Early Wednesday morning, a radical Islamic terrorist drove his truck through a crowd of people celebrating the start of the New Year in New Orleans. Fifteen people were murdered and more than 35 injured. But maybe this tragedy could have been avoided if the FBI spent less time targeting parents, Catholics, and countless other dissidents and instead focused its resources on catching actual terrorists.
Shamsud-Din Jabbar plowed through a crowd in his Ford F-150 Lightning EV truck draped with an ISIS flag before shooting at police officers, who fatally shot Jabbar. Jabbar “recently converted to Islam” and “began acting erratically in recent months,” according to The New York Times.
Unfortunately under the leadership of then FBI Director Christopher Wray, the FBI was too busy doing things like helping to orchestrate a kidnapping plot targeting Democrat Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer to catch a terrorist.
Here are some others the FBI was too busy targeting while a terrorist became radicalized on U.S. soil.
Catholics
Documents obtained by House Republicans in 2023 reveals multiple FBI field offices were involved in the drafting of the infamous memo that labeled Catholics as potential domestic terrorists.
A leaked FBI memo revealed a Richmond, Virginia, field office was investigating alleged “white supremacy” amongst Catholics who attended Latin Mass. The memo warned of “Radical-Traditionalist Catholics” and noted possible infiltration into Catholic communities using “various kinds of informants.” Subsequent memos show FBI field offices in Los Angeles and Portland were involved in targeting Catholics.
Trump Supporters
Jabbar reportedly began radicalizing in recent months, according to The New York Times. But the FBI wouldn’t have caught on to that because around the same time that Jabbar was radicalizing, the FBI was singling out Trump supporters, a report from Newsweek showed.
Newsweek reported that “nearly two-thirds of the FBI’s current investigations” focused on Trump supporters accused of disregarding “anti-riot” laws.
After Jan. 6, the FBI expanded its “anti-government or anti-authority violent extremists-other” (AGAAVE) category to “jumpstart investigations into Americans based on their political affiliations,” as my colleague Jordan Boyd reported. More than a year later, the FBI created the “AGAAVE-Other” category, which devoted its resources to monitor, as Boyd explained, “anyone the agency deemed an anti-government ‘domestic violent extremist’ with seemingly adverse political affiliations.” Newsweek reported that while Trump supporters were not officially designated as members of this category, “government insiders acknowledge that it applies to political violence ascribed to the former president’s supporters.”
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An unnamed senior intelligence official reportedly said he believes “Trump’s army constitutes the greatest threat of violence domestically … politically … that’s the reality and the problem set.”
Parents At School Board Meetings
The Department of Justice (DOJ) issued a memo in October of 2021 instructing the FBI to label activist parents at school board meetings with “threat tags.” The guidance came just days after the Biden White House approved a recommendation from the National School Board Association that called for counterterrorism measures to be used against parents who spoke up at school board meetings.
Attorney General Merrick Garland “encouraged the use of an FBI tip line for individuals to flag parents for surveillance,” as my colleague Tristan Justice reported.
Tiffany Justice, co-founder of Moms for Liberty, told The Federalist of a mother who was reported to the FBI for simply being “quite upset” at a school board meeting when speaking about the adverse effects of quarantines and school closures.
Pro-Lifers
During the Biden administration, the FBI targeted 55 pro-lifers for “praying, singing, and evangelizing at abortion facilities across the U.S.,” as Boyd reported. Under the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act, the Biden administration targeted pro-lifers instead of targeting terrorists or the at least 90 instances of “abortion-fueled firebombing, vandalism, and other attacks on lifesaving pregnancy centers, pro-life organizations, and churches …”
In fact, 75-year-old Paulette Harlow was charged and found guilty for violating the FACE Act after she prayed at a Washington, D.C., abortion facility. Harlow was sentenced to two years in jail.
The FBI has long smeared pro-lifers as threats, with former FBI-special-agent-turned-whistleblower Steve Friend revealing in an interview with the Tennessee Informer that the FBI showed agents a video produced by the far-left Southern Poverty Law Center that, according to Friend, “ranked people who oppose abortion, pro-life activists, as a greater threat than Islamists.”
Grandmas
Imagine how much worse Wednesday’s deadly event would have been had the FBI not taken dangerous grandmothers like 71-year-old Rebecca Lavrenz off the street?
Lavrenz was recently convicted on four counts after she entered the Capitol on Jan. 6 for roughly 10 minutes, having briefly spoken to at least one Capitol Police Officer prior to exiting, according to the official statement of facts. Two FBI agents showed up to her home on April 19, 2021, returning the following week for a consensual interview. Lavrenz was sentenced to one year probation.
At least Americans can rest easy knowing threats like Lavrenz, parents at school board meetings, Trump supporters and Catholics are off the streets.
Brianna Lyman is an elections correspondent at The Federalist. Brianna graduated from Fordham University with a degree in International Political Economy. Her work has been featured on Newsmax, Fox News, Fox Business and RealClearPolitics. Follow Brianna on X: @briannalyman2
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