DISINFO: US authorities refuted that the assault on the Capitol was a terrorist act
SUMMARY
There have been denunciations that the assault on the US Capitol had been organised and orchestrated. It had even been labelled as a terrorist action, something that authorities have refuted afterwards.
RESPONSE
The claim is false. US authorities have not said that the assault was not a terrorist action. There has been some debate about whether it constituted terrorism or not, with voices like US president-elect Joe Biden calling participants “domestic terrorists” and presidential historian Michael Beschloss affirming that it was a “terrorist attack”. On January 10, four days after the assault, US Army Secretary Ryan McCarthy said that at least 25 domestic terrorism cases had been opened as a result of the deadly incident.
There is also wide evidence that the assault had been organised and orchestrated in extremist channels in the previous days, and some stormers coordinated their actions during the incident.
See other examples in our database, such as claims that the US system is not democratic because the Deep State makes the big decisions; that the attack on the Capitol was a planned provocation; that the Democratic Party has become a fascist party; that there was electoral fraud in the US because the Deep State didn’t want Trump reelected; that the cybercracy, the Deep State and the Pentagon subdued Trump; or that the assault on the Capitol was the new 9/11.
This disinformation message appeared in the same article as the claims that “Censorship in the US is now almost akin to that of Nazi Germany”, that “If Trump is impeached, Democrats will have absolute power”, that “Images and videos prove that left-wing radicals took part in the assault of the US Capitol”, and that “Joe Biden starts his mandate with the disapproval of half of the US”.