Two self-described members of the far-right group Boogaloo Bois have been charged with attempting to conspire and become “assets” for the foreign terrorist group Hamas, plotting the assassination of twenty senators, killing police officers, and other crimes of violence, the Justice Department said on Friday.
Hamas is designated by the U.S. as a terrorist organization, and the Boogaloo Bois is a group of far-right individuals who espouse a violent, anti-government ideology.
Michael Robert Solomon, 30, and Benjamin Ryan Teeter, 22, were taken into custody Thursday evening and made their first court appearance in Minneapolis on Friday.
Witnesses told FBI agents that Solomon and Teeter possessed firearms and substantial quantities of ammunition and that Solomon, Teeter, and other members of the Boogaloo Bois discussed committing acts of violence against police officers and other targets, the Justice Department said, according to CNN.
They allegedly discussed raiding a National Guard Armory to steal weapons and “bombs” and would seek out “assassinating twenty senators while they’re f***king playing baseball while someone else recorded it,” according to the criminal complaint.
At some point in June, federal authorities learned from a confidential informant and in audio-recorded conversations that Solomon and Teeter told someone they believed was a member of Hamas that they “desire to employ themselves as ‘mercenaries'” for the terrorist organization, prosecutors said.
Solomon told an undercover FBI agent who posed as a senior member of Hamas that he and Teeter “would be an asset to Hamas” because “we’ve got to be pretty valuable because two American-born white boys, right? We can move around like nothing. I can take anything anywhere,” he said, according to the criminal complaint.
Solomon and Teeter also allegedly said they could manufacture unmarked parts for guns, creating untraceable and unregistered weapons. On July 30, they allegedly delivered five suppressors and expressed their desire to manufacture additional suppressors and fully-automatic weapons for Hamas. They allegedly tried to negotiate a price for five more suppressors.
