08/05/16 – Trevor Aaronson – The Scott Horton Show

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Alright y'all, Scott Horton Show.
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Introducing Trevor Aronson, the heroic Trevor Aronson.
The author of The Terror Factory, the book and the great article from Mother Jones way back when.
But definitely read the book.
It's all about the terrorism entrapments.
And as I say, I'm always a little jealous of you, Trevor, because I was going to write a book like this.
But all the publishers told me to go to hell, so I went to hell instead.
But then you turned around and wrote this great book all about the FBI basically manufacturing terrorism cases out of whole cloth here.
And there's been a big shock, although I don't think a surprise, breaking in the intercept on your byline yesterday.
FBI had undercover agent at scene of Draw Muhammad shooting in Texas.
So that was one where there was actually an attempted attack.
And so why was there an undercover officer there?
What all did the FBI know about what was going on?
Yeah, that's what's really interesting.
I mean, as you and your listeners recall, the Draw Muhammad event was hosted by the noted Islamophobe Pamela Geller and had drawn a lot of kind of controversy up and leading up to the event.
And after the event had started, two men from Arizona attacked the event with assault rifles.
They were not particularly effective.
They didn't kill anyone.
They did wound a security guard before Texas police shot and killed them.
But what's interesting is that prior to the shooting, the FBI had notified local authorities to be aware of this guy, Elton Simpson.
And they provided his photograph, and Elton was one of the shooters.
And then after the shooting, immediately after, the FBI said, well, we didn't have any reason to believe that there would be violence, that they were just suspicious of this man.
And that's what we've known for the last year.
The shooting was in May 2015.
So fast forward to Wednesday, and the Department of Justice indicted a man named Eric Jamal Hendricks, a 35-year-old from Charlotte who they allege was recruiting people online to join the Islamic State.
And what's interesting is in that affidavit, it talks about the undercover operation to build a case against Hendricks and reveals for the first time that there was an undercover FBI agent who was communicating not only with Hendricks but with Elton Simpson, the shooter in the Garland, Texas event, and that when the shooting took place, the undercover agent was not only there present at the event but was communicating with Hendricks, the newly indicted guy, about the security situation there, that Hendricks was asking him how many people are there, do you see any police, are there any feds.
And the affidavit doesn't make clear what he responded with, whether he did discuss the security situation.
And it also doesn't make clear whether Hendricks, the newly indicted guy, was passing that information on to Simpson, which is certainly possible and, if true, is certainly very troubling.
But what's interesting is that this shows that the FBI had greater reason to be suspicious of Simpson and knew or should have known that violence was going to take place.
And it's kind of an interesting pulling back of the curtain on this event that we just hadn't had up until Wednesday when the government released this affidavit.
And then, yeah, the statement, tear up Texas, I guess that can be read, well, I can't really think of too many ways to read it, but it's a little bit opaque, I guess, but sounds like he's saying, yeah, kill them over there at that Pamela Geller event, do something.
Yeah, you know, some have read that to be the FBI encouraging violence of Simpson prior to the attack.
You know, I tend to be on the fence with this.
I think it's a little ambiguous given the way it's written, but it's certainly suspicious.
And that's the word I was looking for.
I mean, the conversation in full, in my view, you know, certainly gives the FBI reason to believe that Simpson might have been interested in carrying out some sort of attack there, even though they later said after the shooting that they had no reason to believe there would be violence.
Because in that exchange, this is all in online communication, and Simpson tells the undercover agent about the event and posts a link to it.
And the undercover agent replies, tear up Texas, right, which could mean violence.
It could mean demonstration.
But most interestingly, I think, is that Simpson then responds something to the effect of, you know, you know about Paris, right?
And he was referring to the Charlie Hebdo attacks in 2015, clearly suggesting that, you know, he wanted to, you know, do some sort of Paris-like operation there, or seeming to suggest anyway.
And, you know, to me, I think that's enough reason for the FBI to have had concern that he was planning to target the event with violence.
And so, you know, I think there are a lot of questions of why James Comey, the FBI director, said following the event that we had no reason to believe he would be interested in violence, when, you know, the transcript that was released as part of the affidavit Wednesday, you know, clearly shows that the FBI had, through its undercover agent, you know, intelligence that this man was planning to attend this event and, you know, had referenced the Paris attacks as a kind of inspiration.
Well, I mean, and as you quoted in your piece here at The Intercept, and I guess you don't have it in front of you.
That's okay.
But, you know, he even says in the reference to Paris, he says in response – I think the way it's written here – in response to the undercover cop saying tear up Texas, he says, bro, you don't have to say that.
You know what happened in Paris, right?
You know, and the guy – and then he says, right.
And then he says, so that goes without saying.
In other words, don't be an idiot and talk about our criminal plans on an open communication platform.
That's all, right?
Am I being too – am I going overboard?
Again, I would mention the caveat that – and the reason I'm unwilling to kind of go as far as some people have is that Hendrix, the person that was newly indicted, has conversations with the undercover agent where they talk about attending the event.
And Hendrix seems to suggest they protest rather than – you know, have a peaceful protest of sorts rather than any sort of violence.
Even though after the violence, certainly the – Hendrix, you know, cheered it on in an online post.
But, you know, in some ways the undercover agent is building on the conversation he had with Texas.
That said, though, you know, you're right in that Simpson clearly seemed to believe that it was referencing violence because, you know, he says, you know, you don't have to say that.
You know what happened in Paris.
And, you know, so – but, you know, this does raise a question, right?
Like does it – I think at a very minimum it raises a question of whether the FBI had a greater reason to believe there was violence that was going to take place and then didn't act on it.
And then after the fact claim that there was no reason to suspect there would be violence.
A kind of more troubling question which, you know, you're raising and I think is legitimate is, you know, was the FBI egging him on in some way?
Like was he encouraging him to commit violence?
And, you know, as you know from my book and a lot of these cases, you know, the FBI has a long history of through sting operations, you know, encouraging people to do violence and doing their best to control the situation by providing fake weapons and doing everything they can to manage a sting operation so that when the person is arrested they can say, well, you know, the public was never in danger.
You know, what we've always wondered is have there been cases where the FBI was encouraging violence and let the target of that sting kind of get out of their control and commit violence that was encouraged by the government in some way?
And certainly this is a case that raises those possibilities.
But you're saying it's clear they were working on Hendricks.
It's not so clear that they had a case going with an undercover guy really working on this other guy.
He knew him through Hendricks.
Is that it?
He knew Hendricks was introduced to excuse me.
Excuse me.
The undercover agent was introduced to Simpson through Hendricks online.
But, you know, that said, I mean, the FBI had spent years building a case on Simpson.
They put informants on him.
You know, he was he was not an unknown quantity to the FBI by any means by the time that this undercover agent was introduced to him through Simpson.
I think, you know, it was probably seen as a boon to the FBI that that Simpson made this introduction.
I mean, there's a there's a clear record available after the shooting that the FBI had spent a lot of time trying to get at Simpson and suspected him of violence.
So it's not, you know, at all unusual.
I don't think that the FBI would have taken this introduction from from Hendricks and tried to run with it with Simpson.
And, you know, I mean, I think what's what's most interesting is that there was the shooting that took place.
The FBI was not only in contact with the shooter beforehand, but had discussed some sort of violence with him.
And then at the and then when the shooting takes place, you know, the FBI agent is is present, but does nothing.
So it's not to to to blow his cover and then continues the investigation.
And of course, this is something we find out about only, you know, more than a year later.
Right.
All right.
Well, stay on it.
Let us know what you find out.
I know you will.
Thanks so much.
Thanks for having me, as always.
Yeah.
Very happy to talk to you again.
That's the great Trevor Aronson, everybody.
Read his book.
It's a really important book.
And you know what?
It's like 200 pages, 250 or something.
You'll just put it away in a day.
No problem.
The terror factory.
It's great.
Please do that.
And read him at the intercept.
FBI had undercover agent at scene of drama homage shooting in Texas.
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