From a recently released Senate report-the NYT writes:
“Our intelligence agencies completely dropped the ball,” said Senator Gary Peters, Democrat of Michigan and the chairman of the Homeland Security Committee. He added: “Despite a multitude of tips and other intelligence warnings of violence on Jan. 6, the report showed that these agencies repeatedly — repeatedly — downplayed the threat level and failed to share the intelligence they had with law enforcement partners.”
The report determined the F.B.I.’s monitoring of social media threats was “degraded mere days before the attack,” because the bureau changed contracts for third-party social media monitoring. The committee obtained internal emails showing that F.B.I. officials were “surprised” by the timing of the contract change and “lamented the negative effect it would have on their monitoring capabilities in the lead-up to Jan. 6.”
But the investigation made clear that monitoring was not the only issue. It faulted the F.B.I. for failing to act on an array of dire warnings.
On Jan. 3, 2021, the F.B.I. became aware of multiple posts calling for violence, such as a Parler user who said, ”Come armed.” On Jan. 4, Justice Department leaders noted multiple concerning posts, including calls to “occupy federal buildings,” discussions of “invading the capitol building” and individuals arming themselves “to engage in political violence.”
Still, the report highlighted interviews with two F.B.I. leaders who said they were unaware that Congress could come under siege.
“If everybody knew and all the public knew that they were going to storm Congress, I don’t know why one person didn’t tell us,” Jennifer Moore, the special agent in charge of the F.B.I. Washington Field Office’s intelligence division, told the Senate investigators.
Jill Sanborn, the former assistant director of the F.B.I.’s counterterrorism division, testified: “None of us had any intelligence that suggested individuals were going to storm and breach the Capitol.”
The performance of the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Intelligence and Analysis was also criticized. The report found that the agency, on Jan. 2, discovered that individuals were sharing a map of the Capitol online. One employee messaged another, saying, “feel like people are actually going to try and hurt politicians.”
But agency analysts appeared not to take such threats seriously, even as it became clear that the violence being warned about was materializing. At 2:58 p.m. on Jan. 6, after the police had declared a riot and the Capitol had been locked down, analysts internally noted online chatter that “called for more violent actions,” but added that “at this time no credible information to pass on has been established.”
A representative for the F.B.I. said that it had been working with law enforcement agencies, including the Capitol Police, in the lead-up to and on the day of Jan. 6: “We also set up command posts and had tactical assets ready to deploy should our partners request such assistance.”
The agency added that after the attack it increased its focus on “swift information sharing” with law enforcement partners, and that it also “made improvements to assist investigators and analysts in all of our field offices throughout the investigative process.”
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