Swatting attacks on Mass. lawmakers are all too common. But there is a fix | John L. Micek

The only thing that’s surprising about the bomb threats that were phoned in against two Massachusetts lawmakers this week is just how depressingly mundane and run-of-the-mill they have become.

In separate incidents on Saturday and Monday, local police responded to the homes of Democratic U.S. Reps. Lori Trahan, of Westford and Ayanna Pressley, of Boston, for threats that turned out to be unsubstantiated.

No one was harmed. But those who phoned in the threats got what they wanted: The lives of Trahan and Pressley — and their families — were temporarily upended. And law enforcement resources that could have been directed elsewhere were diverted to these false threats.

Public officials, who have been the target of ire at least since Julius Caesar had that very bad day at the office in 44 BCE, have raged against such incidents, even as they’ve stoically accepted their inevitability.

“Threats against lawmakers are unacceptable, and I am glad that my colleagues who have faced recent threats are safe,” U.S. Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., told MassLive. “We must condemn any hateful rhetoric that inspires political violence. Hate has no place in our country.”

Still, if you feel like something’s changed, you’re right.

Since 2016, there’s been a “dramatic rise” in attacks and plots that are motivated by partisan political beliefs, according to an October analysis by The Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Pressley, who is the only Black member of the state’s Capitol Hill delegation and one of its most outspoken progressives, has seen that up close — and more than once.

“There are moments in real-time when you’re offering something — on a stage in a dais, in an interview — where you become aware: ‘I’m going to experience a lot of vitriol for this,’” Pressley said in a 2020 interview with The 19th.

The threats against Pressley and Trahan are known as “swatting” attacks, in a nod to the scale of the law enforcement response often employed against them.

They’re rising because “we seem to be at a place in society where some people think it’s perfectly fine to lash out, even dangerously, at someone just because they have a different opinion,” Frank Figluzzi, a former FBI assistant director, and MSNBC commentator said earlier this year.

These incidents have been made easier by technology that “allows us to spoof a phone number to make police think the call is coming from somewhere else,” Figluzzi continued. “This stuff can be deadly. People have died from swatting incidents.”

The threats against Pressley and Trahan also came days after at least five Democratic members of Congress from Connecticut said they had been targeted by bomb threats during the Thanksgiving holiday, NPR reported.

U.S. Sen. Christopher Murphy, along with U.S. Reps. Sen. Chris Murphy, Jim Himes, Joe Courtney, John Larson and Jahana Hayes all said they had been the subject of threats, NPR reported on Nov. 29.

“It’s one of those things you’re seeing with elected officials at every level, senators and [representatives] having a really proactive security presence,” Matt Gorman, the executive vice president of the political consulting firm Targeted Victory, told MassLive. “It’s just a fact of life.”

Gorman agreed that the anonymity granted by technology has made it easier for people to be “anonymous and get away with it.” The increased polarization of our politics hasn’t helped either, he added.

Last week’s fatal shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson on the streets of Midtown Manhattan similarly has reinforced the need for vigilance, experts told The New York Times.

Companies concerned about the safety of top executives had already upped their spending on security, the newspaper reported.

As the attacks have become more prevalent, the FBI has amassed a database to track and prevent them, CNBC reported in 2023.

But despite the threat posed by the attacks, there is no specific law that prevents them, Lauren R. Shapiro, an associate professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, told CNBC.

While there are legal avenues to prosecute those who engage in swatting, they often result in a “slap on the wrist,” that’s minor compared to the chaos and disruption the attacks cause, Shapiro told CNBC.

So is there a way back to sanity? Author and speaker Alexandra Hudson, the author of the Substack newsletter Civic Renaissance, said she believes there is.

And it starts with us — and not mistaking civility for just good manners.

“Politeness is about manners, technique, and etiquette — external behaviors,” she told the National Conference of State Legislatures, a resource organization for lawmakers.

Civility “is something deeper and richer — it’s a disposition of the heart. It’s a way of showing others a bare minimum amount of respect just by our shared dignity and moral status as members of the human community,” she said.

Which is far easier said than done but no less important for trying it.

This post was originally published on this site