Right-wing Violence Rises

In the research paper "A comparison of political violence by left-wing, right-wing, and Islamist extremists in the United States and the world" by Katarzyna Jasko et.al. the authors state "we find that radical acts perpetrated by individuals associated with left-wing causes are less likely to be violent. In the United States, we find no difference between the level of violence perpetrated by right-wing and Islamist extremists." They then go on to show the data that proves their assertion. You may often here conservatives especially Fox News personalities, Breirbart, and others claim that leftists are the source of most violence but they never show you any evidence to back up their claims. The General Accountability Office reports that "Of the 85 violent extremist incidents that resulted in death since September 12, 2001, far right wing violent extremist groups were responsible for 62 (73 percent) while radical Islamist violent extremists were responsible for 23 (27 percent).”

That's important because a new tactic has been spreading across the country over the last several months, you might have heard about the 40,000-plus North Carolinians who were without electricity a week or so ago because someone broke into power sub-stations and shot up critical equipment causing localized blackouts. That's a tactic that right wing extremist groups on the internet have been talking about a lot lately going so far as to offer recommendations on how to do the most damage complete with photos of the equipment to look for and how to best damage it. The FBI is still investigation the attack so we can't know for sure that this particular instance was due to neo-Nazi perpetrators but it sure matches their self-published plans closely according to Rita Katz, founder and executive director of the SITE Intelligence Group, who told Newsweek that the Moore County attack is consistent with recent online neo-Nazi messaging. "The sabotage against the North Carolina substation aligns perfectly with directives and methods seen in accelerationist neo-Nazi communities," Katz said. "If this was indeed a far-right terrorist attack, my worry is that it will serve as a proof of concept for other far-right extremists.”

Just a few weeks before the North Carolina incidents there were at least six different attacks on power substations were reported to the FBI in Washington and Oregon. In recent months there have been at least half a dozen “substation intrusion events” though none involved vandalism by gunfire. Instead, the Florida intrusions involved people manually turning off the power substations by tripping switches. Most of these incidents resulted in brief outages that were quickly restored. What's really frightening about the Florida attacks is that it shows the involvement of people who know how the equipment works.

In January, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) warned that American extremists have begun exhibiting a worrisome interest in attacking the power grid as a means of disrupting the country. Far-right domestic extremists “have developed credible, specific plans to attack electricity infrastructure since at least 2020, identifying the electric grid as a particularly attractive target given its interdependency with other infrastructure sectors,” according to the DHS report.

It’s unfortunate that unlike Presidents George H.W. Bush and Ronald Reagan who denounced racist figures like Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke when they tried to enter mainstream politics Donald Trump uses their rhetoric. If today’s Republican leaders were really patriots they would speak out, like their predecessors in opposition to the hateful messages that inspire such attacks. We know what it means that they don’t.

Published in the Seguin Gazette - December 14, 2022