BLACKSBURG, Va. – The world as we knew it changed forever on September 11, 2001. From our daily lives to the way we travel, to how we view threats to our democracy.
Dr. Ashley Reichelmann, the associate director of the Center for Peace Studies and Violence Prevention at Virginia Tech, says one thing has stayed the same: the threat of domestic terrorism.
“While we’ve spent the past two decades -- now just coming to an end-- fighting terrorism on the shore of another country, it’s always been here,” said Reichelmann.
Reichelmann said 9/11 put a face and a name to terrorism, which made it difficult to picture domestic terrorism as a threat.
Legally, international terrorism can be charged, but charging domestic terrorism is more difficult.
By definition, domestic terrorism is the use or threat of violent, criminal acts to coerce or intimidate a government or group of people for a political aim.
From the 1960s to 1980s, Reichelmann said domestic terrorism was left-wing, then it shifted right.
“The biggest threat has been identified in the past couple years as white supremacist groups and white separatist groups,” said Reichelmann.
She said white supremacist groups use issues like immigration to draw people into their organizations, sharing extremist beliefs over social media and the internet.
“It could be your neighbor, it could be your friend, it could be your professor, it could be your colleague who holds these beliefs,” said Reichelmann. “What we know with extremist views, people often fall on them by accident.”
Domestic terrorism and hate crimes also tread a thin line.
The Atlanta spa shooter was charged with domestic terrorism. However, the Charleston church shooter who took nine black lives in 2015 and the man who drove into a crowd, killing a woman during the deadly Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville in 2017 were both charged with hate crimes.
Reichelmann said the January 6th Capitol riot, by definition, was domestic terrorism.
“For instance with January 6, [their goal] was to stop the election from being certified. That was their end goal. They did not achieve that, but they were trying to use the threat of violence in order to achieve that,” said Reichelmann.
She said people need to understand domestic terrorism in order to prevent it.
“We need to inform the public and educate the public on what is terrorism so that people can work within the bounds of what that is and they can understand those consequences,” said Reichelmann.