Investigative reporters Jason Dearen and Michelle Smith had covered extremism for years when they heard something that grabbed their attention. University of Maryland researcher Michael Jensen, who tracked extremism in the military, found a “huge spike” in cases starting in 2017. Jensen agreed to provide his group’s exclusive data to AP for deeper analysis. Meanwhile, Dearen and Smith interviewed dozens of researchers, service members, advocacy groups and extremism experts to understand the problem. They filed dozens of FOIAs to verify individuals’ military service, obtain information from the Pentagon and understand more about those who radicalized.
Data journalist Aaron Kessler joined to help analyze data, while Rhonda Shafner provided research support. AP’s analysis found that since 2017, more than 480 people with a military background were accused of ideologically driven extremist crimes, while nearly 100 people were killed or injured in plots involving current or former military members, most in service of a far-right agenda.
The story focused on Chris Arthur, a National Guardsman and Iraq War veteran, who began preparing for civil war and training civilians, one of whom got into a gun battle with police. Dearen interviewed Arthur via a prison messaging system, while he, Rick Bowmer and Allen Breed conducted exclusive on-camera interviews with Arthur’s wife, her ex-husband and their two children. Dearen and Smith persuaded sources to share records — logs of calls reporting Arthur to military and law enforcement officials and an internal Pentagon study that revealed an approach the Department of Defense developed but abandoned.
Serginho Roosblad mined video and audio materials Dearen obtained via public records requests, as well as Arthur’s YouTube videos for a short documentary. Kevin Vineys constructed two charts while Marshall Ritzel built animated graphics, using grainy evidence photos to build a striking lead image for the text piece, which combined a compelling narrative that was informed by the exclusive documents and data.
Altogether the story presented new evidence that countered official accounts of the growth of extremism among the nation’s military service members and veterans and painted a damning picture of years of inaction by the Pentagon and federal law enforcement.
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