A quarter of Americans believe FBI instigated Jan. 6, Post-UMD poll finds [View all]

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Source: Washington Post

NATIONAL SECURITY

A quarter of Americans believe FBI instigated Jan. 6, Post-UMD poll finds

More than 3 in 10 Republicans have adopted the falsehood that the FBI conspired to cause the Capitol riot

By Tom Jackman, Scott Clement, Emily Guskin and Spencer S. Hsu
January 4, 2024 at 6:00 a.m. EST



Trump supporters march down Constitution Avenue before a mob breached the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. (Michael Robinson Chavez/The Washington Post)

Share
https://wapo.st/3H3eXfM

Twenty-five percent of Americans say it is “probably” or “definitely” true that the FBI instigated the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, a false concept promoted by right-wing media and repeatedly denied by federal law enforcement, according to a new Washington Post-University of Maryland poll.

The Post-UMD poll finds a smaller 11 percent of the public overall thinks there is “solid evidence” that FBI operatives organized and encouraged the attack, while 13 percent say this is their “suspicion only.” ... Among Republicans, 34 percent say the FBI organized and encouraged the insurrection, compared with 30 percent of independents and 13 percent of Democrats.

The results confirm that misinformation about Jan. 6 is widespread as the United States heads into a presidential election year, during a campaign in which the former president and leading 2024 Republican candidate Donald Trump has repeatedly expressed support for those who participated in the insurrection. Despite a detailed congressional investigation and more than 725 completed federal prosecutions of Jan. 6 participants that did not yield evidence of FBI involvement, a substantial minority of Americans still embrace conspiracy theories not unlike the ones that drove many rioters to storm the Capitol three years ago.

{snip}

Share
https://wapo.st/3H3eXfM

About this story

The Post and the University of Maryland’s Center for Democracy and Civic Engagement conducted this poll Dec. 14-18 among a random national sample of 1,024 U.S. adults through NORC at the University of Chicago’s AmeriSpeak Panel. It has an error margin of plus or minus 4.1 percentage points for the full sample.

Rachel Weiner contributed to this report.

By Tom Jackman, Scott Clement, Emily Guskin and Spencer Hsu

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2024/01/04/fbi-conspiracy-jan-6-attack-misinformation/