Domestic terrorism charge would help track 'mobilization of violence' online, former FBI agent says

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U.S. authorities need to attach a federal penalty to domestic terrorism in order for law enforcement to combat violent ideology that apparently triggered the El Paso, Texas massacre, a former FBI special agent says.

Having a domestic terrorism charge, Clint Watts said, would give the Federal Bureau of Investigation agents "more latitude" to identify online activity that "looks like mobilization of violence" and prevent crimes. 

"You'll never stop this if you're trying to prosecute it after the violence has occurred," he told The Current's guest host Laura Lynch.

The mass shooting in El Paso last Saturday, which left 22 people dead and dozens wounded, has renewed focus on far-right online forums and ignited calls for their elimination.

Police believe the accused gunman, 21-year-old Patrick Crusius, wrote a lengthy anti-Hispanic screed and posted it on the online message board 8chan minutes before opening fire with an AK-47-style rifle on Walmart shoppers — many of them Hispanic.

8chan, an online discussion forum known for trafficking extremist, racist and violent writings, has been linked to a recent spate of deadly shootings. In the last six months, the attackers in at least three rampages — at two New Zealand mosques in March, another at a California synagogue in April, and now at an El Paso shopping complex — posted their plans on 8chan beforehand.

White supremacists are "inspiring each other online, conducting attacks and then using their manifestos to guide ideology between each other," explained Watts, a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Washington.

U.S. law defines domestic terrorism as dangerous acts intended to intimidate the population or influence the government by intimidation or coercion. But there's no criminal penalty attached. 

"If we had that ability for domestic terrorist organizations, then you could actually pursue people on the fringes that helped facilitate this," Watts said, noting that would apply to a website like 8chan "that's not being effectively policed."

'If I could, I would uncreate 8chan'

Fredrick Brennan founded 8chan in 2013 and cut ties with the site three years later.

"If I could, I would uncreate 8chan," he told Lynch. "Of course, you know, I'm guilty to a certain extent of allowing it to go in the beginning, but I never expected it to get this far. I never expected there to be so many mass shootings connected to 8chan." 

Brennan is pressuring owner Jim Watkins, an American living in the Philippines, to shut down the site.

So far, his request has not been met, but the contentious message board has been knocked offline after two companies cut off vital technical services in the wake the the El Paso shooting. This online armour is paramount for the survival of 8chan because it protects websites from denial-of-service attacks that can make them unreachable.

In the meantime, the U.S. House of Representatives homeland security committee has demanded Watkins testify about 8chan's efforts to address "the proliferation of extremist content, including white supremacist content."

Watkins said in a video he posted on YouTube on Tuesday the site provides a space for free speech and the El Paso shooter's suspected manifesto was first uploaded not to 8chan but to Instagram.

A spokesperson for Facebook, which owns the photo-sharing app, said an ongoing internal investigation has found "nothing that supports this theory."

Impact of disconnecting far-right forums

As attempts are underway to permanently muzzle the far-right forum, Watts points out results would be short-lived and pathways of online extremism would once again crop up.   

"These sites going offline does disrupt these networks considerably," he said.

"That damages their ability to radicalize and recruit because they can't reach as large of an audience."

But as long as the internet exists, he believes people will find avenues to motivate extremism and propagate hate speech.

When social media giants, like Facebook, implemented measures to stamp out the promotion of hate speech, Watts contends, the move just pushed extremists and white supremacists to "fringe social media sites." 

"They're usually smaller in number, they can't reach as wide of an audience, which is good, but they can also plot and plan, you know, in a much more obscure way," he said.

Written by Amara McLaughlin, with files from Reuters and The Associated Press. Produced by Allie Jaynes, Sarah-Joyce Battersby and Cameron Perrier.