FBI to vet thousands of National Guard troops.
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great idea, treasonous vets are getting busted every dayOriginally Posted by moon
Last week’s storming of the Capitol attracted a wide range of people, but at least some of the individuals who made it into the building’s inner chambers appear to be members of militia groups, acting with a degree of coördination. Wearing tactical gear, they moved in an organized fashion, using handheld radios and headsets to communicate. Far-right groups at the Capitol included the Oath Keepers, the Three Percenters, the Proud Boys, and the Boogaloo Bois, as well as smaller local organizations.
Donovan Crowl, a fifty-year-old former marine, who had served as a helicopter mechanic on an amphibious assault ship in the Persian Gulf, in 1990, was among the uniformed men. At the Capitol, Crowl wore a combat helmet, ballistic goggles, and a tactical vest with a handheld radio. In a video, he can be seen in a line of people making their way through the crowd up the Capitol steps, each with a hand on the shoulder of the one in front. In another video, he is standing alongside a group breaching the doors of the Capitol. The crowd responds to the question “Who’s our President?” with the shout “Trump!,” and, as people start to enter the building, a man can be heard saying, in astonishment, “We’re the first wave!” Crowl was later photographed in the Capitol Rotunda, and additional videos and photographs show him appearing to stand guard at the doors and on the steps of the Capitol. Crowl’s sister and mother, who identified Crowl, said that he had become increasingly radical in recent years, both in his support of Trump and in his expression of racist views. A friend of Crowl’s said that he had discussed plans to travel from his home, in Ohio, to Washington, D.C., to protest the certification of Joe Biden’s election.
In addition to his military attire, a patch on Crowl’s sleeve identified him as a member of the Oath Keepers. Founded in 2009, by Elmer Stewart Rhodes, a graduate of Yale Law School and a former Army paratrooper, the Oath Keepers is a loosely organized anti-government group with chapters around the country. It claims to have recruited tens of thousands of former law-enforcement and military officials into its ranks. While the organization says that its mandate is defending the Constitution, several human-rights groups have identified it as one of the largest and most dangerous extremist groups in the country. Oath Keepers has been involved in several armed standoffs with law enforcement in recent years, and a number of its members have faced criminal charges for threatening violence or other criminal activity. The group has in recent years embraced Trump, and, earlier this year, Twitter accused its founder of inciting violence and banned him.
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