Wray says FBI field office report was passed to law enforcement partners ahead of Jan. 6 attack

Appearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, FBI Director Christopher Wray said a report from the bureau’s Norfolk field office warning of potential violence at the Capitol on Jan. 6 was sent to Capitol Police and law enforcement partners before the attack.

Video Transcript

DICK DURBIN: There's a lot of confusion about the planning and coordination by federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies in the days leading up to the attack on the Capitol. I was surprised to learn that FBI did not issue a threat assessment before January 6, especially because the FBI'S Norfolk, Virginia field office had uncovered specific threats against members of Congress, maps of the tunnel system under the Capitol complex, and places to meet before traveling together to Washington. I was also surprised to hear acting DC Metropolitan Police Department chief Robert Contee say that his information was only conveyed to the MPD in an email at 7:00 PM the night before January 6. Chief Contee acknowledged that the information was raw intelligence, but said he would think, quote, "something as violent as an insurrection at the Capitol would warrant a phone call or something," close quote. So it comes down to the basic question of what the FBI knew, when they knew it, whether they shared it, why this didn't rise to the level of a threat assessment.

CHRISTOPHER WRAY: So Mr. Chairman, I welcome the question. You touched on a number of points there. So first, let me say that we were, in the period leading up to January 6, tracking a large amount of information about large numbers of people coming to participate in protests and about the potential for violence. The one specific piece of information that you referred to, the information from our Norfolk field office, has gotten a lot of attention.

So this was what's called a situational information report, was prepared by our Norfolk field office specifically for dissemination. It was, as you noted, raw, unverified, uncorroborated information that had been posted online. And my understanding was that that information was quickly, as in within an hour, disseminated and communicated with our partners, including the US Capitol Police, including Metro PD in not one, not two, but three different ways.

DICK DURBIN: Can you be more specific on time?

CHRISTOPHER WRAY: Sure, three different ways. So first, there was an email, as you said, to our Joint Terrorism Task Force, which includes-- the Joint Terrorism Task Force includes task force officers specifically selected by their chiefs who participate on the Joint Terrorism Task Force for the very reason to be that chief's, that department's eyes and ears so that they get the information real time, their departments do. So that's the first piece.

Second, in addition to the email, verbally, through the command post briefing that we had, because we had stood up command posts both in the Washington field office and at headquarters, and those command posts included, again, representatives of the relevant agencies-- Capitol Police, MPD, et cetera-- verbally the same information was walked through again. And third, in addition to the email, in addition to the verbal briefing at the command post, there was-- the information was posted on what we call LEEP, which is a law enforcement portal which is made available to law enforcement not just here in the national capital region, but all around the country.

Now, again, the information was raw. It was unverified. In a perfect world, we would have taken longer to be able to figure out whether it was reliable. But we made the judgment, our folks made the judgment to get that information to the relevant people as quickly as possible, like I said, three different ways in order to leave as little as possible to chance.

Now, I didn't see the report myself even until after the 6th. But the way in which it was handled, at least as I understand it, strikes me as consistent with our normal process.