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Over a year ago @JustinNobel came to @DeSmogBlog with a whistle-blower account out of one of the nation's largest oilfields. Today we published where that investigation led us: To a loosely organized far-right militia movement, the Three Percenters https://www.desmogblog.com/2020/07/21/three-percenters-militia-bakken-oil-oneok-domestic-terrorism
They're working in oilfields in North Dakota, Colorado, Texas, Wyoming, Oklahoma, Alaska. A former DHS domestic terrorism expert said, "What militias like this do is conduct surveillance and find facilities they will either need to take over or attack when ‘shit hits the fan.’”
DeSmog's investigation raises significant concerns among former Department of Homeland Security and FBI officials about the presence of militia members working in oil and gas industry facilities considered critical infrastructure by security agencies.
Militia-related patches, flags, and artwork have popped up across North Dakota's Bakken oil patch, and a thriving gun culture among its workers has led to a Mad Max-mentality of chaos plaguing residents of the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation.
"If you throw a Three Percenter patch on you can stand in a government building with an assault rifle all damn day and nobody will bother you," one resident told DeSmog, "but if you are a minority you can peacefully protest and be met with this military force."
"These are operationally minded people with a paranoid worldview that believe at some point there is going to be a societal collapse,” a former senior domestic terrorism analyst at DHS told DeSmog of movements like the Three Percenter militia.
And the DeSmog investigation found that in 2016, at least one natural gas processing plant in North Dakota's Bakken oil patch had roughly half the plant either open members of the Three Percenters, or sympathetic to the cause.
This alarmed domestic terrorism experts: "They may follow the order of their commander or act on a lone wolf instinct, and their allegiance lies not with their employer but with the militia, although they might think they are doing something righteous and good for the country.”
"It certainly seems like a security vacuum," a former FBI special agent who specialized in domestic terrorism said of security agencies' apparent blind spot on the threats to critical infrastructure like gas plants and pipelines from anti-government militia groups.
“The FBI characterizes itself as a domestic terrorism agency and has been outspoken about prioritizing ecoterrorism as a threat, which is ridiculous...Yet somehow there does not appear to be an attempt to find out what the infiltration is of anti-government militia groups.”
An outspoken Three Percenter in Washington state (and state congressional candidate) Matt Marshall told us: "We at least in our Three Percent groups make sure nobody talks about romanticized civil war...I do believe one is coming but I absolutely don’t want it."
I can't possibly fit this entire meticulously reported investigation by @JustinNobel into a Twitter thread, so please, go read it for yourself https://www.desmogblog.com/2020/07/21/three-percenters-militia-bakken-oil-oneok-domestic-terrorism
