DOJ Indicts Alleged White Supremacists Over Accusations of Attempting to Spark Race War

Improve the News Foundation -
0:00
/1861

Facts

  • US prosecutors on Monday charged Dallas Erin Humber and Matthew Robert Allison for allegedly attempting to incite racial attacks on Black people, Jewish people, members of the LGBTQ+ community, and immigrants, so as to spark a global race war.[1]
  • Humber and Robert allegedly lead 'Terrorgram Collective,' a transnational terrorist group based on Telegram, to promote white supremacist 'accelerationism' and target senators, judges, and state officials.[2][3]
  • Arrested on Friday, the duo has been charged with 15 criminal counts, including soliciting hate crimes, doxing federal officials, and threatening communications.[3][4][1]
  • Prosecutors have traced incidents such as the 2022 killing of two people in a Slovakian LGBTQ+ bar, along with last month's stabbing of five people near a mosque in Turkey, to the so-called Terrorgram Collective.[5]
  • The 37-page indictment filed by US Justice Department lawyers in California on Thursday alleges the pair solicited attacks on government infrastructure and energy facilities 'to ignite a race war and help accelerate the collapse of government and society.'[5]
  • While Allison is expected to appear in court on Tuesday, Humber, a resident of Elk Grove, pleaded not guilty during the arraignment. A detention hearing is set for Friday.[6]

Sources: [1]Reuters, [2]BBC News, [3]NBC, [4]ABC News, [5]Guardian and [6]CBS.

Narratives

  • Narrative A, as provided by Csis. With a significant rise in violent incidents in recent years, extremism driven by white supremacist ideology has outpaced all other forms of domestic terrorism. These groups, often operating through decentralized networks and heavily influenced by online propaganda, have been responsible for the majority of terrorist plots and attacks in recent years. Their actions' growing frequency and intensity highlight the urgent need for robust countermeasures to protect public safety and maintain national security.
  • Narrative B, as provided by Brennan Center for Justice. The threat of white supremacist extremism in the US is exaggerated. The Justice Department's data on domestic terrorism convictions shows that many cases labeled as terrorism involve unrelated personal disputes or non-terrorism crimes. Despite a decade of substantial funding for counterterrorism, the actual number of cases linked to white supremacists is much lower than reported. This undermines public confidence and suggests that the perceived threat may not be as severe as the government claims.

Predictions