A year punctuated by two assassination attempts, high levels of threats and harassment, and a number of troubling, violent incidents in the lead-up to election day will culminate on Tuesday with an election deemed existential by all sides.
It’s the first presidential election since the January 6 insurrection, a reminder of the ways political violence can manifest that leaves Americans with a fear that such an attack could happen again. Those who study the attack and its participants say they aren’t convinced criminal convictions against them will fully deter those involved on January 6 from future political violence, but that the biggest threat is a lone actor, not a large, coordinated event.
In the last few weeks, a man in Arizona was allegedly stockpiling weapons and plotting a “mass casualty” event, according to police who arrested him for shooting at Democratic party offices. The person behind explosive devices that burned hundreds of ballots in two drop boxes in Oregon and Washington is suspected to be a metalworker who could be planning more attacks. Arguments at polling places over political paraphernalia, banned at the polls in some places, have become physical. A young man waved a machete at a polling place in Florida.
The risk of political violence only increases after election day, experts say, once races are called. Certain places could become targets of people or groups upset about results or who claim fraud.
“The strategic value of political violence will go up once there’s an initial winner,” said Robert Pape, director of the Chicago Project on Security and Threats at the University of Chicago. “I would not say the left is totally off the hook, but it’s most dangerous on the right, simply because Trump did it before.”
Trump and his supporters have turned to incendiary rhetoric in recent days, contributing to the tense environment. A speaker at Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally called Kamala Harris the devil, while another spoke of the “slaughter” of Democrats. Trump said on Thursday that the former Republican congresswoman Liz Cheney should face being under fire with rifles “shooting at her”.
Social media platforms have enabled some of the conditions that could lead to offline violence. Militias are using Facebook to organize, and in some instances, Facebook has auto-generated militia pages, Wired reported. X, formerly Twitter, has become a frequent source of election disinformation that could be weaponized to stir people up post-election. The platform created a new “election integrity community” where users can post unsubstantiated claims of fraud. Online forums frequented by the far right are showing patterns similar to those that preceded the January 6 attack.
“It’s absolutely possible that someone motivated by mis- or disinformation that they see online about some polling place in their community could show up with a gun and try to enforce vigilante justice,” said Brian Hughes, associate director of the Polarization and Extremism Research and Innovation Lab at American University.
Alex Jones, the longtime conspiracist, has issued reports on his show for several days warning of a deep state plot to sow chaos around the voting process. “And then there will be a big disputed election and it will get Democrats and Republicans all mad at each other, and that’s the civil war conditions,” Jones said on a broadcast this week.
Elections officials emphasize that voting is still very safe in the US, and the threat of political violence should not deter people from casting a ballot. Levels of political violence have actually been lower this year than recent years, but there has been a continuation of high levels of threats and harassment, said Shannon Hiller, executive director of the Bridging Divides Initiative at Princeton University, which studies and tracks political violence. Elections officials in particular have been consistent targets of threats and harassment campaigns. Concerns about political violence among local elected officials have also risen.
“Whether it’s bad actors or foreign actors, even trying to create that environment of fear is part of what people are doing to undermine our democracy,” Hiller said. “So the best way to push back on that is to remind folks it’s very safe and secure to vote and people feel confident to do so.”
Still, voters feel a sense of unease. A recent survey of swing state voters by the Washington Post found fears that there would be violence if Trump loses the election. In six swing states, 57% of voters said they were at least somewhat worried about Trump supporters turning violent if he loses, far more than the percentage of voters who feared the same for a Harris loss.
January 6 memory hole
The January 6 insurrection serves to some as a reminder of what a riled-up populace ready to take action for political aims can do. But for Trump, it’s now a “day of love”. He has promised to pardon many of those involved in the attack and referred to them as political prisoners.
Having a leader encourage acts of violence or “fear and loathing” of the other side “creates a permission structure for people who want to commit acts of violence to go ahead and do so. They feel more justified, and they expect that they’ll be protected,” Hughes said.
Experts don’t believe the US Capitol could see a similar attack because of precautions taken since January 6, but state capitols and other buildings may not be as prepared.
Pape has studied those involved in January 6. So far, more than 1,300 have been arrested for their actions that day, the vast majority of whom were not clearly affiliated with a domestic extremist group like the Proud Boys or Oath Keepers. Most of those sentenced have since stayed off the radar and are not commenting online about their political beliefs, Pape has found. Of those who do speak publicly about their charges or beliefs, many have doubled down on the issues that motivated them after the 2020 election. They have continued to express support for Trump and for election fraud narratives.
Billy Knutson of South Dakota was charged for his actions on January 6 and has since rapped about the insurrection: “Since they stole the election we living behind enemy lines … We are the people, we won’t be defeated / No peace and no quarter, we never retreated.”
Jake Lang, who is alleged to have swung a baseball bat at police on January 6, has been in prison for more than three years awaiting trial. He has brought in more than $240,000 in an online fundraiser on GiveSendGo, the rightwing crowdfunding site, to fund a “J6 truther” website: “This is the single most important thing you can do to support the Jan 6 political prisoners and help exonerate these brave patriots,” he tells donors. He has also been helping set up a “network of election deniers and conspiracists” known as the North American Patriot and Liberty Militia, or Napalm, Wired reported.
The “patriot wing” of the DC jail where some violent January 6 participants are being held may be further radicalizing the people staying there, a New York Magazine report posited. Extremism experts told the magazine that “its inmates might re-enter society more primed to take violent action than they were before the Capitol riot”.
By reframing what January 6 was, Trump has given permission for his supporters to take similar action again, political violence experts warn.
Lone actors a risk
A memo from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) warned in September that there was a “heightened risk” of domestic violent extremists mobilizing “against ideological opponents, government officials, and law enforcement in an attempt to initiate a civil war” until at least early 2025. The document, obtained by the public records watchdog group Property of the People, said the threat comes from lone offenders, as large group action would probably be deterred by the January 6 convictions.
The two assassination attempts against Trump could inspire copycats or retaliation, the agency said. “Real or perceived mistakes or discrepancies in the electoral process” could also play into broader election fraud narratives that stir up domestic violent extremists. Issues like mass migration could drive these extremists.
“Widespread or high-profile civil unrest, mass immigration, or crimes by migrants or minorities perceived as threatening the United States may drive some DVEs [domestic violent extremists] to mobilize to violence to ‘save America’ from perceived threats,” the memo said. “For example, online users discussed the potential of a sweeping Executive Order that would have given some migrants citizenship, with one user stating, ‘Biden does that executive order, we shoot all democrat officials. And the supporting federal agents.’”
Another DHS and FBI intelligence bulletin obtained by Property of the People from early October said the threat was heightened until inauguration day in January 2025 and extremists could use tactics such as “physical attacks, threats of violence, swatting and doxing, mailing or otherwise delivering suspicious items, arson, and other means of property destruction”. The memo also said there was potential for violence based on grievances related to immigration, LGBTQIA+ rights and abortion access.
Surveys have shown increased support for the use of violence to achieve political goals. When support for violence is more mainstream, it can nudge volatile people who are considering taking action over the edge because they believe they are fulfilling a popular mandate, Pape said.
“There’s a political cause that they sense from the media is popular, and then they want some of that popularity and fame for themselves, so they do a violent act in the name of that political cause,” Pape said.
The risk of violence doesn’t automatically dissipate after the election. But while a Trump loss could inspire his supporters to take action, it could also release the hold he has on the right.
“When you have a very influential leader who acts as the center of gravity for a movement that engages in threats and even violence, when the leader recedes from you, that center of gravity has a way of dissolving, and the problems have a way of dissipating,” Hughes said. “So there is a possibility that the outcome of this election will in itself improve the problem somewhat.”
