For the second time in as many days, FBI Director Christopher Wray expressed concern about alleged QAnon-instigated abuse, but he made clear that the bureau is not investigating the online movement itself, while telling lawmakers that the conspiracy theory is something “we look at very seriously” when it is linked to a criminal act.
Wray was careful to emphasize this distinction during his testimony before the House Intelligence Committee on Thursday, when he was asked if the FBI is investigating elements of QAnon and to clarify the danger it presents in light of its relation to the US Capitol attack earlier this year.
Despite describing QAnon as an online “movement” that “could be an inspiration for violent attacks” in some cases, Wray clarified that the FBI’s investigation into the conspiracy theory has been limited to cases involving ties to a federal crime.
“We’re not looking into the hypothesis in and of itself,” Wray told the House panel, repeating comments he made the day before during a Senate Intelligence Committee meeting.
In both cases, Wray’s remarks highlight the FBI’s difficult task in investigating the January 6 attack and collaborating with other federal agencies to combat the threat of domestic terrorism more generally as it investigates QAnon and other online conspiracy theories.
Wray said Thursday that social media’s position in spreading potentially harmful conspiracy theories and domestic terrorist propaganda makes both tasks more difficult.
“Social media has become, in many ways, the key amplifier to domestic violent extremism just as it has for malign foreign influence,” Wray he told House lawmakers. “The same things that attract people to it for good reasons are also capable of causing all kinds of harms that we are entrusted with trying to protect the American people against.”
Sen. Martin Heinrich of New Mexico announced on Wednesday that the FBI has provided lawmakers with an evaluation of the danger posed by QAnon, the existence of which was previously unknown until Heinrich pressed FBI Director Christopher Wray to clarify why the report’s specifics have not yet been made public.
Heinrich, a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said Wednesday that he requested a threat assessment on QAnon late last year and received a report from the FBI in February, before asking Wray why he “cannot or would not inform the American people specifically about the threat.”
Wray promised to provide an assessment that could be made public, but his testimony provided no insight into the FBI’s (or lack thereof) investigation into QAnon.
“We focus on the violence and the federal criminal activity regardless of the inspiration. We understand QAnon to be more of a reference to a complex conspiracy theory or set of complex conspiracy theories, largely promoted online, which has sort of morphed into more of a movement,” Wray said during Wednesday’s worldwide threats hearing.
“Like a lot of other conspiracy theories, the effects of Covid, anxiety social, social isolation, financial hardship … all exacerbate people’s vulnerability to those theories, and we are concerned about the potential that those things can lead to violence, and where it is an inspiration for federal crime, we’re going to aggressively pursue it,” he added.
Wray also stated that the FBI has detained “at least five self-identified QAnon adherents directly linked to the January 6 attacks,” implying a direct connection between the conspiracy theory and the uprising.
QAnon, a sprawling far-right conspiracy theory that spreads the ludicrous and unfounded assertion that former President Donald Trump has been locked in a struggle against a sinister cabal of Satan-worshipping pedophiles made up of influential Democratic politicians and liberal celebrities, is often referred to as a virtual cult.
Members of the violent pro-Trump mob that attacked the Capitol had links to QAnon, and the conspiracy theory has made its way into the political mainstream in recent years, from online message boards.
However, it is unclear what steps the FBI has taken to resolve the danger posed by QAnon and possibly identify those responsible. Specifically, whether the FBI is trying to confirm the source of QAnon or the identity of its elusive standard-bearer, known to followers simply as “Q,” remains a mystery.
The threat assessment given to lawmakers makes no mention of “Q,” an anonymous source whose bogus assertion that they have access to the nation’s most tightly guarded secrets has frequently been used to justify Q’s cryptic and prophetic social media messages.
The threat assessment given to lawmakers makes no mention of “Q,” an anonymous source whose bogus assertion that they have access to the nation’s most tightly guarded secrets has frequently been used to justify Q’s cryptic and prophetic social media messages.
