The investigative newsroom ProPublica obtained more than 100,000 messages between members of the right-wing militia known as American Patriots Three Percent, one of the largest groups of its kind in the country. The outlet published their findings on Sunday, highlighting a number of concerning plans discussed by the group—including migrant sweeps, potential political assassinations, and operations at voting centers to ensure a victory for Donald Trump in 2024. Reporters who analyzed the trove of data wrote that it could often be “hard to discern the line between bluster and imminent threat in the messages,” but pointed to recent operations along the southern U.S. border and a number of past actions they had taken as reason to take the threats seriously. Reporters also chronicled the rise of Scot Seddon, the national commander of AP3 who helped shape the group into a national force with tens of thousands of members—but failed to keep an iron grip on the membership, which has splintered into rival factions in recent years.
