It’s not just that there are 50 separate targets to defend, while the U.S. capital has been fortified with up to 20,000 National Guard troops. For years, local law-enforcement officials have largely failed to keep pace with the growing menace of right-wing violence and are ill-equipped to track the network of extremists operating in their jurisdictions, according to federal authorities and experts. While officials are scrambling to catch up now, under-resourced departments may struggle to discern which groups or individuals among this new motley coalition of pro-Trump forces pose a real threat.
“Bottom line, last Wednesday was a page-turning event for Capitol security forces across the country,” says Washington Patrol spokesman Chris Loftis. “We allowed 100 years of experience that no one had ever tried to breach the gate convince us that no one ever would try to breach the gate. We were wrong.”…
“If you have people showing up to state capitols with weapons, even if they don’t have the intent of launching an attack, the prospects for confusion or miscommunication are much higher,” says Colin Clarke, a terrorism expert at the Soufan Center, a nonpartisan group that tracks extremism. “That’s what I’m concerned about—Lansing, Mich., and Harrisburg, Penn., and Richmond, Va.,, and the Pacific Northwest in the coming days and weeks.”
