Former FBI agent on plot at UFC event

Well, everything piques the attention of the FBI, especially around an event as broad in magnitude as that UFC fight was on the White House lawn, very much a target of interest for people with certain motivations. So what brought it to the attention was likely the extensive plan that this occurred. I mean, this involved drones. It involved the diversion and involved directing a crowd to a certain area, and then involved an active shooter incident. Extremely complicated to actually pull off something like this. But then the broad nature of it-- I think the statement might have said there were five people arrested, but potentially over 20 involved in the communication about this. That's not to say everybody was involved in the actual planning of this, but at least discussing it.

And so what happens next here? Because we are expecting that indictment to be unsealed later today. I was saying to Vlad this morning, obviously there's a big July 4 celebration. There are going to be a lot of these largescale events, as there should be, because we're celebrating America's birthday. But what happens next from here? Well, I'd like to point out the positives here. This was a threat that was identified by law enforcement, likely multiple agencies. Very likely could have been a member of the public that was involved in this discussion, thought it was just joking or not true. And then some of the people in the discussion probably went a little far, so it easily could have been brought to the attention by the public. So let's bring out some of the positives that, hey, it was identified and it was stopped. And that collaboration between the public and different law enforcement agencies is what's going to stop these. What we're going to see in the complaint, if that's released or an indictment, are some details. I'd love to see if there were any overt acts actually moving towards this incident that would really amp this up, that they were really serious about it enough that they were gathering either drones or explosive devices or traveling to do some reconnaissance of the area. That would really speed things up. And then the motivation of these individuals-- exactly what was their motivation? How were they funded? Who else was involved? Those are big questions left unanswered.

Yeah, that's a good question, Lance, because, again, going back to what we said at the top, if we are looking at something that was just in the pre-operational phase of planning, does that rise to the level of a large press conference, the kind of sharing with the media that the FBI is doing in this particular case? If it's just that there was chatter on the internet or maybe some things were purchased, again, we don't know. But when does it rise to the level of, hey, people need to be made aware of this, that the FBI has thwarted this plot? I think there are multiple motivations for a law enforcement agency to bring it to the public. One is simple deterrence. Just to put it out there that, hey, this is not tolerated. These discussions such as this, like discussions alone, when you're talking terrorism charges, federal charges can be applied when there's just discussions. You don't even need the overt act straight ahead. So there is a deterrent effect in getting this out there and saying, hey, law enforcement was able to stop this. There's a little pride probably as well, that, hey, we were able to stop this, and we want to tell people about it. You see that often in other types of cases and sometimes with this. But I would like to think that law enforcement agencies are being strategic about this and presenting this more as a deterrent than anything else to prevent this from happening in the future.

All right. Former FBI agent Lance Leising, always good to have you. Thank you very much.