Now we know ……Byron York

Byron York’s Daily Memo: Now we know how many secret sources the FBI had on Jan. 6, but what did they do?

December 13, 2024

NOW WE KNOW HOW MANY SECRET SOURCES THE FBI HAD ON JAN. 6, BUT WHAT DID THEY DO? It took years, but now we know the number of secret informants the FBI had in Washington during the Capitol riot of Jan. 6, 2021. What we don’t know is what they did.

In a long-awaited report, Michael Horowitz, the inspector general of the Justice Department, revealed that 26 confidential human sources, or CHSs, “were in Washington, D.C., on January 6 in connection with the events of January 6.” Of that number, 17 went into the Capitol or into the restricted area around the Capitol. Of them, four went inside the Capitol, while 13 were on the restricted grounds. Beyond that number, there were nine CHSs who did not enter the Capitol or the restricted area. We don’t know where they were.

The FBI told Horowitz that most of the CHSs came to Washington on their own and not at the orders of or request of the FBI. But several of them, 13 in all, informed their FBI handlers that they were traveling to Washington. And three of the CHSs had, in fact, been assigned by FBI field offices to go to Washington. Of that group, one entered the Capitol, while the other two entered the restricted area. The report says that none of them were authorized by the FBI to enter those areas. Of the 23 other CHSs who were not assigned to go to Washington and instead came on their own initiative, three entered the Capitol, and 11 entered the restricted area.

None of the CHSs, including the total of four who went inside the Capitol and the 13 who entered the restricted area, has been prosecuted, the inspector general said.

The report goes through some of the CHSs’ interactions with various FBI field offices around the country. (The FBI has 55 field offices nationwide.) None of the CHSs were identified in the report, but some clearly had close connections inside two groups, the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers, that have been extensively prosecuted for their activities in the Capitol riot. Many of those CHSs did not travel to Washington for Jan. 6 but instead told their FBI handlers what they knew of the groups’ leaders’ plans. Other CHSs had access to online chats and communications in what the FBI calls “the RMVE and AGAAVE movements.” (RMVE refers to Racially or Ethnically Motivated Violent Extremism, and AGAAVE refers to Anti-Government or Anti-Authority Violent Extremism.)

It should be noted that confidential human sources are not employees of the FBI. As for actual FBI agents, the report said, “The FBI did not have any undercover employees at the Ellipse, on the National Mall, or at the Capitol on January 6.”

On many occasions, the report states that this or that CHS, whether in Washington on FBI directions or not, “was not authorized to enter the Capitol or a restricted area, or to otherwise break the law on January 6, 2021.” There is a tone of defensive repetition throughout the report: The FBI wants you to know, over and over and over, that it didn’t authorize anyone to do anything bad.

What they don’t say is what the FBI confidential sources actually did, authorized or not. On a few occasions, the report gives the reader a bare-bones sketch of a confidential source’s activities but not enough information to draw any conclusions. For example, a source referred to as “Field Office 4 CHS” merits an entire subsection of the report. He is described as “well placed” and “with excellent access” in the RMVE and AGAAVE world. The source was apparently close to someone who was close to Enrique Tarrio, leader of the Proud Boys. The source told the FBI field office that he was traveling to Washington for Jan. 6 — on his own, not at the FBI’s request.

The report says the Field Office 4 CHS “was not authorized to enter the Capitol or a restricted area, or to otherwise break the law on January 6, nor was the CHS directed by the FBI to encourage others to commit illegal acts on January 6.” So what did Field Office 4 CHS do? That is a little less clear.

After the rioting started, the CHS tried to contact his FBI handler four times, according to the report, which does not say whether any of those attempts were successful. And then, from the report: “Evidence we reviewed showed that Field Office 4 CHS entered the Capitol. The inspector general reviewed records indicating that, after January 6, Field Office 4 provided information from this CHS, including cellphone video from the Capitol, to the Washington Field Office. After reviewing this information, the Washington Field Office asked Field Office 4 to task the CHS with returning to DC for the inauguration. The inspector general reviewed additional records indicating that the CHS was reimbursed for the CHS’s travel on January 6 and for the inauguration, even though the CHS was only tasked with attending the inauguration and not the electoral certification on January 6.”

So, whatever Field Office 4 CHS did, the FBI was really happy with it. The bureau asked that the CHS return to Washington for the Jan. 20 inauguration and paid for both his trips, Jan. 6 and Jan. 20. The source apparently gave the FBI some cellphone video, but beyond that, we don’t know what Field Office 4 CHS did inside or outside the Capitol.

That was the most detailed account of any CHS’s activities in the report. The FBI was careful to say it never authorized Field Office 4 CHS to do anything illegal, but it never says whether the CHS actually did anything illegal. And that is the problem with the new report. Beyond the numbers — 26 CHSs in Washington for the events of Jan. 6, 17 of whom entered the Capitol or the restricted area — there’s just not much there.

We do know that none of them were prosecuted, but we don’t know what that means. The report quoted the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Washington, which makes prosecution decisions, saying that it “generally has not charged those individuals whose only crime on January 6, 2021 was to enter the restricted grounds surrounding the Capitol, which has resulted in the office declining to charge hundreds of individuals; and we have treated the CHSs consistent with that approach.” OK, so what about the four who entered the Capitol? We don’t know.

I asked William Shipley, a former federal prosecutor who has defended more than 50 Jan. 6 defendants and who posts on X under the name @Shipwreckedcrew. “It is correct in my experience that the DOJ is not charging people who were inside the restricted area but remained outside the Capitol,” he responded via email. “There were tens of thousands of people in the crowd but only 1,500 have been charged. With a handful of exceptions, those who have been charged either went inside, or they fought with the police outside. The vast majority of the crowd remained outside and watched the spectacle unfold in real time. If they didn’t do anything else — even if they were inside the perimeter — they have not been charged.”

That does not, of course, cover the four CHSs, including the highly popular Field Office 4 CHS, who went inside the Capitol. After all, the Justice Department, which has been hyperaggressive in pursuing Jan. 6 participants, knows who they are and knows they went inside the Capitol. Shipley speculates that the FBI might have made a “policy call” to give the CHSs a break on the grounds that the sources might have mistakenly believed their FBI handlers would have wanted them to go inside and check things out. Or maybe the bureau thought that prosecuting CHSs would make it harder to recruit new CHSs in the future. Or maybe the FBI did not want a messy prosecution that would inevitably reveal a lot about the FBI’s activities.

Whatever the case, it still means the FBI, which stonewalled Republicans in Congress on all sorts of issues during the first Trump administration, is being far less than transparent about what some of its secret informants did on Jan. 6. We know enough, for example, to know that the bureau was very happy with the work of Field Office 4 CHS, but we don’t know things like: How did he get into the Capitol? How long was he there? Who was he with? What did he do?

There are other things we don’t know as well. The report covers the FBI, which is under the purview of the Justice Department inspector general. But it does not cover the activities of the Capitol Police or the Washington Metropolitan Police Department, which are not part of the Justice Department. Did they have confidential sources or undercover agents? We also don’t know, as law professor Jonathan Turley has pointed out, whether the presence of the secret FBI sources was “revealed to the defense in the hundreds of prosecutions.”

Friday morning, reporter and DOJ critic Julie Kelly posted, “It struck me that not a single text between an FBI handler and CHS is included in the Horowitz report. No comms whatsoever. How is that an investigative work product?” Kelly also pointed out that Inspector General Horowitz could only review what the FBI gave him. Whether you think that is acceptable or not depends on your degree of trust in the FBI, which is quite low among Republicans these days.

So, there is a lot more to know about the FBI and its secret sources on Jan. 6. Yes, it’s good to know a specific number. But that’s not the whole story.