] >> I would like to think that we would draw the attention of people that are from the military with the military background and I think it it it would be true of

like the 3enters or the old keepers. The one thread that kind of combines all of our groups is the US Constitution, our respect for and I signed up to defend this country. I was essentially joining the 3enters already. The oath of enlistment is the exact oath of a 3enter. I do solemnly swear >> I do solemnly swear >> that I will support and defend the Constitution >> I will support and defend the Constitution >> of the United States >> of the United States >> AGAINST ALL ENEMIES >> AGAINST ALL enemies >> foreign and domestic >>

foreign and domestic >> in Atlanta I met up with 3% SF and some of the other brothers out there and everybody was upset about the election You know, I mean, basically, we're looking at a criminal that has become our president illegitimately. Joe Biden has already harmed this country. His son has already harmed this country. We know for a fact that that family is a criminal family. The situation we're in is a situation of treason. The punishment for treason is death. In America, you have the right to be an [ __ ] You have the right

to have the most pathetic views in the world. I don't have to agree with you. You don't have to agree with me. But that is a right protected by the First Amendment. I think when we talk about violent extremistic groups, we're talk we're talking about individuals that go beyond the narrative to violence. People who are planning to attack the US government because it's an evil empire. people who are trying to, you know, kill Jews or kill immigrants or kill black people just based on their race or on their religion. When you move away from the

narrative, as ugly as that narrative is, to carry out violence based on that narrative, to recruit individuals to carry out violence based on that narrative, then you're a violent extremist. then you're frankly a terrorist. >> We used to talk about IEDs, improvised explosive devices in Iraq and they were incredibly lethal. And what we learned as we tried to stop this was that the problem was not the bomb itself. the problem. You had to go left of the boom. You had to go upstream to the problem and look at where the problem is coming from. Where's

the energy? >> January 6th. Now, a militia group had stashes of guns on the outskirts of DC, ready to go on that fateful day during the insurrection. That's just one of the alarming allegations from the Justice Department today after the feds charged the leader Steuart Rhodess and several members of the right-wing group the Oathkeepers with sedicious conspiracy. >> Stuart Rhodess is a former army paratrooper with a law degree from Yale. In 2009, he founded the Oathkeepers, a shadowy organization that recruited law enforcement officers, active duty military and veterans. Their mission was to supposedly defend the

[music] US Constitution, but it quickly devolved into an armed militia dedicated to overthrowing the US government. >> The founders told us in their wisdom that we must be the militia. You will not be secure. You will not be free without it. It's time we resurrect that and become the militia once [music] again. >> There are thought to be 35,000 members in the organization, most of them [music] heavily armed. And January 6th was not the first time RHS assembled his forces and an arsenal of weapons. >> A state of emergency [clears throat] in Louisville, Kentucky, after

a grand jury decided not [music] to indict three police officers in the shooting death of Briana Taylor. [music] >> Late this afternoon, protesters clashed with police. >> Guys, bring it in. Pay attention. You can't talk and listen at the same time. >> You're in a military operation. Behave like it. >> Overdrive is going to be Bravo team and the pawn shop's going to be Charlie Team. >> Following the killing of Briana Taylor, the Oathkeepers went to Kentucky alongside local militia groups. >> Here in Louisville to protect the shell station and also the pawn shop across

the street and also a private residence. You can't predict the unpredictable. You can't predict chaos. You can't predict stupid. Is there going to be enough room? >> My main message is you got to get ready and prepare yourselves in your communities for what we see coming where I think it's unavoidable. Now got too many brainwashed Americans have been brainwashed by communist professors and teachers to hate their own country. [screaming] >> What do you do that hates your own country? It hates you. by a close extension if you believe in your country still. >> 3 2

1 go. >> It's almost like we're in a foreign country doing a stability operation against an insurgency with our guys up there is SF special forces vet and we got another one that's a retired staff sergeant SF. I'm not surprised that extremist organizations try to recruit veterans for the credibility that we bring, but also for our commitment. Um, [music] and that commitment takes a lot of forms. Veterans are people in our society who in many ways have said, "I will do whatever is necessary to preserve what I believe in to preserve the baseline values and

the baseline existence of my society up to and including violence. >> Put a scope on there and take a peek at and see what they get." >> That's same kind of [ __ ] they've been doing their whole career, you know, now they're doing it here inside the United States. It's kind of a weird feeling. >> I had two purple two purple hearts already in a bronze stock. They said, "David, the only way we'll call you back in is if the [ __ ] going to hit the fan." [music] I came home to visit my

mom in Crestwood, Kentucky. Was taking a shower. She come pounding on the door early in the morning. She put the TV by the time second airplane hit 911. [music] >> Well, 3 weeks later, I was getting my shots. Our group was the second group to enter Afghanistan. >> Hell yeah, man. It's it's so enticing. I mean, I um god, you get to fight again. You know, it's um you know, you're trained in certain things. You know, you can see the battlefield better. Uh if you believe the country is under attack, you have a certain set

of skills that maybe you were trained uh trained with that you can, you know, help the group around you, right? You're a force multiplier. The quitessential examples of a force multiplier are special forces, army green berets, you know, these 12man A teams that actually go behind enemy lines and train up to a battalion, you know, up to 6 or 700 local indigenous forces on combat skills. Certainly, I think that's one of the reasons why some of these extremist groups are recruiting these individuals very deliberately into their movements, right? >> They're [ __ ] coming. Y'all

know that's not the way to square, right? >> Then you get locked, ready to go. >> Hey guys, everybody spread out, get eyes open, get a good perimeter. >> They light [ __ ] on fire. We can shoot on them, right? >> Yep. >> They very [ __ ] will. Hopefully they light [ __ ] on fire. When I was 21 and severely damaged from a war that I had been lied into and that my friends [music] were dying for, when a guy like Stuart Rhodess comes along with a Yale law degree and they see

the eye patch, they don't know that he shot himself at a range, but they assume he's a combat wounded vet and says like, "Hey, you can support and defend the Constitution in the United States standing with us." And just, you know, repeats the words of the the the Second Amendment. that that's all it took for me to be like, okay, you know, you know, you've got the pedigree, you've got the background, so why should I challenge that? You know, I I have no basis in in experience or education to challenge it. >> They're not going

to let him get anywhere near us. >> Yeah. No, cuz we're going to [ __ ] paint the streets, man. The challenge with having veterans [music] directly involved is twofold. The first is that they bring a certain expertise. They might bring an organizational skills or military skills that can make a movement more dangerous. >> All right, hold on. Let's go. >> The second thing that's disturbing, however, is particularly in our society, veterans have legitimacy. They have a particular place of respect and when we see veterans involved in something, it gives some component of legitimacy to

that cause. >> Our command's been trying to tell us to inform you that you are breaking curfew right now. >> Yes, sir. >> If you could just go back to your post that >> not not by us, just by we will have to enforce curfew. >> I have no problem. Appreciate it. >> Thank you so much. >> Very kind. >> Very kind. >> Veterans have a kind of social cache that provides cover for a lot of the extremist activity that these groups are trying to do. So if you turn out to a protest with a

bunch of people in uniform, much like if you turn out with a bunch of women, um you have a different kind of reception than if you turn out [music] wearing say swastikas and hoods and robes. So when we think about this, this is along the lines of something like choosing to come out in polo shirts and khakis or choosing to come out in funny Hawaiian shirts as part of bugaloo. Those are deliberate decisions that are made to create the opportunity for public reception. And the use of veterans is one way to do this among several.

>> I've not been a part of any militia beforehand, but once they opened up and said that they were doing all this BLM and they, you know, I'd seen my city on fire, I I was just like, I've had enough. And so I, you know, I reached out to my local militia >> and, you know, I've been with them ever since. >> Yeah. Straight back. When you're vulnerable and you're looking for family, cuz that's what the people you serve with are, [music] they look like they could be family. They look like they can provide you

that sense of purpose, that mission, that camaraderie that you had in the military, that you became dependent on, that became the center of your identity. They could give that back to you. And when he tells you to fight, you have no reason to question that because he's giving you purpose and he's giving you a mission. >> Would you say the Oathkeepers are preparing for potential violence on and around the election day? >> Yeah. Yeah. We got our people across the country um making plans, but there's too many of us. There's too many veterans, first of

all. Too many freaking military veterans. That's one thing. I'm not a big fan of the war on terror. It did wrote about a lot of our rights. One thing it did give us is a massive pool, huge pool of combat veterans and about 95% of them are on the conservative side or on the side of the Constitution. >> Yeah. So, it's not going to play out very well. And so when I look at January 6th, of course there were people who did violence [music] and climb gates and caused trouble, but in my view they were

likely the foot soldiers. They were [music] the result of the efforts of other people. There's the man behind the curtain pushing everybody out. You know, these these are the halfcock plans, the guys who go early. The people you really have to worry about are the people you don't even know exist until you're 2 years into the conflict cuz they're tactically patient and they're watching you. Oh my god. >> And I still am absolutely stunned that people don't see how awful January 6th [music] was and what an indicator that is and how it's escalating. And [music]

anybody who says that this can't happen in a worse way, either they're ignorant um or they're part of the problem. >> Overran the capital. >> We're in the [ __ ] capital. >> People shouldn't look at the insurrection at the capital as an anomaly. We should pay attention to the pattern that got us there. In the name of Jesus Christ, we light this cross. And as light dispels darkness, so may his word and his example dispel the heathen from our midst. Amen. >> Amen. >> Amen. >> By this sign, you will conquer. White victory. >>

WHITE VICTORY. >> WHITE POWER. >> POWER. >> WE WILL FIGHT. >> WE WILL FIGHT. >> There is one American example of an extraordinarily successful Paris movement and that is of course the GKX clan. >> Many people in the clan talked about their experience as a continuation of warfare. The first wave came after the Civil War and here we saw prominent veterans like Nathan Bedford Forest who rose to leadership of that clan. And although it started as a veteran social organization, it very quickly pivoted to extralegal violence targeted at African-Ameans which included night writings, lynchings, serial

rape, serial murder. All of these things were designed to create terror in African-American communities, to control labor pools, to control local politics, and to keep African-Americans from the polls. One of the main parts of the Jim Crow era was something that we would think of today as election subversion. And we would see in states like Georgia where they refused to seat 33 state legislatores. We saw in states like Louisiana where they refused to seat [music] a dulyeleed United States senator in North Carolina where they held a coup to overthrow black leadership in Wilmington. >> And

in Mississippi when winning elections by fraud and violence became increasingly difficult, white politicians turned to the state constitution. In 1890, Solomon Calhoun, the convention's president, gave delegates their marching orders. We came here to exclude the Negro. Nothing short of this will answer. The pole tax and literacy tests that were written into Mississippi law were so effective at keeping blacks from voting that Calhoun's strategy became a model for the rest of the South, staying in place for almost another century. The clan managed to keep African-Americans from voting for 100 years. Uh that is an astonishing political

success and it happened because the clan was politically powerful, really well-connected largely in the Democratic party, not just in the South, and was able to establish itself as a counterpower that would stop the emergence of new voters, whether those voters were blacks or indeed Catholics who they didn't see as genuinely American. The next and most politically effective wave of KKK activity came after World War I. The second clan that emerges after Birth of a Nation, a movie that really changes the perception of the clan that Woodro Wilson as president screens in the White House, allows

a new media savvy extremist movement to emerge. >> And this is when you really saw the group take off, not just in the South, but nationwide. This is the clan that reached a membership of some four million people and 10% of the state of Indiana. They were parading in public on the National Mall in Washington DC. [music] And the founder of that organization had been a veteran of the Spanishamean War. It [music] comes to a head in 1924. The Democratic Party has a convention in Madison Square Garden and the Kulux [music] Clan decides that it's

going to stop the Democratic Party from condemning clan violence and they pretty much take over the party and make sure that it is running on their agenda. Now, if you want the optimistic story, four years later, the Democratic Party changes. [music] If you want the pessimistic story, a major political party gets co-opted and taken over by a violent insurrectionist [music] terrorist movement. The KKK's grip on the Democratic Party soon ended, but nearly 100 years later, attempts to subvert free and fair elections have not. >> You rigged my [ __ ] election, you [ __ ]

piece of [ __ ] We're going to try you and we're going to hang you. We're talking about 50 and 60 year old ladies that are just that just been working elections their whole life or respected [music] leaders on on both sides that are being inundated with some of the worst types of threats that you can imagine. >> You and your family will be killed very slowly. The death threats came by text to Trisha Rathenberger, wife of Georgia Secretary of State, as [music] Trump attacked him incessantly for standing by the election results in Georgia. He's

an enemy of the people. [music] >> Intimidation is a form of voter suppression and goes hand in hand with with election subversion both in our history and today. >> They're trying to rig an election and we can't let that happen. I hope you're all going to be poll watchers. >> The entire poll watching program for the Trump campaign was called Army for Trump. >> We need every [music] ablebodied man woman to join Army for Trump's election security [music] operation. The underlying narrative, the messages that were pushed were one of we need to go protect and

stop fraud from uh coming into our elections. It was a very militaristic campaign. >> To increase its [music] operational effectiveness, Trump's army enlisted groups like True the Vote, which had many veterans within its ranks. >> As a veteran, [music] we're sworn to support and defend the Constitution. My brothers and I were willing to shed our blood on the battlefield to protect the beliefs of the Iraqi people [music] so they can vote. So I'm asking you as Americans to take involvement in this vote. >> The idea that military [music] service entitles you to talk about protecting

the Constitution is a real problem because it gives a level of justification these groups do not deserve and have not earned. >> If you have any information about ballot harvesting in your state, go to true the vote. It's called truethevote.org and I'm sure I'm sure a lot of people in this audience saw plenty. >> If there's always this underlying [music] belief that people are trying to game this system in an unfair [music] way, then regardless of the intent of the people that are are are brought into that system, that default [music] will always be there

to to police that vote. And we know that that's going to have a disproportionate impact on communities of color. We're trying to build an army here that will have the confidence and and and courage to come down in here in these areas where we really need um pole workers. This is where the fraud is occurring. >> You know, those areas that he was pointing [music] out, there are no allegations of any sort of voter fraud or shenanigans taking place there in 2020 [music] at all. The only thing that's known is that black and brown people

vote heavily in those areas. Harris County, [music] like the rest of the United States, has seen its percentage of white residents decrease dramatically. [music] 50 years ago, white Americans made up more than 80% of the US population. [music] By 2044, they will be in the minority. The demographic change [music] of the United States away from being a white majority country towards a multi-racial nation and a multicultural nation is what moves it from simply aha my community is becoming multi-racial and our politics will change because of this to we have to stop this because if people

can vote and exercise their rights the white majority will be imperiled. And everywhere I turn, I have been hearing from my constituents. They are deeply worried. They know their history. They are witnessing what is happening to our democracy in real time. >> In the aftermath of the 2020 [music] election, Republican legislatures in Georgia and 18 other states passed a slew of laws that limited access to the ballot box. But what is even more disconcerting is that these politicians in the state legislature have already laid the tracks to take over local boards of elections. Control the

count. >> We can get to the same place through bureaucratic violence as some would say as we can get to through actual violence and intimidation. [music] And when you marry those two, then you are in a unique era of suppression and anti-democratic efforts. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this wonderful gathering of people that's come this afternoon, Lord, to celebrate this grassroot campaign of keeping America great. We know that there's groups today uh that have brought havoc to our great cities across America, this militant Marxist groups, Lord, that uh would destroy us from being a

greatness. I pray against them, Holy Spirit, in Jesus name. And everybody said a big old amen. >> Amen. >> You joyful warriors and patriots have watched as your tyrannical governments have separated you from your churches, from your schools, from your prosperity, right? From your families, from your businesses. But now you can fight back cuz that's what we do. We fight back. All right, listen up. HOW MANY VETERANS I GOT IN HERE? LET ME HEAR YOU SHOUT. [cheering] >> They're trying to make us a socialist country. >> And maybe they're trying to make us a communist

country. >> I am deadly serious. The next three years is going to determine [music] whether we remain a free country. That's why all over America, we need people like Eric, particularly in the Senate. [cheering] [applause] There is he hasn't stopped fighting. He's still on the front lines. And the day after the election, he said, "You know what? We got some serious irregularities here. We need to look into this fraud." And what did you hear from the mainstream media over and over again? They said, "Oh, that's just crazy. You can't do that. You can't to say

that there's any fraud in the election. Well, I'm proud to tell you I'm the only person in this race from Missouri who went down to the front lines in Arizona myself to look at the election audit and they need to audit the whole election. They need [applause] to audit the whole election. >> Eric Brightens is a highly decorated former Navy Seal and a road scholar. He grew up as a Democrat and after leaving the service wrote several best-selling [music] books about humanitarianism. >> Strength and Compassion is a book of photographs and essays from eight different

countries where I did international humanitarian work and documentary photography. >> He [music] also co-founded the influential veteran nonprofit, The Mission Continues. >> Everybody's home sleeping. We're out here working. The mission continues. Our belief at the mission continues was that every single veteran who is coming [music] home was an asset and that they could all live lives of purpose and dignity and meaning here at home. >> In 2015, he became the Republican governor of Missouri, but resigned less than two years later in the wake [music] of a sex and fundraising scandal. In 2021, he began his

campaign for the US Senate. When I took the oath to serve in the United States military, I took an oath to defend the Constitution against all enemies, >> foreign and domestic >> and domestic >> and domestic. [applause] >> And folks, let's be clear, we have a fight on our hands for this country. And we're here to let the mainstream media know and let the left know and the establishment know and let the rhinos know that we are going to win and we're taking back our country. [cheering] We are taking back our country. This is our

COUNTRY AND WE ARE TAKING it back. [applause] There's a cadre of Iraq and Afghanistan era veterans who were trained in elite military units, who went to elite schools. >> A+ we're with you all the way. who know better and over the last few years have seen Trump's rise to power and rather than be disgusted by it because it goes against all of our values, they don't live by those values. And you went from high school to the Marines. >> Yeah. The good the great thing about the Marine Corps is that they really force you to

shape up. I I like to describe [music] it as a four-year character education because they teach you not just, you know, how to iron in a uniform, but they teach you about financial management. They teach you how to [music] make your bed. They teach you a lot of the skill sets that you need to be a successful adult. >> JD Vance is a former [music] Marine. Like Stuart Rhodess, he graduated from Yale Law School. And like Eric Brightens, he's a best-selling author who was once a darling of the New York Times. [music] >> Are there

commonalities between poor whites, poor blacks, poor Latinos? >> Absolutely. There are things that are shared across across different groups. And I think that we should take some inspiration for it from it, some recognition that that we are sort of in this together. >> In [music] 2016, he called Donald Trump an idiot. >> I'm a never Trump guy. I never liked him. >> And suggested [music] that he could be an American Hitler. But four years later, he changed his tune when he launched his campaign for Ohio Senate seat. >> I wasn't always nice, but the simple

fact is he's the best president of my lifetime, and he revealed the corruption in this country like nobody else. JD Vance a few years ago I I think a lot of people across political spectrum had a [music] lot of respect for him but now we see him pretending to be an idiot. >> Are you [music] a racist? Do you hate Mexicans? >> I think it's ridiculous that we're focused on this border in Ukraine. Uh I don't I got to be honest with you. I don't really care what happens to Ukraine one way or another. A

guy like Eric Brightens or a guy like JD Vance, they didn't internalize any of the morals that are supposed to be instilled in us during our training. Things like valor and honor and respect. >> Strike your fear in the hearts of liberals everywhere, folks. [applause] >> They understand when they're lying. They understand when they're fueling hatred. I say it all the time, right? I think the election was stolen from Trump and technology companies would not let us talk about the fact that Joe Biden is is the leader of the world's biggest crime family >> and

they recognize that they need to do it in order to achieve power. >> Part of the problem for the young veteran, too, is that some of these manipulative voices are former highranking military leaders. >> GENERAL MICHAEL FLYNN. [cheering] So when you hear somebody who held sway over you when you were in uniform and now they're out and they're still commanding that respect that has just such a strong purpose. >> Trump won. >> He won. [cheering] He won He won the popular vote. He won the popular vote and he won the electoral college vote. Ah, you

know, Flynn's Flynn's a character. He's something special. You know, it's comes a little bit from the camaraderie of of being a military person. I can look at Flynn and I can see that he's he's got some really really deep love for this country and respect for it. And he does respect his oath. >> I am not a conspiracy theorist. I I base my life on facts and judgment and what I believe is right for this country. For this country, period. Flynn has been exposing truth left and right and that's what makes him one of the

most dangerous men in America. >> Michael Flynn is a retired US Army threestar general. His specialty was military intelligence. >> Is it trusted? You know, the intelligence community wants to, you know, validate the sources of information that we have in order to make it to to ensure that it's believable, reliable, relevant. and the teams he led were notoriously effective in rooting out insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan for over a decade. In 2012, he was nominated by Barack Obama to be the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency. Mike Flynn brings to this position decades of experience

in military intelligence. His knowledge of the 21st century battlefield is unsurpassed. But three years later, the one-time Democrat had become an avid supporter of candidate Trump. >> Lock her up. That's right. Get That's right. Lock her up. >> And would soon become President Trump's national security adviser. But just 22 days into his term, Trump fired him for lying about his interactions with Russia. The evolving and eroding level of trust as a result of this situation is what led the president to ask for General Flynn's resignation. >> And General Flynn would soon enter a plea deal

with the FBI. His prison sentence was under review when Trump pardoned him in December 2020, [music] less than a month before leaving office. Mike Flynn and I served together for many years and we're very close friends. I disagree with him politically. I am disappointed by the nature of the the comments that he makes, the calls to action. >> This is one of our top quality guns. And >> maybe I'll find somebody in Washington DC. [laughter] [cheering] >> Disgraced former General Michael Flynn. Convicted felon. He uses general like it's his first [music] name. I'm his Facebook

friend. His Facebook name is Jen Flynn on Telegram. He's General Flynn. He's using his rank as part of his identity. And he has adopted the radical fascist politics of MAGA and of KQAnon. >> Where we go one, we go all. >> Where we go one, we go all. >> God bless America. to build himself up as a leader for an insurgency against the people of the United States. >> THIS COUNTRY IS AWAKE. THIS IS SOIL THAT WE HAVE fought over and we will fight for in the future. >> He could take military capabilities and he

could place them in those states and basically rerun an election in each of those states. >> Clearly, his military experience influences some people to give him legitimacy [music] that he might not otherwise have. >> I'm a simple Marine. I want to know why what happened in Minamar can't [music] happen here. [cheering] >> No reason. I mean, it should happen here. No reason, right? That's right. >> Flynn's apparent endorsement of a military coup is not the only time the former military intelligence officer has planted ideas about the illegitimacy of the federal government and its partners in

crime. Well, he doesn't need any introduction on this Friday, January 28th broadcast. He's General Flynn and of course a embattled individual in the fight for this republic. All these global organizations, they see themselves as this is how we can control societies. This is how we can control humanity. So, let's introduce something called COVID. And they did it. And they did it for a couple of reasons. One of the big reasons was was to steal an election. They have an intent to have a new world order. They have an intent to track every single one of

us. And they use it under the skin. They use a means by which it's under the skin. Dr. Fouchy would be right in right in there in the same room with people like Dr. Mangallay and Dr. Zel who worked for the Nazis at the time of uh of of Hitler's all of Hitler's experimentation on human beings. The reality is as you learn the ability to lead, whether it's military or not, you learn the ability to get people to do stuff. And that's just what he's doing. >> We are in a crucible moment in the history

of the United States of America. >> We're fighting with faith. We're fighting with courage. And nothing can resist the power of prayer. And he perverts this military experience, this religious experience to evoke this kind of feeling of a higher purpose. >> The oppression that they have used with THIS VIRUS IS AN ABOMINATION TO FREEDOM. [cheering] >> There is no righteousness on their side. THE LORD IS NOT ON THEIR SIDE. >> HE IS ON OURS. [cheering] >> That's right. We will not go silently into the night. >> All right. >> We will [music] fight. >> We

are making our lists and we are checking them twice and we are finding out >> who is the enemy of America. >> People that are creating the oppression in this country. The people that are involved with tearing down our freedoms, our liberties, and the value of what we hold dear in this country need to be placed on lists. People like Dr. Fouchy that have constantly in his life caused death, destruction, illness, and horrible things. They have to be put on these list. They have to be put out of our society altogether and never be trusted

again. Now, if someone ends up attacking these people that have been found to be an enemy of the United States and they're criminals, I'm not going to shed a tear about it. Okay, go away. [music] >> When I left the military, I was a hardcore Republican. I was a libertarian like a lot of people in the military. I was looking at like I can't even call them documentaries but these YouTube videos like uh this movie Zeitgeist. [music] >> You have better wake up and understand that there are people who are guiding your life and you

don't even know it. >> Now that I study extremism, I recognize it's filled with anti-semitic tropes. The theme of the movie without explicitly saying it is that Jewish people are out there controlling the banks and the banks are the reasons why we go into war. So therefore the Jews are responsible [music] for my friends dying. Right? That's the connection that it's trying to make. >> The ultimate goal is to get everybody in this world chipped with a chip with an RFID chip and uh have all money be on those chips and everything on those chips.

And if anybody wants to protest what we do or violate what we want, we just turn off their chip. I just absorbed [music] this propaganda and fell for it. Fell into it. >> I was watching Alex Jones before anyone knew what his name was. I >> mean, now they're openly bragging it's world government and they run it. >> Tucker Carlson was back on MSNBC and Glenn Beck. >> It's all connected. These people down here are radicals. And all of these concepts started to fit together and feed this narrative, this this idea [music] that I had

felt but couldn't put words to for so long that I was the victim not just of circumstance but of some sort of nefarious group of powerful individuals who were manipulating all of us and that and that everyone was just [music] acting as puppets. You know what people now call the deep state. But we were awake and it was our job to wake everybody else up. >> Who's up Patriot video? [music] [music] >> [music] >> Ladies and gentlemen, prepare for the strong magn. [cheering] >> There's a lot there. They flashed photos of the pyramid on our

dollar bills. They showed a picture of George Soros. They talked about the World Bank, Everything's Incorporated. These are all things that I didn't understand when I was watching my propaganda videos uh back in 2007, 2008. But man, I mean, it's like they just took notes off of the [ __ ] that had me all confused and crazy back then. And the second thing was my family. >> These groups have always operated on a playbook of using the prevailing social context to mobilize people, recruit, and radicalize. The 20s clan was anti-lack and anti-Jewish, but it was

also anti-Mexican near the border, anti- labor in the Pacific Northwest, [music] anti-immigrant in the Northeast where there were a lot of immigrants. What it did was figure out what the prevailing social tensions were in a given community [music] and use those to recruit people for its own purposes. The prevailing feeling among a host of veterans returning from Vietnam was that they [music] had been stabbed in the back by an ungrateful society, their own feckless government, [screaming] and the media elite. For it seems now more certain than ever that the bloody experience of Vietnam is to

end in a stalemate. >> It made them ripe recruits for a new conspiracyfueled wave of violent extremism aimed at rooting [music] out the enemy within. >> The Cubans are coming in by the thousands. The Mexicans are coming in by the millions. The the Hatens are coming in from Haiti or wherever the that little [ __ ] country is. Coming in by the hundreds of thousands. White people have had enough. They can no longer even afford to buy proper housing for themselves. Yet, our government would have us spend thousands and thousands of millions of dollars on

nonwhines. They've had enough. >> One of the key figures in the white power movement after the Vietnam War and one of the architects of its move to sell style terrorism, to using the early internet, and to a number of other major changes that fueled its rise is a veteran named Lewis Beam. The only thing is it important tonight IS WILL AMERICA BE WHITE 100 years from tonight? And if so, will you commit yourself to the battle to make it so? >> Lewis Beam served two tours in Vietnam as a helicopter gunner and came home in

1968 with multiple medals for bravery in combat. >> Says that I use great professional skill and courage in the face of great personal danger. That hasn't changed at all in my opinion. Presently I'm having to use utmost skill and I think it does take courage to to do what I'm doing and I'm doing it in the face of the enemy. This time the enemy goes under a different name. >> Beam took the skills he honed in the military and brought them to the KKK where he rose to Grand Dragon of the Texas Knights. might have

been paid by the government $300 a month to fight and kill communists or execute them, whatever term you want to use in Vietnam. And what is the difference between Vietnam and Houston, Texas, but a few thousand miles. [screaming] One of the reasons that Beam rose so quickly in these organizations is that he told a story about warfare and trauma that a lot of other people were mobilized by, including people who didn't serve. I saw a young man about 19 years old entrapped in a armored personnel carrier about 22 mi northeast of Saigon with his legs

pinned beneath the seat as a result of a a rocket propelled grenade. and he stayed on the radio, kept asking for help, asking us to come get him. >> So his argument was about the wrongness of war, the horror of seeing casualties in the field, the horror of losing your fellow soldiers. But his pivot was this is why we should come back to the United States and bring that violence home to everybody who left us there. >> Our mission is a reconnaissance patrol. We have information that the enemy is in the area. >> The Jews

have assumed leadership of the federal government. They totally control it and they're controlling us thusly. The government that's in Washington DC today does not represent the interest of the white people. Therefore, we will replace them with people who will represent the ideals of white western Christian civilization. How are we going to replace them? By any means necessary. >> We want the heads of the enemies in our toe sacks. In Vietnam, they took years. We're going to take heads. Beam's rhetoric and military [music] exercises eventually got the attention of the FBI. And in 1983, he left

Texas [music] for Hayden Lake, Idaho, a haven for white supremacists. >> He joined forces with Aryan nations [music] and began to command a cell style terrorist movement of white power activists. The idea was that one or a few white power activists could work together towards a commonly held set of goals and targets, but without prosecutable ties between them and without direct ties to movement leadership. >> But there was a problem. The cells which were spread across the country and into Canada still needed to communicate with each other. And even when the FBI wasn't listening on

[music] their phones, Beam wanted to do more than talk. He wanted to share ideas and [music] create networks. >> So they created a social network called Libertynet. And one of the first postings was titled [music] online for God and country. And then Lewis Beam traveled around the country teaching people how to go online. These message boards included assassination lists and ideological content [music] and who you should hate and why. But they also included social network content like personal ads. And this was in 198485, way before most people think about far-right online activism, decades before Facebook.

>> Can't beat that with a stick. Using this early form of the internet, clansmen, skin heads, neo-Nazis, and other extremist groups [music] banded together to commit a series of heinous robberies, bombings, and murders across the country. >> And since we're all racists, since we're all the radical right, and that's a crime in America, when you have to do the time, don't regret the crime. >> We'll be at the forefront of the fight. >> Doing what? uh hopefully uh smashing the uh skulls of communists or executing race traders or shooting on site anybody we don't think

is white. >> We have to get our government back. That's what it's all about. All these so-called subversive groups are nothing but patriotic citizens trying to do just that. By 1985, the Department of Justice came to believe that the network of white power cells behind these crimes represented a serious [music] threat to national security. >> Lewis Beam has been charged with sedicious conspiracy along with 13 other individuals. >> Mr. Beam, did you plan to go over the government? >> What else is a country boy going to do on Saturday night with the only drugstore in

towns closed? But the trial was a disaster for the government. >> A stunning verdict this afternoon in the trial of 13 white supremacists. Among charges they faced, conspiracy to overthrow the government of the United States. >> The verdicts from the all-white jury came on the fourth day of deliberations. >> Beam and his codefendants were acquitted on all charges. The humiliating outcome led the DOJ to focus their attention on individual criminals and abandon investigations of the white power movement as a domestic terrorist threat. >> The catastrophic legacy of leaderless resistance has been that we as a

public have lost sight of this movement. >> We don't have any domestic terrorism legislation. We don't have domestic terrorism laws. For example, the number one tool um FBI agents and prosecutors use to disrupt terrorist attacks in the United States is material support. Material support is basically a charge to levy on individuals who are helping a terrorist organization or a violent organization. Unfortunately, we don't have that when it comes to domestic terrorist organizations. The problem with this situation is when you don't have domestic terrorism laws, you need an act to happen. You need a hot body

in order to start an investigation. And usually you can charge that individual with hate crime or with other charges, but you cannot charge them with terrorism. You cannot go after the whole network. >> Holy cow. About a third of the building has been blown away. This is just devastating. Go. Get him back. Get him back. >> A massive car bomb exploded outside of a large federal building in downtown Oklahoma City, shattering that building, killing children, killing federal employees, military men, and civilians. Even Timothy McVey, he blew up a whole federal building and prosecutors could not

charge him or his associates with terrorism. The bombing of Oklahoma City in 1995 was the largest deliberate mass casualty event on American soil between Pearl Harbor and 9/11. But most people still don't understand what that event was and what it meant. >> The indictment charges that Timothy McVey and Terry Nichols, former Army buddies with a grudge against the government, planned the bombing, selected >> McVey and Nichols met each other through their [music] service. They trained together at Fort Riley, Kansas before McVey deployed to the Gulf as part of Big Red One infantry [music] unit in

Iraq. There he seems to have experienced some amount of traumatic combat before their return home after [music] washing out of special forces. He was really angry and we see at that moment his deepening involvement in radical white power activity ranging from McVeyy's connection to the Michigan militia. >> The federal government itself is the child of the armed citizen. We the people are the parent of the child we call government. In short, the federal government needs a good spanking to make it behave. his [music] contact and attempted contact with groups like the Arizona Patriots and the

National Alliance and his written belief in white power principles that were [music] published in his hometown newspaper. >> McVey used his military training to help carry out the Oklahoma City bombing. And in a letter to a friend, he invoked his military oath to justify it. I have sworn to uphold and defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. And I [music] will. Blood will flow in the streets. Good versus evil. Free men versus socialist wannabe slaves. Pray it's not your blood, my friend. >> The other key component here was his use of the Turner

Diaries. >> [music] >> At gun shows, Timothy McVey would hand out copies of The Turner Diaries, a dystopian novel that details how to topple [music] the US government. The fictional revolutionaries start by blowing up a federal building [music] and then proceed to exterminate their political enemies, including all Jews, [music] blacks, and Latinos. The Turner Diaries became enormously important to this movement, not because it's a good book, but because it provides the imaginative answer to a really important question, [music] which is how can a tiny group of people, a small fringe movement, do what they're setting

[music] out to do in this period, which is to overthrow the most militarized superstate in world history. In 1997, McVey was [music] convicted of murdering 168 people using a weapon of mass destruction and blowing up a federal building. No domestic terrorism charges were brought, however, because he and Nicholls were thought to have acted alone. Just imagine if Timothy McVeyy's name Muhammad, we will look at that terrorism threat in a very different lens. First of all, we will look at it as a terrorist threat. We will go after McVey. [music] We will go after all the

people who are helping him or who are assisting him. We will keep the investigation going in order to get the whole network. And when you are very limited with the tools uh you are using these groups will take benefits from it. >> These are not lone wolves. These are people who are united by ideology, by social ties, by selection of targets. These are all part of the same movement. And this is really what we're seeing continuing into our present day moment. >> Tonight, [music] the plot to kidnap a governor foiled by the FBI. [music] In

October 2020, less than a month before the presidential election, 14 men were [music] arrested in a plot to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer. Their plans included storming the state capital, using zip ties to take hostages, [music] and conducting a trial that would result in a public hanging of the governor. The suspects were all members of the Wolverine Watchmen, a paramilitary group commanded by a former Marine that had ties to the Michigan militia. Prosecutors [music] contend that they wanted to kidnap her to try to ignite another American civil war before the 2020 election in hopes [music]

of disrupting it and perhaps keeping Joe Biden from becoming president. >> But federal prosecutors could not [music] charge any of the conspirators with material support. And despite having a mountain of evidence laid out against them at [music] trial, >> the group's leader, Adam Fox, telling the informant he was inspired by Oklahoma City bombing terrorist Timothy McVey, telling [music] the informant, "If we can't have our world, they can't have theirs." Burning it down. Like Lewis Beam before them, >> if we can't have this country, nobody gets it back cleared. Going to be total ashes everywhere. >>

None of the defendants were [music] convicted on federal charges. The goals of this insurgency in Michigan were to take over the state house and then to kidnap [music] and execute the governor. The goal of the insurgency on January 6 was to overturn the results of a democratic election. So if we see this as part of a movement, it's to stop the American people being able to [music] choose their own leaders. An insurgency is all about seizing control of a government, not through winning an election, not through democratic processes, not through persuasion, but through violence. It's

an it's a form of wars. USA. >> If you look at January 6th, what we're looking at is really the collision of three different streams of [music] activity. One is the organized white power movement that is coming off of decades, if not generations, of organizing, armament, training, and ideological content. >> They want to know what the orange hat stand for. >> [ __ ] Proud Boy. Another is QAnon which is newer, more radical, works very fast. >> Where we go one, we go all. >> And the final one, the biggest one is simply the Trump

base. [screaming] Trump want >> It's clear to me that what you had was a concerted effort by a number of different organizers. >> Do you want your house back? >> Take it. to take these various groups together and focus their energies into create a critical mass. And that's not new. >> [screaming] >> in Iraq when [music] al-Qaeda in Iraq emerged. It really came led by a guy named Abu Musaba Zarqawi. He traveled around the country had a charisma to him and he portrayed this, hey, I'm not your normal political leader and we are going to

[music] show the kind of commitment that real men would do. and al-Qaeda in Iraq, which was very extreme ideologically, started to be joined by people who weren't natural bedfellows. People go, "Finally, someone who's not going to put up with the crap, someone who's going to take the law into their own hands and is going to get us what we deserve because [music] we have been exploited by the elites of the region." I think Abu Musabazarqawi [music] and Donald Trump both understand that you can inflame those passions. It is where the leader takes those frustrations that

becomes potentially disastrous. Grievance narratives are made up. They're constructed narratives, but they are used by demagogues because they work. And if you have a political party that is organized around grievance, [music] around a sense of loss and a sense of threat, you have the basis for the ideology that will promote violence. We gather together in the heart of our nation's capital for one very, very basic and simple reason to save our democracy. here. We're going to walk down to the capital [cheering] >> and we're going to cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and women.

And we're probably not going to be cheering so much for some of them because you'll never take back our country with weakness. You have to show strength and you have to be strong. DC IS A [ __ ] WAR ZONE. This is WHAT WE GET FOR YOU. >> THE SIEGE of the capital on January 6 did not overturn the results of the 2020 election. But that's not the only measure by which the actions of that day are being judged. >> There's footage of Proud Boys directing journalists to read the Turner Diaries. >> Read the Turner

Diaries. On January 6th, the Turner Diaries was structuring a lot of sort of the imaginative performative action of that day. The news hung outside the capital refers to events in the Turner Diaries called the Day of the Rope, which is the hanging of race traders, which include politicians. And significantly, there is a strike on the capital that is not supposed to be a mass casualty attack. In the Turner Diaries, it's a mortar attack. It's meant to be simply the selected killing of a few corrupt legislators in order to show other white people that extremists can

strike at the heart of American power. >> Yeah. [screaming] >> Yeah. >> We did it. >> We did it. >> We [ __ ] did it. Yo, take laptops. Take the work, take everything, >> all that [ __ ] >> My friend, my friend sitting in color right now. >> And by that measure, I think that they succeeded. >> Donald Trump tweeted out a video. He said, "We did a good [ __ ] job." >> January 6 was a huge success for them. January 6 inspired uh so many people not only here in the United

States but even in Europe that violence is a way to change the government is a way to change that establishments in the western world that they consider corrupt they considered evil uh they considered that these governments are nothing but tools to the Jews or to whatever conspiracy they believe You believe the rich people in the world are using this disease and exaggerating it to create some sort of apocalyptic nightmare, right? >> You think it's common sense that we all have to stay inside and be afraid of the air. [applause] >> [cheering] >> You look at

January 6th, I think the people that were there that participated in it, number one, they wanted it to serve as a wakeup call to those people who are in power. And the fact of the matter is every single person that was there that day is a patriot of this nation. >> Yo, Randy, maybe you want to put the beers inside the the the bridge. maybe you want to get off your ass and do something. >> Being a patriot, being a person that loves their country, especially, you know, being a military veteran, you take an oath

to the Constitution. And for a lot of those people that were there that day, they felt that their Constitution was being shredded up. Our democracy was being shredded right in front of our eyes. >> I think it's absolutely heartbreaking to see veterans involved in these things. And I know for a lot of them that their hearts are in in some ways in the right place. that we just don't live in the same world of truth anymore. >> The people in DC, they were Americans. Yeah. And they were patriots. They only broke laws because the DC

police didn't do their job. >> Okay. Okay. >> That's it. People died because they didn't do their job. >> So, they broke into the capital because DC police didn't do their job. the DC police. >> They didn't break into anything. >> They let them in. >> Not only did they let them in, >> it's paid for by tax dollars. It's their [ __ ] property. >> Easy. >> Sorry. >> This is the lethal danger [music] of the big election lie, >> right? It's this is a conspiracy theory that says the very heart of American political

life, the very heart of our democracy has been destroyed and taken from us, which leaves us what recourse. >> Do I believe the election was stolen? Absolutely. Without a doubt, there's no way in hell Joe Biden was elected. >> 81 million votes for Joe Biden. I [music] don't think so. We're in a situation right now where, you know, we can't trust our elections anymore. We know that. So, what really is scary is is that what [snorts] will the people do? What will the average American do when they finally wake up to the reality of all

this? And the answer to that is we don't know. We have no idea what the American people will do. This no longer is a constitutional republic and we are going to fight to bring our constitutional republic back again. >> We've had violent domestic extremist organizations for a long time. But I think what makes this moment [music] particularly dangerous, there are a couple of things. The first one is the fact that it's able to ride on a wave of conspiracy thinking and general distrust that's happening because of social media technologies. is happening [music] because of the

way we we've structured our society on the internet that gives them the sheer numbers of people that they could never dream of of bringing to bear on their own. >> Everybody's got to put their shoulder to the wheel. We need participation 24/7. We need you to be a force multiplier. >> As a soldier and as a as a uh as a general, as a retired general, we have an army of digital soldiers. If you can do command and control over social media and you're fighting against evil and you're on the side of God and you're

on the side of the United States and your oath, it's a very attractive proposition. The sad part is is you're using all those skills and that goodness and that purity of heart that you think is actually absolute unadulterated [ __ ] >> The second major difference is you have political cover from the very top. The only way we're going to lose this election is if the election is rigged. Remember that. >> January 6th was the culmination of two months of a propagation of a big lie and of conspiracy theories by the president of the United

States. Twothirds of House Republicans go along with Trump and vote to overturn the electors on the evening of January [music] 6th. >> We, a United States senator and members of the House of Representatives, object to the counting of the electoral votes of the state of Pennsylvania. Madam Speaker, I rise to support the objection. >> Madam Speaker, I rise to support the objection. >> Madam Speaker, I rise to support the objection. >> Madam Chair, I vigorously support this objection and I ask you >> in a vote that has always been thought to be ceremonial and ministerial

where you accept the electoral college results which were in no serious way contested. I mean, that's almost as astounding as what happened in terms of the insurrection. [music] >> How can so many people believe that it was unfair? It was because their president said it was unfair. Their [music] senator said it was unfair. Their member of Congress said it was unfair. >> A full audit is absolutely necessary. We should get injunctions if necessary. [music] >> And normally those are people that the electorate can have faith in. >> I rise for myself and 60 of my

colleagues to object to the counting of the electoral ballots from Arizona. >> Is the objection in writing and signed by a senator? [music] >> Yes, it is. >> It is. But it is not just the big lie that appears to have captured much of the Republican party. >> Congressman Denver Wgleman lost his party's nomination over the weekend. The first term congressman was ousted by former Liberty University employee Bob Good. >> Getting run out of the Republican party was really interesting. I believe I was the first one that was affected by Q conspiracy theories when I

didn't even know it. I had conducted a same-sex wedding in summer of 2019. Two guys who had worked for me or volunteered. And then I started hearing these weird things. I'm funded by George Soros. I'm a secret Jew. I'm a secret Dem. I'm trying to change the sexual orientation of children. I'm a tool of the Antichrist. And I'm hearing all this. I'm like, this is sounds like new world order crazy stuff. You know, the old anti-semitic tropes. >> You had better wake up [music] and understand that there are people. Then I started doing my own

research and I'm pretty good at it. And uh I saw some of the same patterns that you saw with foreign terrorists, you know, and when you chased ISIS or al-Qaeda or IED resupply from Iraq into Iran, you know, I I've seen some things. And uh what I saw was that people were using language uh in the open that I I thought we would never see as Americans. My two decades of intelligence, war fighting, and counterterrorism experience, coupled with serving in the 116th Congress, [music] is why I will not allow conspiracy peders to hijack our ability

to conduct reasonable policy discussions [music] for the betterment of all Americans. I was pretty much drumed out and censured for following the law and trying to save this country. And uh I'm not I don't think I'm overstating that. BAL STEEL. >> If one of our two parties is committed to [music] an Orwellian whitewashing of history. >> If you didn't know the TV footage was a video from January the 6th, you would actually think it was a normal tourist visit. >> Is committed to [music] propagating or at least not quarreling with a big lie. >> Uh

the big lie. The big lie is a lot of [ __ ] That's what it is. is committed to not quarreling much with conspiracy theories, is committed to purging those Republicans at the state and local level and at the national level who want to fight back against the lies and the conspiracy theories. That's a big deal. War is literally the continuation of politics by other violent means. [music] Our military forces are the part of our society that carries out that peace. Then we come home and the question is do we have a political system that

functions or are we at a point where our own politics the politics inside our own communities the politics inside our own country can only be continued through other means and we got to be very careful because if you think you have support from the highest levels of government why aren't you fighting for your country? Aren't you already sort of sworn in to do this? The issue is is that the people that we are identifying as extremists, they're identifying as patriots or freedom fighters. and that is it almost sounds like I'm talking about terrorism right now.

[music] >> One of the organizations that I'm particularly interested in uh is the Patriot Front >> for the life OF OUR NATION FOR THE LIBERTY OF OUR PEOPLE. FOR THE victory of THE AMERICAN SPIRIT VICTORY. >> They're producing what they refer to as propaganda. They're studying books on fascism because they believe democracy has failed and their vision for the future is a dominant white race that has captured the Republican party and has defeated their political opponents by violence or by exclusion. These guys showed up in Philadelphia on the 4th of July, 20121 and assaulted a

bunch of people. [music] >> Nothing came of it cuz the local cops didn't know what the [music] hell were they were dealing with. So, this is a fascist gang who's operating all around the country. Police in Idaho say they prevented a possible domestic terror attack over the weekend. 31 men were arrested, all dressed alike, allegedly on their way to wreak havoc at a pride event in the city of Cordelane. >> Cordelane is just a few miles north of Hayden Lake and the Patriot Front following in the footsteps of Lewis Beam had made it a base

of operations. And in the same way Denver Wgleman had been targeted by QAnon for officiating a gay wedding. Q's rhetoric casting the [music] LGBTQ community as groomers and pedophiles helped put them squarely in the sights of the white nationalist patriot front. While the Proud Boys, the Oathkeepers, the 3enters are a threat, the ones that I'm really afraid of are the Gen Z ones, the service members who have served during a time of relative peace. These young people who joined to fight, never got a chance to fight, [music] and who starting in conservative echo chambers online

have been brought into the Proud Boy to fascist pipeline. So, Gab is an alternative social media platform that was created to be a safe space for neo-Nazis. One of the groups on here is the National Justice Party. This is a neo-Nazi party within the United States whose goal is to use protests to radicalize Trump supporters into explicit white supremacy. They're developing new and original propaganda that paint them in a light of achieving the power, the ability to shape politics and engage in violence in a way that they thought they were going to get from the

military. They understand how to recruit people into that lifestyle. [music] So, right here, this is an Italian mayonnaise frago. Uh, I don't care. That was the slogan of the fascist party under [music] Mussolini. So what they're trying to do is make white nationalism look like it's testosterone [music] way to be a man. I believe that these young veterans who are getting out and joining things like the Patriot Front and Nationalist Socialist Club and the word Nazi is nationalist socialist. I think that the Republican party is is, you know, more than capable of adopting that ideology

in a way that that's unfathomable even to me. You know, I I never saw us where we are today. I I think another four years things could be far worse. I think the worst case scenario is probably worse than most of us want to imagine. I could see a civil war. >> Because this is the same movement we've been dealing with this whole time. It's reasonable to assume that what we can see is only about half of the activity that there is an underground that is mounting violent action, training in camps, trying to accumulate weapons

and preparing for violence. >> When you talk about civil war or specific sectors of the country that could go kinetic, just go to these areas where you see the first big far-left protest when Republicans take back the House. Boom. If there's anybody out there from Antifa or Black Lives Matters, spin your first [ __ ] bullet in my chest. Okay? >> Or if Republicans think that one of the state elections were stolen, boom. >> Forget writing your legislators. You got to do something. It's us. It's we the people. You're going to have to take my

life. There's no way I'll die on this hill. There's no way. No way. [cheering] >> All of this can happen. >> Who's to say that if uh legislation came down where we lost our Second Amendment tomorrow that that wouldn't start a civil war? To be honest with you, I don't know of any veteran that wants war in this country. But at the very same time, when you look back to [music] what our founding fathers wanted for this country, we are so far away from that today. >> It's just something they're ready for. And their gun

safe is full. >> If you're prepared, you're prepared. And if you're not, you're not. If you're armed, then you're somewhat prepared to defend your family and yourself. If you're not armed, you're dog meat. There's imminent civil war. If [music] we don't fix our elections and actually make them bonafide again, we don't have 2024. There is no 2024. >> But it is the election of 2024 that opens up a different front, one that is potentially as dangerous as a violent civil war. >> There are people in this movement who believe that the nation cannot be saved

as it is [music] and must be overthrown in order to make way for a white ethnostate. And then there are probably people in this movement who think aha there's an opening here to run for office and mount a sort of coup from inside in order to change the very nature of the nation. You >> know I worry about scenarios in which you [music] know in 2024 one party controls Congress, the other party wins a presidential election and Congress refuses to certify the election. The Republican party has a pretty systematic [music] plan to have state legislatures

impose themselves much more directly into the certification of electors [music] to perhaps also suppress some Democratic votes along the way. So I do think the chances of a real attempt to overturn a legitimate election results are not nothing and they're not tiny. and then somebody is president or people that are elected that aren't do aren't there in a in a legal way and then that's when the disscent happens and that's the end of our country and our legal norms and that scares the hell out of me. >> This country you as individuals with the individual

liberties and the individual rights that you have. You need to start assuming risk for your neighborhoods and your communities in your towns. You have to get involved. General Flynn's ultimate plan is to undermine democracy, is to [music] get his digital soldiers to radicalize the rest of the Republican base. >> Go run for Dog Catcher. If you don't like this who's running your school board, go run for the school board. If you don't like who's running your little town or your little parish, go get involved. >> If Flynn can convince his followers to push enough good

people out of government, they'll [music] beat us into submission. I don't want guys like disgraced former General Michael Flynn to be deciding who's an American and who's not. >> General Flynn, do you believe the violence on January 6 was justified? >> I said I I said [music] >> because their movement is about excluding others. It's not about the will of the people. It's about suppressing opposition. It's about power. General Flynn, do you believe in the peaceful transition of power in the United States of America? >> Yes, sir. >> This is how countries fall apart. Part

of my experience as a veteran and as somebody who's worked with refugees and done human rights work, I know what happens when the center cannot hold and a and a society falls apart. I know what happens when your ethnic identity or your in-group outgroup membership becomes a life and death issue and when neighbors start killing each other. I've seen it. And whatever your Twitter bravado about the next civil war is, nobody wants to see that. I mean that is the road to hell. >> The very worst case scenario [music] is that we slide to authoritarianism

that we are not able to climb out of this. [music] We have seen this happen over and over and over again in other countries. We have seen them fight back against the first wave [music] and not be ready for the second and not be ready for the third. This is a this is going to take a long time and it's going [music] to take everything we have to make sure that our democracy is still standing at the end of it. >> I hope that people are [ __ ] scared because being scared motivates people and

I I want you to be scared by what's true and I want [music] you to look at evidence. We need to think critically and do everything within your power and within [music] the uh confines of of the law to make sure that we don't live in that dystopian future that could just [music] be a few years away. I went to my son's grave site and I just felt so helpless. It made me angry that my son's sacrifice almost felt like it was in vain. Now I've refocused and I had to take a look at it

and I had to do a lot of soulsearching to understand that that's not the case. And this [music] fight is not over. It's far from over and it may never be over. But his sacrifice is not in vain. My service of everyone else of all Americans regardless if you wore a uniform as long as you got up in the morning, you just try to do the right thing. It's not in vain. What if every young American did national service for a year? Maybe in uniform, but not necessarily. What if they did in healthcare, conservation, education?

How would they feel about each other at the end of that? By experience, we know you almost always feel different, [music] more tightly. You break down many of your preconceived prejudices [music] against other groups. Trust starts to build. >> [music] >> In 2013, I first applied to my local community college. Having had my military experience [music] turn out so negative, I'll be honest, my confidence was destroyed. And I was like terrified of registering for [music] classes because I was terrified of failure. And I went over the course of my first semester at Nassau [music] Community

College fulfilling a lot of bad stereotypes about veterans. You know, coming in, having my headphones on, having my hoodie over my head, kind [music] of just like sitting down, not talking to anybody, not engaging. And a group of student [music] veterans at my community college identified that, recognized that it was a problem, and helped to break me of my shell. I went from being that guy [music] who doesn't talk to anybody and sits in the corner to being elected to represent all of the student veterans of my school. Student veterans of Nassau is a chapter

of Student [music] Veterans of America. It's a national organization focused on basically easing people in the transition from combat to college to [music] careers. One of the things that the Veteran Center does is it allows for us to kind of get back into an environment that we're familiar with. It gives us a sense of camaraderie that we really miss [music] from the military. It's not something that happened overnight, but it set me [music] on the path towards recovery. And rather than feel like the future was predetermined by [music] these powerful groups and that there was

nothing that I could do to fight against them, I started to accept the idea of maybe the truth is [music] somewhere in the middle. And because most of my interactions with the outside world were [music] in person, personto person, I wasn't as easily able to seek [music] out an echo chamber that didn't challenge my opinions, that only reinforced my beliefs. That diversity of opinion is what kept me from, you know, joining the Oathkeepers when it first sprang up. [music] That helped to break me out of it. A lot of veterans getting out, they don't [music]

have that opportunity. We're in a different world. >> In this new world, our troops have to be trained to not only defend themselves against a Chinese sniper or a [music] Russian tank, but against enemy disinformation campaigns on the internet. It's also true that disinformation is not just coming from China and Russia. >> We know how to combat malicious misinformation. We did a pretty good job teaching soldiers and citizens how to not fall for Nazi propaganda. We did a pretty good job teaching soldiers and citizens how to not fall for communist propaganda all through the Cold

War. The problem with that, of course, is that, you know, opposition to the Nazis was a goal shared by both political parties in America. Opposition to the Soviet Union was a goal shared by most across the political spectrum in America. Right now, this conflict, [music] you know, it's far too partisan. It's far too divisive and it's far too politicized. We know how to do this, but it takes unity. >> And this is a layer cake of problems. This is something that does not just exist at [music] say DoD policy level. This is about how journalists

talk about the movement, how our laws prosecute the movement, how our national leaders direct their time and attention. >> We know that there is a lack of political will to establish or to create a domestic terrorism law. Yet I think there is a big possibility that we can designate [music] these groups as international terrorist organizations. So what that means we can take all the rules, the laws, the authorities that the FBI and other law enforcement and intelligence agencies have to go after them the same way we go after international terrorist organizations. [music] Who's paid a

price? Who's paid a price for being a conspiratorial irresponsible demagogic extremist? With the exception [music] of a few true believers who were just duped and taken in and foolishly believed all this stuff, most of them are going about going along doing fine. >> Voters need to decide [music] whether they are comfortable with those who incite violence representing them. And movements like this end when the entire population decides [music] that they are unacceptable. We haven't seen that yet. So the ideal solution is dradicalization. But that's not something I'm interested in. I'm interested in justice and I'm

interested [music] in imposing costs on people who are trying to hurt America and Americans. All I think about all day is finding bad [music] guys and hoping that they end up in jail. Documenting any potentially criminal behavior, documenting things [music] that if they're not illegal, society would frown upon. And ultimately, it's to put a cost behind being an insurgent [music] within the United States. I'm a Nazi hunter, >> but it doesn't mean we're going to win. And that's what I want to tell people. This good doesn't always triumph, but I do believe the oath means

something. And I know that I'm going directly against people who think that they also are honoring their oath in the [music] same way. And that's why I think this makes this dangerous. But what's enabling that schism to happen is the lie. Which world of truth do you live in? It's not about commitment to country. That's shared. So the only way back to get back together, the only the only possibility of reconciliation is a conversation that can occur in the, you know, in an [music] environment of truth. We can either reconcile with with each other as

a country or we can have a conflict. Where do I want America to go, not here, not where we're at, this path we're on will kill us. It'll kill this country. It'll kill freedom. It'll kill our camaraderie. It'll kill our compassion and our human decency [music] for each other. What I'd like to see is for the people on both sides all come together and agree on going by the truth only. If we can do that, then this nation can be salvaged. Do I see that happening? No, I don't. I can hope though. Hey. >> [music]