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(FOX 2) - About a week ago FBI Director Christopher Wray spoke about the threat of domestic terrorism and white nationalism.
In the wake of mass shooting tragedies in El Paso and Dayton, what's going on in our area?
The FBI's domestic terrorism program has four primary threat issues they focus on.
"Of those four, racially motivated, violent extremism is at the top of the list so to speak of what we do here in Detroit and I would say, nationally," said Special Agent Devin Kowalski, Joint Terrorism Task Force.
FOX 2: "What would be the second most concerning?"
"Anti-government, anti-authority extremism," said Kowalski. "These groups must be involved in the use of force or violence, or the threat, the intersection of those, that's when we get involved."
Devin Kowalski is the supervisory special agent with the Joint Terrorism Task Force Squad in metro Detroit. They are the front line against domestic terrorism.
The El Paso shooting which killed dozens is being investigated as spurred by white nationalism. While the motives in the Dayton mass shooting, happening about 13 hours later, are less clear.
"In this case, the lack of connection between the Dayton and El Paso events, the FBI will turn over every single stone to make sure this is not a networked attack," Kowalski said. "There's no information out there to suggest that this is part of a larger scheme."
The joint terrorism taskforce has five squads operating all across the state, dealing with threats that are credible, and otherwise many of them neutralized before any of us in the public even know about them.