US watchdog cites wrongdoing by FBI but avoids blame in January 6 report | Donald Trump News

The United States Department of Justice has released a report on intelligence gathered before the 2021 attack on the US Capitol – and whether that evidence was handled appropriately to prevent violence.

Thursday’s 88-page report, released by the office of Inspector General Michael Horowitz, details the work of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), one of the leading domestic intelligence agencies in the US.

It concluded that the FBI had behaved “effectively” before the attack on January 6, 2021, which sought to interfere with the certification of the 2020 election.

“Despite playing only a supporting role in preparing for and responding to the events of January 6, the FBI recognized the potential for violence and took significant and appropriate steps to prepare for this supporting role,” the inspector general’s office explained.

But, he added, the FBI could have gone further to identify intelligence about potential threats, including canvassing its offices for materials, as it does before major events like the Super Bowl.

An uncertain future

The FBI, however, has long been under scrutiny for its actions before the January 6 attack.

And now the future of the agency is in doubt, as its longtime director, Christopher Wray, prepares to step down after more than seven years at the helm.

President-elect Donald Trump has long taken a stand against the office, which he has described as part of a “deep state” plan designed to undermine his authority.

The nominee to lead the FBI, former prosecutor Kash Patel, has been floating around closing the agency’s headquarters in Washington, DC, and drastically reducing its operations.

The report focuses on the events of January 6, when Trump, then president-elect, held a rally near the White House asking supporters to “stop stealing” the 2020 election.

He claimed – falsely – that his defeat in the 2020 race was the result of voter fraud.

In the following hours, pro-Trump protesters marched from the Ellipse, a circular park south of the White House, to the US Capitol, where members of Congress were inside certifying the election results.

Rioters attacked law enforcement and broke into the Capitol building, some chanting slogans such as “Hang Mike Pence”, who was Trump’s vice president at the time. Members of Congress were evicted, and one protester was shot dead as he tried to enter the chamber through a broken window.

Some of the dead are also linked to this attack. Some protesters faced emergency situations during the riots, and several police officers reportedly killed themselves afterwards.

Criticism and conspiracy theories

What role the FBI played in the lead-up to those events has been the subject of bipartisan scrutiny in the years since.

A June 2023 report from the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs concluded that the January 6 attack was “obviously planned”.

He blamed the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for “intelligence failures” that allowed the attacks to continue.

“The failure of intelligence prior to January 6 was not a failure to receive intelligence indicating the possibility of violence,” the 2023 report said.

Instead, he accused the FBI and DHS of failing to “fully and accurately assess the severity of the threat” based on the tips they received.

The report added that both agencies have a duty to issue guidance “with enough urgency and urgency to” implement the law “to prepare for the violence that eventually erupted on January 6”.

Meanwhile, conspiracy theorists say FBI agents helped fuel the violence on January 6, unfairly demoralizing Trump supporters.

Thursday’s report denies that. No undercover FBI agents were present at the demonstration, the report said.

While there were 26 secret informants in Washington, DC, for the January 6 events, only three were in the Capitol, according to the report. It specifies that they have been tasked with looking into “specific topics of domestic terrorism cases”, nothing more.

“None of these FBI CHS [confidential human sources] authorized by the FBI to enter the Capitol or restricted area or otherwise violate the law on January 6,” the report explained.

“And no CHS was directed by the FBI to encourage others to commit illegal acts on January 6.”

This week’s report also emphasizes that the FBI was charged with only a “supportive role” in the preparation for the events of January 6.

Instead, it said, law enforcement agencies such as the US Capitol Police and the Metropolitan Police Department “are generally responsible for security operations, crowd control and visitor protection prior to protests and other demonstrations in and around the Capitol”.