Terrorism Research Center Director Gruenewald Discusses Attack on U.S. Capitol

Jeff Gruenewald has a pleasant, agreeable personality, but he isn’t one to smile quickly. He’s serious to the point of solemn, and above all, he is measured; he speaks slowly and chooses his words carefully. He comes across as the kind of person who would write a dissertation on murder, which he did, or direct a terrorism research center, which he does.

Gruenewald is an associate professor in the Department of Sociology and Criminology and director of the Terrorism Research Center in the Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Arkansas. The center – currently funded by the Department of Justice –  specializes in terrorism and domestic violent extremism — the analysis of demographic patterns of those indicted on terrorism and related charges and emerging groups, court strategies and geospatial and temporal analysis of terrorism and domestic violent extremism.

Gruenewald took the helm of the center in 2019. Starting with his dissertation at Michigan State University in the early 2000s, he has spent his entire professional career, more than 15 years, monitoring and gathering information on people who kill for their ideological beliefs and the victims of these tragic crimes. He has published more 40 peer-reviewed articles on topics related to terrorism and other forms of domestic violent extremism.

As director of the center, one of only a few of its kind in the United States, Gruenewald leads a team of analysts – students, staff and faculty – who conduct and facilitate research on terrorism and domestic violent extremism. Their work not only produces original research but also analyzes the effectiveness of anti-terrorism policies and programs.

The center manages several of the nation’s open-source databases, including the American Terrorism Study, the longest running domestic terrorism project in the country, and the Bias Homicide Database. The American Terrorism Study is a compendium of federal court records and media documents about defendants federally indicted on terrorism-related charges. The Bias Homicide Database tracks bias-motivated murders committed in the U.S. since 1990, including information on the incident, victim and offender.

Gruenewald is also a co-principle investigator of the U.S. Extremist Crime Database. Operated as a collaboration of terrorism researchers from multiple universities, the Extremist Crime Database is a comprehensive source of information on multiple forms of violent extremism in the U.S. since 1990. It contains information on more than 200 extremist murders and is considered the most reliable and robust source for data on the nature and scope of this particular type of violence in the U.S.

Researchers at the center study terrorism and domestic violent extremism across the political spectrum, including radical Islamic terrorism, left-wing terrorism, far-right terrorism, and ecoterrorism.

Before the January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol, Gruenewald admits, none of this meant much to people outside of criminology and studies on terrorism and homeland security. Since then, however, their knowledge on the topic has been in greater demand.

The events of January 6 will result in a large number of extremist-violence cases for which the Terrorism Research Center will collect relevant federal court documents and other publicly available information. Gruenewald expects researchers at the center to be studying those charged with crimes for the next several years. They’ve already begun to distil the events of that day with their knowledge of domestic terrorism and extremist groups operate.

January 6: ‘Failure of Imagination’

January 6 started with a Stop the Steal rally near the White House, during which then-president Donald Trump exhorted his supporters to “fight like hell” and march to the Capitol to interrupt or stop Congress’ counting of electoral votes to certify Joseph Biden’s 2020 presidential election win. A group of marchers turned violent beating U.S. Capitol Police officers and tragically killing one before forcing their way into the U.S. Capitol where they defaced and damaged the building and interrupted but ultimately did not prevent the counting of electoral votes.

As Gruenewald is careful to point out, most people who showed up at the Capitol that day were not affiliated with an extremist organization and did not participate in the violence.

But, of those who did, many belonged to organizations that are very familiar to Gruenewald and the center’s researchers, such as the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, QAnon and more obscure groups such as the Three Percenters and Boogaloo Boys.

As federal prosecutors file conspiracy charges against some members of these organizations and as congressional committees meet to discuss security failures that occurred at the Capitol on January 6, investigations have found that members of these extremist groups organized and planned the attack weeks in advance.

Gruenewald has referred to this moment – the point at which loud and dramatic and yet protected-by-the-First-Amendment protest transformed into violent rioting and ultimately criminal behavior – as a flashpoint. Considering his knowledge of these groups, their membership and their propensity for and indeed record of conflict and violence, Gruenewald was not surprised by the turn of events. But it was this feature, the flashpoint, that shocked him just as it did millions of Americans.

“It made sense, even in the moment [that it was a flashpoint],” he says, “but I was still shaken seeing it play out live on TV.”

Two other features surprised Gruenewald as he watched events unfold on television. The scale, he says, was difficult to fathom. His research, as well as that of others, shows that most terrorism and domestic extremist violence and murders happen on a much smaller scale, very often committed by so-called “lone actors,” people who strike out at racial, ethnic and religious minorities or government officials. Seeing that many extremists behaving violently in concert was mind-bending for Gruenewald.

“There was a lot online chatter … that many in law-enforcement were aware of,” Gruenewald says, “but extreme anti-government rhetoric on the internet is not new. Analysts have been studying extremist chatter for decades, and the question is how were they to know this type chatter was any different from that of the past, and why should they think it could manifest into deadly violence against the federal government? So, one of the key questions going forward is, how can they distinguish between benign and more serious online threats?”

All of this largely amounts to another “failure of imagination,” says Gruenewald, borrowing an expression penned in the 9/11 Commission Report following the investigation of the 9/11 attacks. Despite known warning signs, security officials and others who could have taken steps to prevent the January 6 attack from happening could not envision a crowd of protestors would overwhelm police and attack the seat of federal government.

“I imagine we will find instances of critical intelligence that was not widely disseminated and failures to connect the dots leading up to January 6,” says Gruenewald.

The Power of Misinformation, Conspiracy and Social Media

Extremist violence in the United States is not new. Though the U.S. Extremist Crime Database goes back only to 1990, the roots of domestic extremism can be traced to vigilante groups that formed after the Civil War, most notably the Ku Klux Klan. The intelligence-gathering strengths of law-enforcement combined with poor organization and predictable communication both within and between extremist organizations, they haven’t been that difficult to track. And until now, these organizations were not effective at harnessing mass communication for the purpose of mobilization.

Gruenewald, right, with Grant Drawve, left, assistant professor of sociology and criminology and associate director of the Crime and Security Data Analytics Lab in the Terrorism Research Center; and Katie Ratcliff, associate director and research program manager at the center.

But this is changing. Today’s threat of extremist violence is different, Gruenewald says. Increased opportunities for online communication, including social media and encryption technology, allow groups to spread misinformation and conspiracies, organize mass events and coordinate training and travel, all of which occurred in the lead-up to January 6.

Gruenewald sees another, and perhaps more disturbing, difference with today’s groups. Bolstered by popular social media outlets and the rhetorical legitimization of misinformation and conspiracy theories by some leaders, current extremism has been “mainstreamed.”

Learning From the Past

“I see what happened at the Capitol as a flashpoint in several ways, one being that it should be used as an event to help us start talking about these dangers,” Gruenewald said.

He has a five-point plan for how to prevent future acts of deadly violence. He doesn’t defer or equivocate on this question. Rather, he is direct and, in one case, as he says, “preachy.”

We must recognize the serious threat of extremist violence, Gruenewald says. By “we,” he isn’t talking about the FBI or law enforcement. He means the broader culture.

“We cannot hesitate to label violence motivated by political and social ideologies as terrorism,” he added.

We have to do a better job of learning from the past and heighten our sensibilities during similarly difficult times, Gruenewald says.

“If the first Black president resulted in increased extreme activity, then we have to expect the first Black and Asian vice-president will do the same. If we know that times of uncertainty lead to more violence, then I think we can expect more violence, given the global pandemic.”

Law enforcement throughout the country, on all levels, must have better training to recognize the signs of radicalization, Gruenewald says. This will take more effort and more funding, as will training the next generation of intelligence analysts, a daunting task that Gruenewald says can best be accomplished by combining the tools of criminology and computer science. He would like to see an investment in more empirical research on the topic of extremist violence, especially examining the links between online and offline radicalization.

Gruenewald says we must educate children about tolerance and empathy for others. This involves teaching children how to listen and incorporating lessons in schools about the threats of misinformation, conspiracies and signs of radicalization encountered online.

“We also need to make sure that we as a society remember that victims of deadly extremism are real people with families grieving for loved ones,” he says. “While these are rare events, they have lasting impacts on our communities.”

Terrorism Research Center

Katie Ratcliff

Grant Drawve

The Terrorism Research Center in the Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Arkansas was founded in 2003 by Emeritus Distinguished Professor Brent Smith. Smith, who retired in 2019, is considered a pioneer of criminological research on terrorism in America.

The center conducts research on terrorism, violent extremism and bias crime, and the effectiveness of anti-terrorism policies and programs. In addition to managing several open-source databases, the center trains and equips students with the knowledge and skills they’ll need to help combat terrorism and violent extremism in their future careers.

“We want to get our research into the hands of police and government officials who are working to counter terrorism and violent extremism,” says Jeff Gruenewald, the center’s director. “Many of our graduate students and research interns go on to become intelligence analysts in agencies across the country. We’ve heard many times from previous students that the analytical skills they develop during their time with us are directly applicable to their positions.”

In addition to Gruenewald, the center is led by:

Katie Ratcliff, associate director and research program manager. Ratcliff oversees the day-to-day activities of multiple federal research grants and trains and oversees the work of research interns for the center. She also teaches courses for the Department of Sociology and Criminology. 

Grant Drawve, assistant professor in the Department of Sociology and Criminology and associate director of the Crime and Security Data Analytics Lab, which is housed in the Terrorism Research Center. A leading expert in crime analysis, Drawve applies geospatial and risk analysis techniques to the study of terrorism and crime.

Podcast: Extremist Flashpoint

The May episode of Short Talks From the Hill, a research podcast of the U of A, features Jeff Gruenewald, associate professor in the Department of Sociology and Criminology and director of the Terrorism Research Center in the Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences.

Read the transcript below.

As director of the center, which conducts and facilitates research on terrorism, extremist violence and the effectiveness of anti-terrorism policies and programs, and author of more 40 peer-reviewed articles on topics related to terrorism and other forms of extremist, ideologically motivated violence, Gruenewald is specially qualified to comment the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol and the groups that carried the attack.

Shocking as the attack was, it could have been mitigated or perhaps prevented if security officials and law enforcement agencies would have made better use of readily available intelligence, Gruenewald says. The information was there, but officials and law enforcement could not piece it together into a coherent and serious plan for an attack. Borrowing an expression used in the 9/11 Commission Report following the terrorist attacks in 2001, Gruenewald calls this a "failure of imagination."

As with 9/11, Gruenewald says, analysts and experts will reflect on this failure. "We had the threats, we had the intelligence, they were pretty clear," Gruenewald says. "…We saw for the last several years that these groups are using the internet more effectively to organize and show up at the same place at the same time. But even despite all of that knowledge, we just didn't think — those in charge didn't think — that it would actually come to fruition."

Short Talks From the Hill highlights research and scholarly work at the University of Arkansas. Each segment features a university researcher discussing his or her work.

Thank you for listening!

Podcast Transcript

Matt McGowan: Welcome to Short Talks From the Hill, a research podcast of the University of Arkansas. My name is Matt McGowan. I’m a science writer here at the University. Today we’re talking to Jeff Gruenewald. Gruenewald is an associate professor in the Department of Sociology and Criminology and director of the Terrorism Research Center in the Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences.

Gruenewald has published more than 40 peer reviewed articles on topics related to terrorism and other forms of extremist, ideologically motivated violence. As center director, Gruenewald leads a team of students and faculty who conduct and facilitate research on terrorism, extremist violence and the effectiveness of anti-terrorism policies and programs. Research at the center informs the work of those who seek to counter terrorism and other forms of extreme violence.

To do their work, Gruenewald and other researchers at the center rely on several public, open-source databases. Gruenewald is co-PI on one of these, the U.S. extremist crime database, a collaboration between many universities. The extremist crime database contains comprehensive information on multiple forms of violent extremism in the United States since 1990. Today, Jeff and I will be talking about what happened at the U.S. Capitol on January 6th, a complicated event that he has called a flashpoint in the development of far-right extremism in the United States.

So many people who watch the news have seen images and video of the attack at the U.S. Capitol. Some of these people, I’m sure, came as individuals, not necessarily affiliated with a group or organization. But I know that many people who showed up that day were affiliated with an organization. You’ve talked about this a little bit and actually made a presentation on it, but tell us briefly who some of the main groups were.

Jeff Gruenewald: Yeah, the videos seem to be getting now more and more disturbing as time goes on and even more being released. You know, with the second impeachment trial. ones that we had not been seen before. So the spotlight right now is on a couple different groups. But you know, we’ve been studying groups like this for a long time, and people, sociologists, political scientists before me as well, so we know quite a bit about the ideologies, although they’re always nuanced. But the ideologies and some of the factors that drive them. Some of the members to commit violence. And of course we like to remind people that not all of them are committing violence. And you know, even the so-called violent groups, it’s usually a handful who are resorting to violence. But I think the Proud Boys is becoming the most prominent extreme, far-right group. They’re the one that’s catching the headlines after the January 6 attacks, and these guys are ultranationalist, they’re xenophobic, they’re authoritarianists, if that’s a word. They’re white supremacists.

MM: Do you think most Americans were surprised by what happened on January 6th?

JG: It’s hard, you know, I don’t want to speak for most Americans, but I will say maybe I wasn’t surprised, you know, it makes sense, even in the moment, but I was still shocked to see it play out live on TV. But I think you know something to that scale at the Capitol was again still shocking, and I think others were shocked. And then as we just sat there watching, you know the next thought was where’s the law enforcement, where’s the backup? Why is it taking so long for the National Guard to be called in. I’d say I was surprised that…  uh, I wouldn’t have called that one. Similar to after 911, analysts and experts have looked back and said that was that was a failure of imagination.

MM: You’ve talk about that before, failure of imagination. What does that mean?

JG: We had the threats, we had the intelligence, they were pretty clear. If we look at the 9/11 Commission report, you have page after page of the intelligence from all around the country, where we had all these dots that we failed to connect them. We failed to imagine how that they could all be connected into this violent, dangerous move on January 6.

MM: And so there was a lot of intelligence chatter about these groups. Is that correct?

JG: Yeah. It was known, and I talked about this before, but discerning between insightful chatter is also not new. We’ve saw for the last several years that these groups are using the Internet more effectively to organize and show up at the same place and same time. But even despite all of that knowledge, those in those in charge didn’t think it would actually come to fruition.

MM: I want to talk a little bit about conspiracy or misinformation, especially in the context of social media and sort of the relationship of all of that to far-right extremism. What do you think is the relationship between misinformation and goals of some of these groups?

JG: It’s one of the most interesting parts of studying the far right, but also one of the most dangerous parts of these groups. And maybe what separates them… This is why we call them extreme. Most people aren’t aware of these types of conspiracies. You know when I talk about them… if I’m teaching a terrorism course or homeland security course or speaking in public, I can just tell by people’s faces. This is this is new to them. Well, maybe that’s a good thing. That it is new to them, but we have old conspiracies with the far right that… We’ve got the Zionist occupied government, this new world order that claims that the government is being run by global elites and specifically Jewish bankers. There’s a lot of anti-Semitism as you go back and certainly still case in the extremist movement. But more recently, of course, we’ve got Q Anon that’s catching the headlines. This one I think a lot more members of the public are aware of, but it is pretty extreme that… They think that there’s a cabal of cannibalistic, satanic child traffickers made up of Hollywood elites, Democratic elites, and they believe some government insider named Q is communicating with them over the Internet. And so we’re just starting to grasp the toll it’s taking on… Well, I’ve said in the U.S., but it’s also outside of the U.S. But just families in particular… I’ve been watching videos of kids kind of losing their parents to the these conspiracies and just ripping families apart. But they’re dangerous, in addition to harming families and relationships. But they also maintain that these conspiracies that people need to define government authorities, law enforcement, particular that that there’s this imminent threat, and there’s a need to take up arms to protect… whether it’s their race, their way of life. And that it’s up to them to root out and to overthrow this corrupted tyrannical government. And I think… We’ve got freedom to think in this country, think about how we want to think, freedom of speech, but one way I really think that these are dangerous is how they demonize others. And they dehumanize, whether it’s through anti-Semitic beliefs, racism, xenophobia. But it puts a target. They kind of help narrow the target on certain social groups who are dehumanized, and that’s a dangerous thing when you have people who become radicalized to the point of violence. I think you mentioned social media, how that plays into it, and I think it’s just, uh, obviously that social media helps to spread these conspiracy theories. I think social media allows for these conspiracy theories that seem a little more palpable, because you see all these other people who also believed them. You see, a post has 2,000,000 likes and it seems like, well, how can all of these people be wrong? And when you got people in power, you know political figures seemingly accepting them as true, or not rejecting them out hand, that these conspiracy theories seem a little more legitimate.

MM: How could we prevent something like this from happening again? Are there policies or programs that might be implemented to reduce the risk of this type of violence, this type of event?

JG: I’m a criminologist, so of course I’m going to think about what we can do from a criminal justice perspective, but at the same time obviously we need to think about how to prevent people from entering it… hopping on these pathways towards radicalization. I think we should educate ourselves and our children about the threats of extremism, the threats of misinformation, disinformation, conspiracies that are, like we mentioned, ever more present online. And this has to start in our schools. Here in the local high school we have great classes. We’ve got students taking criminology classes, sociology classes. I think these are great opportunities to talk about extremism and the dangers of it. I think we also have to be willing to as a society – and I think we’re getting closer to this – but call politically motivated violence terrorism, despite the color or the nationality of who’s committing it and recognize it as a serious and enduring threat, it’s not something that used to happen. It did used to happen, but it’s still an ever-present threat. The Department of Homeland Security is recognizing this officially too.

MM: Jeff Gruenewald, thank you for being here with us today on Short Talks From the Hill.

JG: Thanks for having me, Matt.

MM: Music for Short Talks From the Hill was written and performed by local musician Ben Harris.