• Justice Department, FBI embarking on nationwide manhunt for suspects in riot.
FBI, Justice Dept. pursuing more than 150 suspects in riot
The Justice Department and the FBI have embarked on a nationwide manhunt to track down scores of people who attacked the Capitol last week, according to law enforcement officials, as they grapple with the fallout from the widespread government failure to protect the building.
Investigators are pursuing more than 150 suspects for prosecution, a total that is almost certain to grow, an official said. Analysts are also scouring intelligence to identify any role that domestic terrorist organizations or foreign adversaries may have played in radicalizing Americans who were among the rioters, according to a law enforcement official briefed on the investigations.
Some indication had emerged that at least some assailants initiated a more organized attack, Rep. Tim Ryan, D-Ohio, chair of the House subcommittee that has oversight of the Capitol Police, told reporters Monday. Initial reports Wednesday afternoon about pipe bombs planted at the nearby Republican and Democratic party headquarters drew some law enforcement attention away from the breach that was unfolding at the Capitol, Ryan said, suggesting a “level of coordination.”
Two Capitol Police officers have also been suspended, according to Ryan: one who was seen in photographs with rioters and another who walked among the crowds wearing a hat emblazoned with President Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” campaign slogan. The Capitol Police have also opened internal inquiries into about 10 to 15 officers’ actions during the violence, though the nature of the inquiries was unclear, and Ryan cautioned that he had seen no sign that any officers helped coordinate the attack.
In the sprawling Justice Department criminal inquiry run out of the FBI’s Washing ton field office — the country’s second largest, with about 1,600 employees — agents and support staff have established a nationwide dragnet to identify members of the mob. At least five people died during the attack and in its immediate aftermath, including a police officer. In particular, the FBI is working closely with the Capitol Police and the Metropolitan Police Department in Washington to track down those who attacked law enforcement.
The FBI has moved quickly to ease some bureaucratic hurdles to making arrests, and it has received more than 70,000 photographic and video tips after asking for the public’s help in identifying suspects. Agents were also scrubbing airline passenger manifests and video of air travelers to and from Washington to find potential suspects.
But some prosecutors have expressed concerns that the Justice Department is creating a bottleneck by funneling prosecutions through Washing ton. The lack of public appearances by top national security officials in the Trump administration has also prompted criticism that the federal government is failing to provide the reassurance, information or leadership that it typically would in a time of national crisis.
The Justice Department has gathered enough information to charge and arrest more than a dozen people, some of whom have emerged as faces of the attack, such as a man carrying House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s lectern and another photographed with his feet up on a desk in her office.
Some images of the riot showed what seemed to be an organized effort among people in matching military gear moving as a unit through the crowds and into the Capitol, which has raised fears that some of those involved acted as part of a well-coordinated effort to storm the building.
The Justice Department manhunt is highly unusual and complex. Like the investigation into the Boston Marathon bombing in 2013, the FBI is relying heavily on video from cellphones and security cameras to identify the perpetrators.
But while other notorious, deadly attacks on the country like the Oklahoma City bombing or the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, were conducted by foreign adversaries or involved a few people acting in secret, the riot Wednesday was carried out by hundreds of American citizens.
After the mob stormed the building, damaged property, stole computer equipment and other files and attacked officers, an overwhelmed Capitol Police — the force designated to protect the complex — allowed all but about a dozen to leave peacefully. That failure to detain the suspects created a major obstacle for federal investigators, who must now fan out and look for them across the country.
Despite the high-profile nature of the attack and the complexity of the investigation, no top federal law enforcement or Homeland Security official has gone in front of television cameras or answered questions, working in near silence as Congress and the White House debate how best to respond to the role the president played.
The silence is a stark contrast to the Trump administration’s response last year to protests against police violence and racism. Former Attorney General William Barr instructed all 93 U.S. attorneys’ offices to aggressively pursue charges — including sedition — against rioters at protests, to the surprise of some prosecutors.