Justice Department forms domestic terrorism unit
WASHINGTON — The Justice Department is creating a unit to fight domestic terrorism at a time when the threat of violent extremism has increased, a top official said Tuesday.
The number of FBI investigations of suspects accused of domestic extremism has more than doubled since the spring of 2020, the head of the department’s national security division, Matthew G. Olsen, said in testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee.
The national security division has a counterterrorism team, Olsen added, but a group of lawyers will now be dedicated to the domestic threat and ensure that cases will be “handled properly and effectively coordinated” across the agency and federal law enforcement.
The move is in keeping with Attorney General Merrick Garland’s vow to prioritize combating domestic extremism. It comes as the Justice Department investigates the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, an assault that underscores the resurgence of domestic extremism driven in part by the baseless perception that the 2020 election was marred by election fraud.
Last year, the Biden administration unveiled a national strategy to tackle domestic extremism, which called for preventing recruitment by extremist groups and bolstering information sharing across law enforcement.
In its budget proposal this spring, the Justice Department requested an additional $101 million to address domestic terrorism, including $45 million for the FBI and $40 million that federal prosecutors can use to manage their increasing domestic terrorism caseloads. But Congress has not yet passed its annual appropriations bill, so no agency funding requests have been granted.
Political events will continue to drive the threat of violence in 2022, Jill Sanborn, executive assistant director of the FBI’s national security branch, told the Senate panel.
The two most dangerous types of domestic extremists, Sanborn said, are driven either by racial or ethnic beliefs, often “advocating for the superiority of the white race,” or by anti-government sentiment from members of militia or anarchist groups.