The Department of Homeland Security has officially warned that the 2022 midterm elections could be a flash point for extremist violence in the United States. The agency’s terrorism alert attributes the nation’s current “heightened threat environment” to an “online environment filled with false or misleading narratives and conspiracy theories...introduced and/or amplified by foreign and domestic threat actors.” DHS cites COVID-19 misinformation as well as the fraudulent but widespread conspiracy—created and spread by Donald Trump and his supporters—that the 2020 presidential election was stolen as leading incendiary topics. The missive warns that political candidates and election workers could be targets of violence, adding that lone assailants, small cells of actors, and foreign adversaries, like ISIS, are seen as threats.
