What it Means for Trump’s 2024 Campaign to Start in Waco, TX

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CHIEF INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Earlier in the program we spoke about how lies and disinformation could poison the 2024 U.S. election. Well, my next guest, the journalist, Mike Giglio, thinks it’s already getting off to a rough start. Donald Trump is the current front runner for the Republican nomination, and he’s launched his campaign in Waco, Texas. It’s a place perhaps best known for the notorious cult, the Branch Davidians, who lived there and the botched federal siege on their compound back in 1993, an event that lasted 51 days and left 82 of the cult members dead. In a new piece for “The Intercept,” Giglio argues that Trump could have been using this charged location to send a coded message to extremists. A theory he’s explaining to Hari Sreenivasan.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HARI SREENIVASAN, CORRESPONDENT: Thanks. Mike Giglio, thanks so much for joining us. First, here we are having this conversation about 30 years after what happened in Waco, Texas, and there’s a reexamination of that in the current political context here. For people who might not have been alive then or aren’t familiar with the standoff in Waco, what happened in those 51 days?

MIKE GIGLIO, JOURNALIST: You know, for me, like I was in grade school, so I even have to refresh on this. But it’s such an important event in American history. And it’s — it was a Christian sect in moving outside Waco, Texas heard, I think, decades. And they eventually came under investigation by the ATF because they were suspected of manufacturing machine guns illegally and explosives, hand grenades. And the ATF conceived a pretty disastrously botched initial raid in late February of 1993. So, this is right at the start of the Clinton administration, there was on the right very widespread fear of the federal government and gun control. The NRA was sounding the alarm about this. And so, it kind of like paved right into the passions of the moment. And the ATF raid went horribly wrong. It resulted in the shootout. Four ATF agents were killed and two members of the Branch Davidians. And then, what happened was a very long siege that lasted through all of March and up until April 19th, during which there was a major American news story. You know, helicopters from CNN, like the whole home media circus that is kind of like common now in America. And the FBI, which had taken over the operation executed a second botched raid that was meant to be nonviolent, but ended up in another shootout and a fire that killed more than 70 people at once, all from the Brand Davidians. And so, this is the tragedy and it is really an example of botched operations and overreach of the federal government. But it also became a cultural touchstone on the right, especially for militant groups. And for them, it became like, you know, the seminal example of federal overreach and the — a scare story, really, of the danger of the federal government and what it was willing to do, especially in the hands of a Democratic administration against gun owning conservatives.

SREENIVASAN: And it was also women and children that were in this compound. I mean, why is it that that raid resonates and is one of those core fears for groups like the Oath Keepers and the Three-Percenters and other kind of militant national organizations that you have been reporting on and tracking?

GIGLIO: So, I’ve spoken at length with the leader of the Oath Keepers, Stewart Rhodes, for example, about Waco, and he wasn’t involved in any political movement at the time, but he was a libertarian minded conservative, and he watched it play out like any other American on television that really affected him. And for him, the moral of the story was really clear, it was never that the Branch Davidians were heroes. You know, he and other people that really kind of focus on Waco, they don’t necessarily identify with the Branch Davidians. For them, the stories about the bad guys. It’s about how the Branch Davidians were demonized for being outside the cultural mainstream. How, in their view, the media and the government, which did happen, demonized them during the siege made them appear like these threatening outsiders. And in their minds, like in Stewart Rhodes’ mind, the basis of this demonization once in large part of the fact that they were Christian, very hardline Christian, and that they were very hardline gun owners. And it’s that directly into the kind of fears of Democrats and of the government that people in that movement have had for a long time.

SREENIVASAN: I should remind our audience that two years after that, Timothy McVeigh took matters into his own hands and he was inspired by what happened at Waco.

GIGLIO: Yes. So, Timothy McVeigh was a Gulf War veteran, and he had actually come down to Waco during the siege himself and handed out, I think, pamphlets supporting the Branch Davidians. And he saw it very clearly through an antigovernment lands, you know. And when he saw the violence happen on TV, it really triggered him. And he later came to see it, or at least portray it, as a preview of the coming fight with the government. And a wider global bout that he saw, and when he carried out the Oklahoma City attack, it was on the anniversary, like you mentioned, of the Waco attacks, and he was pretty explicit in saying that this was one of the reasons that he carried out the bombing.

SREENIVASAN: So, we fast forward. Here we are. And while they are kind of documentaries on Showtime and Netflix about this, I think another moment in our immediate political history is that Former President Trump chooses to launch his reelection campaign or one of his first rallies in Waco. Significant?

GIGLIO: To me, yes, as someone who covers militant groups on the right and political violence in America. His campaign denied that had any connection to what happened in Waco in 1993. But I think, if I were someone who was a member of the Oath Keepers, for example, and I saw that he had picked that place to launch the first official major rally of his presidential campaign, it would send a message to me that he was on my side, which is something that Trump has been signaling, I think, without holding a rally at Waco. It was a message that he obviously sent to his followers ahead of January 6th, militant groups took that message, they showed up at the capitol. Members of the Oath Keepers, including Stewart Rhodes, have been convicted of seditious conspiracy now for January 6th. And it came out in the trial that they thought that they were following Trump’s directives. They were — they thought they were in communication with Trump. Stewart Rhodes is writing open letters to Trump, urging him to take specific actions. And that’s what’s his portrayal of why the Oath Keepers were there on January 6th, was to help him. And so, fast forward to the current campaign, I have noticed and other commentators as well, Trump speaking even more openly in the terms and frames of the militant right and militant groups. He’s portraying the battle as existential against the federal government, against Democrats. So, he’s already been very aggressively in his messaging on this front. And to me, the choice of Waco, whatever he might have intended, is sending another very strong signal that this is the direction that his campaign is headed. And I would just note, you know, he opened that rally. He didn’t mention Waco. The events of that Waco. But he opened the rally by playing a rendition of natural anthem that was started by a choir of people who have been imprisoned for January 6th and playing images on the ride of the capital. So, again, a pretty clear messaging where he stands on this.

SREENIVASAN: So, there were images of the capital insurrection playing at the rally in Waco sort of connecting these dots for people. But I — you know, let me be a little skeptical here and say, listen, are we reading too much into this? If he doesn’t mention Waco, is this conveniently the — I don’t know, the airport hangar between Dallas and Austin or Houston? I mean, it’s there.

GIGLIO: I mean, it’s not — he didn’t mention it, like I said, like his campaign has expressly denied that that’s why they chose Waco. So, he’s — they’re denying that that’s the reason. I just know, having covered militant groups for years now and understanding just how important Waco is in their world view, whatever Trump intended is sort of beside the point, the message is there no matter what, and it blends with the messaging that’s already there from his campaign, that is intentional. He is intentionally saying to his followers, this campaign, this political battle is an existential struggle against the government, the federal government as controlled by Democrats. They’re coming after you and I’m just standing in their way. So, it’s going to be a very and has been existentially themes campaign from Trump, and I just think that this is playing into that messaging, and that it’s something that we, observing it, should just understand that context matters.

SREENIVASAN: You write that this all kind of feeds into this larger conspiracy of a new world order, all the way from Waco to a stolen election. Explain that.

GIGLIO: Seclans of the Right (ph) have believed for decades now, and some version of conspiracy theory called the new world order, and the very basic form of that conspiracy theory is that elite interests, global interests are, you know, businessmen and oligarchs are trying to establish a global dictatorship and that they’re trying to first undermine American democracy in order to do that. And it sounds like pretty outlandish, but you can sort of see when, in the talk of oligarchy and erosion of rights in America, how it can blend into different versions of politics in the United States. And some version of this year’s here (ph) are explicitly racist. Some are just really grounded more and like, talk about control the corporations have over government, influence of money in politics, but it is something that has been part and parcel of the militant movement since before the 1990s and certainly, in the 1990s. And Waco played into that is fear security. So, fast forward to 2020, without ever saying, now, we’ll go to conspiracy theory, if you look at the press conference that Sidney Powell and Rudy Giuliani held after the vote in 2020, when they put forward what was the Trump campaign’s official narrative of how the election was supposedly stolen, this is the Dominion conspiracy theory, it is about elite global interests, American’s foreign — America’s foreign adversaries conspiring with elites in America and politicians and the Democratic Party to steal an election, and it echoed very loudly with the new world order conspiracy theory. And if you’re conversing that, you know, theory and its influence in certain segments of American politics, it was very alarming to see that put forward on a national scale. This is something that have been confined to the fringes for decades. And for me, it really did preview some what we saw in January 6th and sort of drastic, sometimes violent action that some of the Trump’s followers took that day.

SREENIVASAN: Are there parallels between what happened after Waco and what’s happening now after January 6th in terms of whether these groups are sort of going to ground, whether their activity has been decreased because of the increased scrutiny by federal agencies and authorities and the press and everyone else on them?

GIGLIO: So, in the immediate aftermath of Waco, militia activity surged, because of the — because people were so alarmed by it. And it wasn’t until after Oklahoma City that federal investigative pressure really start to focus on militia style groups in America and there was a public outcry and, you know, fears of right-wing extremism were like very, very pronounced in the immediate aftermath of the bombing and then, you saw participation in militia groups really decrease. I have the sense just talking to people in the movement after January 6th that they’re still believers in Trump or in the cause that first had gotten to join a group like the Oath Keepers, like no one may convinced that this is the wrong way of thinking, but that they’re also conscious, like there is a lot of investigative pressure from the federal government, from Congress, and they are keeping their heads down. And I think just waiting to see, you know, whether this will blow over, whether there will be an opportunity where they can stick their heads back up without fear of being pressured or prosecuted. I think it’s very reasonable for them to be watching the presidential race and wondering what would happen if Trump were to win. He has suggested that he would pardon January 6th — people who were convicted for January 6th. So — and again, he’s opening his ground in Waco with a rendition of the national anthem, that’s sung by people who are convicted of January 6th. So, he’s signaling very clearly to people who are in prison that he’s on their side. So, I think there’s a very much all around like a wait and see approach right now.

SREENIVASAN: You’ve said in your reporting that movements like this are filled with people who think of the long game. I mean, you’ve said — used the phrase, I think, tactical patients. Explain that.

GIGLIO: I think that if you look at a group like the Oath Keepers and the wider spectrum of militant groups that they’re at the vanguard of and you understand that they don’t think of themselves as antigovernment or extremists, they think of themselves as the rightful authority in the country. They think that they should be in charge. And I think they felt for a time, part of Trump administration, that they were moving towards that. You know, that Trump was on their side, they still had a lot of resistance within the government and the political system, but that they were generally empower. I think if you think of it from that mindset, then that’s a mindset that encourages for long view. That’s a mindset that encourages participation in the political process where it helps and then, using any other means to grab and leverage power that you can when the political process isn’t working. And I think that it’s a struggle that, in their minds, has been happening since the 1990s, when lot of these groups first came into being, in the immediate aftermath of Waco. And I think they are very content, at least at the moment, to see can they get political power again. And you know, what would be the result if, again, like a Trump or someone that shared his worldview were to come back into power. You know, like the — I don’t think that they would consider that whatever the political — the hammock is right now, whatever investigated pressure they’re facing right now, but that’s the end of the story for them.

SREENIVASAN: So, there seems to be a little distinction that you’re drawing here too, that it’s not just antigovernment, it’s more specifically anti-Democrat.

GIGLIO: Yes. I — these groups have been, since 1990s, called antigovernment. If that term ever was appropriate, I don’t think it really is right now. I think it’s more accurate to say that they want to be the government. And that they’re not afraid of federal power. They’re afraid of it in the hands of Democrats. Because if you think about what the Oath Keepers and other supporters were asking for on January 6th, it was for Trump to invoke the insurrection act and to overturn an election. To use the National Guard to help him do this. That would be a massive use of federal power, obviously, a massive of abuse of federal power. So, I think we should consider that their enemy is not really the government, but yes, like you mentioned, it’s Democrats, it’s Democrat’s control of the government, and that’s what motivates them, I think, right now more than anything else. And that’s also how Trump, I think, frames the struggle that he says his campaign is engaged in right now.

SREENIVASAN: Do you think that government agencies have learned from Waco from what happened in January 6th how to stop this from happening again?

GIGLIO: The government, after Waco, did tons of internal investigations and reports. I think it’s pretty obvious that whatever the Branch Davidians did wrong at Waco, which is quite a bit, that really over the top aggressive government response was just not called for, and was responsible to largely for the deaths that happened. And also, I think there’s an awareness that that sort of drastic overreach creates problems that last in this game for decades, like it’s still influencing politics today. I don’t know how that translates to present moment other than saying, you know, you just always hope that anyone in power in America realizes that it is usually much more risky in the long- term to use too much power rather than too little. And I think that is a lesson that they have learned from past incidents at Waco and elsewhere and that I think the government has really been having struck it (ph) downs with in what is the largest — one largest investigations, obviously, in FBI history after January 6th.

SREENIVASAN: Mike Giglio, thanks so much for joining us.

GIGLIO: Thanks for having me.