WASHINGTON (AP) — Law enforcement officials disrupted a planned attack targeting the UFC cage-fighting show staged at the White House this past weekend, according to court papers unsealed Tuesday that say plotters who harbored fringe conspiracy theories spoke of flying explosives-laden drones and shooting panicked crowd members as they fled.
Investigators recovered firearms from several of the suspects last week and obtained encrypted text messages between roughly 20 participants who shared detailed maps and aerial photographs of the area and discussed the need for a “safe house” and escape routes after the intended attack, the documents show.
But it’s unclear from the court records how close the would-be attackers could have come to being able to carry out the plan had it not been thwarted.
Several suspects or co-conspirators who were questioned by the authorities said they did not intend themselves to carry out violence but planned to instead watch others. One said he would have traveled to the UFC event as a protester but had to return home after his vehicle malfunctioned. And though the group chat participants spoke of using drones rigged with explosives, charging documents do not reveal that any were located by law enforcement.
United by conspiracy theories and anger over the country’s direction
Law enforcement officials learned about the possible threat on June 10, four days before the mixed martial arts extravaganza on the White House’s South Lawn, “and thanks to the rapid action of the FBI, our partners, and the Department of Justice in a multi-state operation, multiple individuals are now in custody and allegedly planned attacks were stopped cold,” Director Kash Patel said in a post on X on Tuesday.
Five people from states including Ohio, Missouri, Nebraska and California were arrested on federal charges.
Asked about the arrests Tuesday, JD Vance said there was “more violent rhetoric coming from the left than the right these days.” But the charging documents paint a much more muddled view of their views, depicting them as espousing a tangled web of anti-government sentiment, antisemitic grievances, fury over President Donald Trump administration’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files and conspiracy theories about a powerful elite that sacrifices and consumes children.
Both Trump and Vance said Tuesday that they had not been briefed in advance of the plot. A top Secret Service official suggested Tuesday that the investigation was continuing despite the arrests.
“Anyone that believes that case was worked in a bubble is naive,” Deputy Secret Service Director Matthew Quinn told reporters at an unrelated news conference. “I’ll tell you, the Secret Service led that investigation from the beginning. I’ll tell you that it’s ongoing. In order to maintain the integrity of the investigation and the security plan, we chose not to leak it.”
Communications took place on TikTok and Signal
Among those arrested was Tycen Proper, a 19-year-old Ohio man whose mother contacted local law enforcement last week with concerns about his firearms purchases and online communications, according to an FBI affidavit filed in the case.
Proper admitted in an interview with law enforcement that he participated in the planning of an attack, according to the affidavit, which says some members of the group began communicating with each other last March through a TikTok group called “Vanguard of the Old.”
“The members of the group stated that they wanted to protect the United States, which they believed was headed in the wrong direction,” the affidavit says. “Members of the group believed that the United States needed to be torn down so that it could be rebuilt. Some expressed a desire that people who were involved with Jeffrey Epstein should not govern the country.”
A lawyer for Proper, who faces a detention hearing on Wednesday and is charged with firearms offenses rimes including attempted murder of an officer or employee of the United States, did not immediately return a message seeking comment.
The logistics were discussed via Signal, an app that uses end-to-end encryption for its messaging and calling services, through a primary chat of “approximately 19 individuals” and smaller side chats, authorities said. Messages obtained from Proper’s phone show he discussed the plot with others and highlighted several Republican lawmakers he said should be targeted because they received donations from causes supportive of Israel, the affidavit said.
Proper told law enforcement officials that he had been planning to drive with weapons and body armor to a meet-up spot in Fredericksburg, Virginia, where the group was set to gather, it said. He said that though he did not intend to shoot people at the White House, others in the group did, the affidavit said.
The plan called for the use of drones that would be detonated over the north side of the White House, prompting a rushed evacuation into the line of fire of waiting snipers in an attack that Proper said was designed to “jumpstart” a revolution in the U.S., authorities said.
Investigators who examined Proper’s phone and TikTok account identified additional suspects who helped develop plans.
Michael Alan Thomas told officials that he viewed him as “the planner and advisor for the group, and while he was not willing to take action himself, wanted to guide and instruct others on how to carry out attacks.” Thomas said the group’s planned attacks were designed to overthrow of the U.S. government, an FBI agent said in an affidavit. The agent said Thomas believed the U.S. government was “run by an elite group of individuals who sacrifice and consume infants who also were deeply involved with Jeffery Epstein and are now protected by President Donald Trump.”
Another suspect, Bryan Omar Roa, also of California, told the FBI he had planned to attend the event as a “protester” but that he had to return home because his car was broken, an agent said.
It was not immediately clear who their lawyers were.
Two other suspects were identified as Daniel K. Eskridge, of Missouri, who officials say said in a group chat that a target of the attack should be “big and someone a majority of the country knows,” and Abraham Hermosillo Alvarez, a Nebraska man whom the FBI said posted detailed plans in the group chat. A lawyer for Alvarez declined to comment and a lawyer for Eskridge did not immediately return a message seeking comment.
Trump, who celebrated his 80th birthday at the UFC event on Sunday, was friends with Epstein many years ago but has said he ended their relationship before the disgraced financier’s crimes became known. Epstein killed himself in a New York jail cell in 2019 as he awaited trial on sex trafficking charges.
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