FBI Director Christopher Wray told Congress on Thursday there is a “persistent, pervasive threat” posed by white supremacist violence.
During a hearing on the FBI budget request for fiscal 2020, Wray broke with President Trump, who last month said white nationalism is not a rising threat and called white nationalists “a small group of people.”
“The danger of white supremacist violent extremism … is significant. We assess that it is a persistent, pervasive threat,” Wray told the House Appropriations Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies Subcommittee.
Pressed on whether the FBI was doing enough to combat white supremacy and to investigate hate crimes, Wray testified “underlying drivers for domestic extremism … remain constant.”
“The FBI is most concerned about lone offender attacks, primarily shootings, as they have served as the dominant mode for lethal domestic extremist violence,” Wray said in his opening statement. His appearance comes after the Tree of Life synagogue mass shooting on Oct. 27, 2018, in Pittsburgh that killed 11 people. The mass shooting on March 15 at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, killed 50 people.
The committee’s chairman, Rep. Jose Serrano, D-N.Y., pointed out Wray’s budget request “does not mention white supremacist extremism at all” and told Wray to “describe the danger to public safety that is posed by white supremacist extremism.” Serrano asked Wray: “How much funding and how many employees are dedicated to investigating white supremacist extremists in the 2020 budget? What is the danger to the country and what do you need to fight it?”
Wray replied: “The danger of white supremacist violent extremism — or any other kind of violent extremism — is, of course, significant. We assess that it is a persistent, pervasive threat.”
Wray said the FBI combats extremism “both through both our Joint Terrorism Task Forces on the domestic terrorism side as well as through our civil rights program on the criminal side through hate crimes enforcement.”
“We tackle it through agents, analysts, professional staff, and technology,” he said.
Wray pointed to some recent victories by the FBI in prosecuting hate crimes, including securing “a 29-count hate crime guilty plea from an individual connected to the Charlottesville incident.” In 2017, Heather Heyer was killed by James Alex Fields Jr., who was found guilty of murder last year. He then pleaded guilty to federal hate crimes charges in March. Wray also said the FBI “charged eight defendants in the Rise Above Movement for rioting they had caused during various rallies.” Rise Above is a white supremacist street-fighting organization.
“We’re using every tool at our disposal — whether it’s hate crimes charges, gun charges, explosives charges, or, as in the example of the Rise Above Movement charges we brought, we’re trying to be creative in looking at what other charges might be available to us, like the federal rioting statute,” Wray said.
When Serrano asked him if the FBI had enough resources to handle the problem, Wray said: “Certainly we are stretched thin. There’s no question about it.”
Wray described the challenges posed by modern domestic terrorism. He said it is difficult to combat because of its diffuse nature. “It’s less structured, less organized, fewer groups, more uncoordinated, one-off individuals as opposed to some structured hierarchy,” Wray said. He also explained the challenges posed by online recruitment and radicalization, saying “there’s a lot of social media exploitation that comes with it.”
Another topic of discussion was hate crimes. Although Wray declined to confirm there has been a rise in hate crime incidents, he said the FBI is raising awareness and is seeing a “very positive upward trend in terms of the number of agencies that are reporting.”
Wray’s 2020 budget proposal included a request for $9.31 billion “to carry out the FBI’s national security, criminal law enforcement, and criminal justice services missions.” He asked for enhanced programming funds for cyber investigative capabilities, mitigating foreign intelligence service threats, targeting transnational and darknet criminal networks, supporting the National Vetting Center, improving the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, and strengthening the FBI’s ability to render safe a weapon of mass destruction.
“The resources provided will allow the FBI to combat some of the most egregious national security and criminal threats; continue to partner with state, local, tribal, and other federal agencies in a task force environment; and endeavor to keep pace with technological advancements employed by our adversaries,” Wray said.
