Thousands of residents in the Tacoma, Washington area lost electricity Christmas morning as local officials reported that three power substations in the area were “attacked” by unknown suspects. The Pierce County Sheriff’s Office said in a press bulletin that responding officers found signs of forced entry at all three locations, along with vandalized equipment that had caused the outages which affected more than 14,000 people. While authorities said they haven’t taken anyone into custody and are still unclear about motives or possible coordination, the sabotage comes amid a surge in threats to power grids nationwide—with the number of recent events in Washington and Oregon—a hotbed of organized domestic extremism—now standing at eight. In January, The Daily Beast first reported a Department of Homeland Security memo warning that domestic extremists have harbored “credible, specific plans to attack electricity infrastructure since at least 2020,” and in late November the agency released another bulletin saying those threats remained heightened. Days later, unknown actors shot up two power stations in Moore County, North Carolina, knocking out power to more than 40,000 homes in what federal and local officials are calling an “intentional” and “criminal” event.
