This article was very interesting, but I think it was needed long before this past election in 2020. I am glad that the FBI and Department of Homeland Security are worried about foreign interference targeting the election. Although in the report they said that they didn't find anything relating to foreign interference, it is good that they are looking at least. I do think that they should focus domestically as well. Citizens of the United States attempt to manipulate voting. I think that they can help with this problem with the many recommendations they made at the bottom of the article. I hope that the U.S. government looks at these vulnerabilities that we have within our election process, that way we can prevent these things from happening, instead of election security being a huge problem every election we have. We need to fix things not let them keep happening.

I agree, I think that both elections need to be looked at. I wish people didn't try and rig these elections, the right to vote is given to us and people take advantage of it and might ruin it for others.

I am glad to hear that the FBI is catching people like this, it take a lot of expert intelligence to figure out stuff like this. I also really liked that the case example included ways that they can learn from their mistakes that were made. The biggest one for me was the back ground check. The background check absolutely needed to be more in depth. From the looks of what was in the case example, the individual must have had a pretty high security clearance, and this means that he is presented very secret and important issues and facts about the United States. If he is going to have access to this type of information, a better background check is needed, I am surprised the FBI did not catch this when doing his background check to begin with. I do however think it is good that the FBI is realizing their mistakes, sometimes as a large agency it is hard to do that, people worry that I will give the FBI a bad name.

That is a great thing to consider. What kind of security clearance did he have because this would raise questions about what he knows. These people do need to have tabs kept on them, especially if they have red flags.

The second part of this strategy was just as interesting as the first. The domestic terrorism threat is evolving, especially with the Covid-19 pandemic, everything is going virtual, this includes terrorism. With the four pillars, the thing that I thought in my head being a law enforcement specialist is that law enforcement is at the front lines of this domestic terrorism, so these agencies need to work together. This goes along with pillar one: understand and share domestic terrorism-related information. The federal government needs to share information among all federal agencies but this should also include state and local law enforcement agencies. That way we can all work together to combat this. This can also increase awareness and new tactics to help combat domestic terrorism. I liked what Patrick said about the fact that these radical groups are feeding off their public image. Social media platforms need to stop giving these groups this satisfaction. This made me think of the fact that serial killers feed off of their publicity, they want their horrible actions to be heard. This is also how we get copy cat killers. We should think of these radical groups like that. If we give them this publicity and satisfaction they will just grow their organization and other groups might follow alongside.

You are right, I never thought of these radical groups like that. They thrive off of public image and social media. Reminds me of serial killers in a way, they want the popularity and fame from the terrible things they are doing. Interesting point!!

I also think that with the pandemic domestic terrorism has changed. I like how you incorporated this into your post because this is a problem that will just get worse as life moves on.

This was a very interesting article, definitely something that I know a little bit about. America has seen a lot of domestic terrorism, probably due to the fact that Americans do hold a very wide range of beliefs. Beliefs that are important to our countries values. I like that the strategy includes talking about the fact that domestic terrorism is "persistent and evolving". This tells me that law enforcement at all stages, whether its local, tribal, state or federal, need to work together to combat these issues. This includes staying up to date on all of the aspects of the evolving terrorism, including new technological advances, different groups of people, current events issues and especially efforts to try and combat these militia violent extremists. I also think that this includes learning and sharing new information about these different groups. Sometimes agencies do not share all of their information with each other, I think we need to change this. This article was very interesting to me, I look forward to reading more tomorrow, and hearing others opinions.

It is ver important to note that domestic terrorism is evolving. Law enforcement needs to make sure that they adjust to this evolving so they can help combat terrorism correctly.

Thank you for informing me about hacktivists, that was a very interesting point. Online and cyber attacks are becoming more and more prominent.