WASHINGTON — According to a report in The Washington Post, the FBI had warned that extremists were preparing to come to Washington, attack Congress and engage in “war.”
The report says the warning was issued internally by the FBI’s field office in Norfolk, Virginia, a day before the violent riot at the U.S. Capitol.
The warning directly contradicts statements from the Justice Department and FBI officials that they had no intelligence to suggest a storming of the Capitol.
The Post says the memo described how people had been sharing maps of the Capitol’s tunnels and discussing rallying points to meet up to travel to Washington. The newspaper reported that the document detailed posts calling for violence, including that “Congress needs to hear glass breaking, doors being kicked in, and blood from their BLM and Antifa slave soldiers being spilled.”
The posts also told followers to “go there ready for war.”
Five people died as a result of the violent riots at the Capitol on January 6, including a Capitol Police officer.
The FBI and other agencies are facing criticism for not being more aware of publicly-available conversations and posts talking about plans for January 6 in Washington, D.C., and seemed to do little to prepare for the possibility of violence.
At the end of last week, the head of the FBI’s Washington Field Office, Steven D’Antuono, told reporters “there was no indication” of anything planned for the day of Trump’s rally “other than First Amendment-protected activity," according to the Washington Post.
The Associated Press has not obtained the document. The FBI did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
