Homeland Security Officials Warned of Right Wing Terrorism. Now They Endorse Biden.

Two top Department of Homeland Security political appointees tried to get the White House to do more on right-wing terrorism. Both gave up on the Trump administration and have now endorsed Biden.

Just a few weeks into the new administration, DHS leaders noticed an alarming trend: a burst of vandalism at Jewish cemeteries in Philadelphia; Rochester, N.Y.; and University City, Mo.  On Aug. 11, 2017, scores of young white men carrying tiki torches marched through the campus of the University of Virginia chanting “Jews will not replace us” and “White lives matter,” in a public display of white supremacist mobilization that shocked and sickened the country. The next day, counterprotesters thronged the streets of Charlottesville to push back. And a white supremacist drove a car through that crowd, injuring 19 people and killing a woman named Heather Heyer.

Trump’s infamous response to the weekend: “You had some very bad people in that group, but you also had people that were very fine people, on both sides.”

It could have been a moment of action from the federal government.... a chance for a systematic White House review of the threat’s scope and causes. But it wasn’t.

As the domestic terrorism threat began rising in the U.S.—including from racially motivated extremists—the White House turned a blind eye. We’re less safe because of it.

....nightmare scenario of globalized white supremacist terrorism was coming to life. Meanwhile, the U.S. government was doing far too little about its own homegrown extremists — often "lone wolves" radicalized online by white supremacist websites and fueled by hostility toward immigrants and minorities. But White House officials didn’t want to talk about the rising domestic extremist threat or even use the phrase “domestic terrorism.” The administration’s relentless, single-minded focus on immigration enforcement — coupled with nonstop turnover on the National Security Council — constantly pulled senior DHS leadership away from everything else.

“We were pushing the White House: ‘Make this a priority, talk about this, fight for money on Capitol Hill for this,’” he said. “It was on deaf ears. You could not have seen a White House less interested in this.”

For four years the Trump Republican regime has deliberately ignored the growing danger of right wing domestic terrorism instead steering DHS solely to immigration.

Trump often expressed irritation when he saw the DHS secretary anywhere other than the border.... Trump used to lambaste her if she didn’t physically spend enough of her time there.

Trump once fumed when he learned Nielsen was in Europe working on cybersecurity issues — even though cybersecurity is one of DHS’s many core missions.  “Why isn’t she on the border?” the official recalled Trump saying.

In a 2019 town hall meeting with a group of DHS lawyers... one attendee asked Senate-confirmed general counsel for DHS, John Mitnick what his biggest challenge was. His answer: finding time to work on anything other than immigration and border security. Mitnick told attendees that they should inform their supervisors immediately if anyone ever pressured them to greenlight an illegal action or policy, and he promised to support them. Later that year, Mitnick was fired.

Reminiscent of reports indicating Trump didn't show any interest in threats of a potential pandemic, Presidents have access to classified US intel and we rely on them to protect us from potential threats.

Two months after releasing the document that discussed the white supremacist threat,  acting DHS head Kevin McAleenan resigned from DHS.

A new acting secretary, Chad Wolf, took his place. On Jan. 17, 2020, Wolf gave a speech that discussed McAleenan’s document and terror threats.  “We’re working aggressively to develop the implementation plan, which will be ready in the coming weeks,” he said. 

No such plan is public.

Source: https://www.politico.com/news/2020/08/26/trump-domestic-extemism-homeland-security-401926