Political scientist Robert Pape has found that unlike other extremists he's studied, most of the Jan. 6 rioters were older, employed, and few are members of hate groups.
It will be months before the House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection on the U.S. Capitol will release its first report on the causes of that day's deadly violence.show that Americans of different parties view it very differently, from whose fault it was, whether violent action is OK, and whether those who stormed the Capitol were mostly violent or peaceful.
“This isn't just simply normal criminal behavior or escalations like street fighting,” he says. “This is clearly collective political violence done by hundreds and hundreds of people for essentially the same political purposes.”Right-wing extremist violence is usually strongly linked to skinhead gangs or militia groups. But as of Dec. 2021, he says 87% of Capitol rioters he’s analyzed were not members of violent groups like the Oath Keepers or Proud Boys.
Normally, 40% of right-wing extremists have prior military service, whereas Jan. 6 Capitol rioters sat at about 15%, he says. “This is uncomfortable for a variety of reasons. It means a lot of our usual counter-violent extremist solutions just don't apply,” Pape says. “Usually, we think we'll get them a job. Well, we've already got over half business owners, CEOs and folks from white-collar occupations — that's not going to work.”
Rioters flooded in from places such as San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York City, Dallas, Houston, Philadelphia and Chicago, he says, or from the immediate suburbs surrounding those cities, where they were essentially the political minority.
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