Former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe is warning that a “very serious threat” of violence is emerging and called law enforcement to ramp up security ahead of an upcoming MAGA rally in support of jailed Jan. 6 rioters.
While it’s not clear how many people will attend the right-wing “Justice for J6” rally organized by a former Donald Trump campaign official, but McCabe told CNN that he views the Sept. 18 event as a violent threat to Washington.
“I think they should take it very seriously,” McCabe told anchor Jim Acosta. “In fact, they should take it more seriously than they took the same sort of intelligence that they likely saw on Jan. 5.”
The Metropolitan Police Department will be fully activated on that day, and officers are already monitoring online chatter and travel bookings ahead of the rally, and Homeland Security officials are seeing numerous calls for violent action linked to conspiracy theories and election lies — although McCabe said there’s one major difference between this event and the Jan. 6 insurrection.
“You don’t have a sitting president actively fanning the flames and trying to get people to attend the rally,” McCabe said, “and, on the other hand, it looks like, from all indications, our law enforcement partners are well prepared for this one. They seem to be taking the intelligence very seriously, which raises a question as to whether or not they did on Jan. 6, but that’s another issue.”
