Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) pointed to a conspiracy theory being circulated among members of Congress and in conservative media suggesting that federal authorities helped plan the Jan. 6 rioting by supporters of former President Trump at the U.S. Capitol as indicative of Trump’s legacy.
“It’s not the far, far right, it’s just the right now,” Kinzinger said during an appearance on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” on Thursday. “We’re saying [Ashli Babbitt] was assassinated … now we’re saying that the FBI somehow actually planned and assisted in Jan. 6.”
Host Joe Scarborough interjected: “You have members [of the GOP] who are actually promoting that.”
“Yes,” Kinzinger responded. “It’s been so much information peppered on these people, but now you can just say ‘FBI planned Jan. 6,’ that’s the new thing. You can’t prove otherwise, because by the time you do prove otherwise they don’t listen to facts anyway.”
Several elected Republicans have pushed baseless claims that FBI informants were among those who planned and executed the breach on the Capitol.
“We need names and answers about the FBI operatives, who were involved in organizing and carrying out the Jan 6th Capitol riot,” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) said in a tweet on Wednesday. “First they had a ‘back up plan’ to stop Trump in Russia Collusion witch hunt, now we are finding out they were deeply involved in Jan 6th. Deep State.”
Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) also promoted the conspiracy and on Tuesday sent a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray demanding he explain how many of the unindicted co-conspirators cited in federal documents about the riot were undercover agents with the bureau.
Fox News’s Tucker Carlson, who hosts the highest-rated cable news television program in the country, touched on the theory during a segment earlier this week.
Citing a report in Revolver News, Carlson told his viewers “upwards of 20 unindicted co-conspirators in the Oath Keeper indictments, all playing various roles in the conspiracy who have not been charged for virtually the exact same activities, and in some cases, much, much more severe activities as those named alongside them in the indictments.”
“Huh? So it turns out that this ‘white supremacist’ insurrection was, again by the government’s own admission in these documents, organized at least in part by government agents,” Carlson said.
Kinzinger, who has been sharply critical of the former president and his supporters, said the spread of the conspiracy is a prime example of the effect Trump has had on the information and politics ecosystem in America, particularly on the right.
“This is the legacy of Trump and Trumpism,” he said. “This is the legacy of blatant and outright lies to people that are being abused for their raw noble patriotism.”