In a letter to US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, 40 congressmen have demanded answers as to why “the State Department has failed to include certain overseas violent white supremacist groups on the Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTO) list.”The letter, sent last week by Homeland Security Subcommittee on Intelligence and Counterterrorism chair Max Rose, recalls numerous international acts of hate and violence carried out by white supremacists, including “the recent attack in Halle, Germany, which killed two innocent people."The letter pointed out that “like the previous shooter in Christchurch, New Zealand, the attack in Halle was live-streamed and the killer posted a hateful antisemitic manifesto” online.The congressmen cited Search International Terrorist Entities Intelligence Group Intelligence Director Rita Katz, who said the separate videos of the alleged Halle shooter and the Christchurch attacker demonstrated that the Halle “attack is another installment from a global terrorist network, linked together via online safe havens much like ISIS.”The congressmen emphasized that “there are several resources available to counter the threats” posed by potential American citizens swearing allegiance to the so-called Islamic State or other Foreign Terrorist Organizations on the list.Yet, if an American were to swear allegiance to a “violent white supremacist extremist group,” the federal government does not have the same tools. In a September strategy report, the US Department of Homeland Security said that “white supremacist violent extremism... is one of the most potent forces driving domestic terrorism.”The report said that “lone attackers, as opposed to cells or organizations, generally perpetrate these kinds of attacks, but they are also part of a broader movement,” pointing out that “white supremacist violent extremists connect with like-mined individuals online" not only through mainstream social media platforms, but also by using "lesser- known sites like Gab, 8chan, and EndChan, as well as encrypted channels.”JTA, Maayan Jaffe-Hoffman and Tovah Lazaroff contributed to this report.
How Congress is fighting the U.S. Government's white supremacy problem
Members of Congress are demanding answers as to why the State Department mentions Islamic State but not white supremacy groups.
