DownWithTyranny!: How Connected Is The Trump Regime To The Boogaloo Movement?

Although most members of Congress have their eyes set on finally bringing DC statehood, Trump and his Republicans and many Blue Dogs from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party, are not onboard. The latest profa-- opposite of antifa-- group from the dark fringes of American fascism and white nationalism, the self-styled boogaloo bois, have other ideas for DC. Boogaloo is a term referring to their goal of inciting a civil war and the fall of civilization that has largely left them behind, societal roadkill. According to the National Capital Region Threat Intelligence Consortium, boogaloo groups have their sites set on Washington in their quest to start a race war or civil war or just for general mayhem. (Note: these are Trump's "very fine people.")

An NTIC report from earlier this week warns that "recent events indicate violent adherents of the boogaloo ideology likely reside in the National Capital Region, and others may be willing to travel far distances to incite civil unrest or conduct violence encouraged in online forums associated with the movement... While it identifies Washington D.C. as an attractive target, the boogaloo ideology is not restricted to a specific region and those who wish to cause division are routinely using peaceful protests as means of cover... These individuals may target law enforcement as violent adherents have in other parts of the country, and motivated adherents have an increased number of targets given the concentration of law enforcement agencies in the region."

Their assessment has been backed up by the Department of Homeland Security which has alerted other agencies that "domestic terrorists advocating for the boogaloo very likely will take advantage of any regional or national situation involving heightened fear and tensions to promote their violent extremist ideology and call supporters to action... [D]omestic terrorists [will] attempt to shut down or endanger government operations, judging from domestic terrorists’ continued calls for attacks."

The nationwide peaceful Black Lives Matter protests have served as cover for boogaloo bois terrorism and rampages around the country, including murders.

While Trump and Barr try to muddy the water with constant and deceitful attacks on anti-fascist demonstrators, they are very consciously giving cover to the pro-fascist, pro-violence terror groups which are considered pro-Trump.

Here in California, the pro-Trump, pro-fascist groups-- an off-shoot of reddit and 4chan chat groups-- have been murdering police and, according the NBC, plotting to kidnap the children of government officials.

This week, federal prosecutors announced that Steven Carrillo, the accused gunman in fatal attacks on a federal security officer and a Sheriff's deputy, wrote the word “BOOG” in blood after the ambush killing of Santa Cruz sheriff’s Sgt. Damon Gutzwiller.

“The boogaloo term is used by extremists to reference a violent uprising or an impending civil war in the United States,” Northern California U.S. Attorney David Anderson said at a press conference this week.

...Anderson believes Carrillo and an accomplice were also attempting to further the "boogaloo boys" goal of triggering a civil war when they gunned down Federal Protective Services officer David Patrick Underwood outside the federal courthouse in Oakland on May 29.

“Pat Underwood was murdered because he wore a uniform,” Anderson said.

But the attorney representing Carrillo disputes how prosecutors have characterized him.

“I cannot comment on my client’s involvement or non-involvement with the movement,” said attorney Jeffrey Stotter. But he stressed that Carrillo served with distinction in a staff sergeant in a special protection unit of the Air Force, even after his wife killed herself in 2018.

“He’s certainly emotionally and psychologically traumatized by all of these events, including his service to our country.”

But federal authorities say their evidence includes postings they believe Carrillo made on Facebook just hours before the Oakland courthouse killing-- advocating violence.

One post reads, “We have mobs of angry people to use to our advantage.” Prosecutors say Carrillo posted that after 8 a.m. on the day Underwood was killed, and another security officer was shot at the Oakland federal building. They note that those shooting happened in the midst of a major Black Lives Matter demonstration on Oakland's streets-- suggesting Carrillo was using the protest as cover.

Sources with knowledge of the investigation claim that Carrillo is one of a dozen members of a local "boogaloo" cell. They also believe the attacks the group had been planning are not limited to law enforcement.

Sources say that elected leaders in at least two cities in the East Bay were recently alerted to suspected plots by "boogaloo" movement members to kidnap their children.

Investigators tracking the "boogaloo" movement note that the group is particularly dangerous because they sometimes defy classification-- with some members advocating for white supremacy, while others are simply anti-government.

“The boogaloo boys movement, whether they are racist or not, is looking to start a civil war,” said Brian Levin, head of the Center For the Study of Hate & Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino. “And who are the folks that are likely targets? Government officials.”

Levin says he has watched with alarm over the past year as the group escalated attacks and became a broad umbrella for the various extremist factions scattered across the U.S.

“They all glorify heavy armaments and confrontation, they are looking for a catalyst for an impending civil war,” he said, adding that the movement is bent on exploiting the current national turmoil.

“Anything goes in these kinds of turbulent election seasons,” Levin said, “where we have a variety of catalysts as well as an expandable pool of potential recruits who are fearful or upset over recent developments.”

The unwillingness by Barr and Trump to warn the nation about these far-right groups publicly is not what anyone rational think is part of "law and order," a slogan Trump and Barr like to bandy around. Jason Blazakis, a senior researcher at The Soufan Center, a nonprofit that studies emerging threats: "It puts a target on the backs of law-enforcement-- whether federal, state or local-- because these individuals, with the power they have at the podium, are not speaking out about who is really carrying out these abhorrent acts of violence."

Yesterday ABC News reported on the murder of Patrick Underwood in Oakland as more details came to light. Luke Barr wrote that Carrillo and Richard Justus pulled up in a white van alongside a guard shack at the federal courthouse in Oakland late last month and shot and killed a Federal Protective Service Contract Officer Patrick Underwood, critically injuring his partner. They then fled the scene, which was near where protests were taking place in the wake of George Floyd’s death, setting off an eight-day manhunt.

"We believe Carrillo and Justice chose this date because the planned protest in Oakland provided an opportunity for them to target multiple law enforcement personnel and avoid apprehension to the large crowds attending the demonstrations, as described in detail in the complaint," John Bennett, FBI special agent in charge of the San Francisco field office said at a press conference after an arrest was made.

...Justus turned himself in and was charged with attempted murder. Carrillo was arrested after a witness eventually reported seeing the van and "observed what appeared to be ammunition, firearms and bomb making equipment" inside, prosecutors allege. Santa Cruz Sheriff’s Office deputies showed up to Carrillo’s doorstep, and as they approached his home, he opened fire, killing Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Sgt. Damon Gutzwiller.

The government alleges that Carrillo fled on foot, and then began carjacking innocent people using what is known as a ghost gun-- a firearm which is privately made and untraceable. Court documents say that when authorities searched his van they found a bulletproof vest with a patch on it that tied Carrillo to boogaloo.

The patch showed an igloo and Hawaiian-style print that are symbols of the movement. Authorities also say Carrillo scrawled "boog" in blood on the hood of one of the vehicles he stole.

Carrillo was charged with federal murder of the FPS officer and was charged with murder on the state level for allegedly murdering the Santa Cruz Sheriff’s Sargent.

Near Las Vegas, three men with military experience who authorities say were connected to boogaloo, were arrested for allegedly trying to firebomb a Black Lives Matter protest last month.

Andrew Lynam, Stephen Parshall and William Loomis met by chance while attending ReOpen Nevada rallies in April and May, protesting against measures taken to prevent the spread of COVID-19, according to court documents.

Brandishing automatic weapons, Lynam said at the rally his group "was not joking around" and "that it was for people who wanted to violently overthrow the United States government," court documents say.

Lynam and Parshall were initially planning to create a disruption at a May 19 ReOpen Nevada rally using fireworks and smoke bombs that would cause "some type of confrontation between the police and the protesters," according to a federal criminal complaint. The FBI says the men were using tactics from the Irish Republican Army Green Book.

The IRA Army Green book is a training manual that includes military tactics to wage war with the British government.

Having failed to cause a disruption at that rally, Parshall and Loomis discussed "causing an incident to incite chaos and possibly a riot," in relation to the death of George Floyd by firebombing a power substation, according to court papers.

The three were eventually arrested after they allegedly started making Molotov cocktails to throw into the crowd. A lawyer for Parshall told ABC News he looks forward to questioning the state's witness in court.

"[Parshall] denies any affiliation with extreme right wing groups. He had no intention to overthrow the government or engage in any violence," Robert Draskovich, Parshall's lawyer told ABC News.

Court documents define boogaloo as a "term used by extremists to signify a coming civil war and/or fall of civilization." The movement, according to Howard Graves, a senior research analyst at the Southern Poverty Law Center Intelligence Project, started picking up steam in 2018.

"The name came from this movie Breaking 2: Electric Boogaloo. It became almost like one of these inside joke sort of cultural references for these like-minded individuals," Javed Ali, a visiting professor at the University of Michigan and former senior counterterrorism official told ABC News.

The movement, according to Ali, spawned in chatrooms and the dark net before manifesting in the real world.

"The origins are also kind of murky. The movement has grown over the last decade mostly online through alternative content platforms. It initially took hold in sort of these dark corners of the Internet, 8chan, 4chan, Reddit and others," he said.

According to Reuters, The Tech Transparency project, a nonprofit that seeks to hold big tech organizations accountable, found that tens of thousands of people joined Facebook groups related to boogaloo over 30 days in March and April.

John Cohen, a former undersecretary at the Department of Homeland Security, told ABC News that it is not a laughing matter anymore.

"While the use of the term boogaloo started as a joke-- the call for a second civil war has become a social media fueled rallying cry for an eclectic group of far right extremists, some of whom have committed acts of violence in an effort to bring down our current system of government and establish a racially pure United States," Cohen, an ABC News contributor said.

Facebook has taken down many boogaloo pages, according to Graves.

"We designated these attacks as violating events and removed the accounts for the two perpetrators along with several groups. We will remove content that supports these attacks and continue to work with law enforcement in their investigation," a Facebook spokesperson told ABC News in relation to Carrillo and Justus case.

But the movement is difficult to understand, and Ali said the challenge is that boogaloo represents a "mishmash" of different beliefs.

"I don't think there's a central core belief either in the movement. There's a range of different grievances or different potential individuals who they believe are legitimate targets," he explained.

"There are some in the boogaloo movement that their animus is toward minorities or people and others that are protected classes. There are some in the boogaloo movement that their main animus is toward law enforcement or government. And then there are probably people who are a combination of both of those," Ali explained.

Graves said that while there is a white nationalist slant, boogaloo is really an anti-government movement and that advocates of the philosophy are being "opportunistic" when they invoke George Floyd or Breonna Taylor’s names in their outrage.

Graves estimates that there are followers in the thousands, but adds that it is "impossible to tell" because of the lack of structure.

Adherents are known for wearing Hawaiian shirts, Graves said.

"A lot of emphasis is put on the Hawaiian shirts because they know it comes off as ridiculous but that's kind of part of the intent," he said.

"If a boogaloo boy were in front of you, but not dressed out, a lot of the conversation with them is going to be particularly directed toward Second Amendment. They sincerely believe that any firearms legislation whatsoever is an absolute utter violation of the Second Amendment, the Constitution," Graves said. "And they also believe that anybody who sort of breaks that oath is marking themselves for death. They think a citizenry would be justified in killing that person because they are, quote unquote, a tyrant."

Graves said that a message Carillo wrote on another one of the cars he stole was, "I became unreasonable," a reference to Marvin Heemeyer, a man who got into a dispute with a local zoning board in 2004 and did damage to one South Dakota town.

"In kind of an act of desperation, he up armored a bulldozer that he had with concrete and steel armor and basically went on a rampage around the town," Graves explained of Heemeyer, adding, "it ended in hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars of property destruction and his suicide."

According to local reports, Heemeyer left tapes after his death that said that God put him on earth to carry out his attack. The meme of Heymeyers word’s have become popular in boogaloo circles.

After law enforcement caught Carrillo, he screamed "this is what I came here to fight. I’m sick of these [expletive] cops," as he was being led away in handcuffs.

Lawyers for Carrillo and Justus did not respond to ABC News’ request for comment.

According to a Las Vegas Metropolitan Police report obtained by ABC News, when police raided Loomis’ home, they found "kill boxes, survival tactics, fireworks as a distraction, a tannerite tree bomb and other various booby traps." More evidence, authorities say, of the seriousness with which the three men were planning on taking action.

"Now, luckily, in the Las Vegas case, those guys were sloppy in their tradecraft and they managed to get disrupted," Ali said. "But there could be dozens of other people who have that same sort of profile who aren't as sloppy and could be silently advancing toward some plotting and we may not, unfortunately, know about until it's too late."