National Defense

Bomb Plot By Leftist Liberation Group Thwarted, DOJ Officials Say

(Official White House Photo by Molly Riley)

The FBI thwarted a bombing plot by a leftist group targeting multiple California locations and federal immigration agents, officials said Monday.

A group called the Turtle Island Liberation Front (TILF) planned explosive attacks across Los Angeles for New Year’s Eve before the FBI arrested four members on Friday, Department of Justice (DOJ) leaders said in a press conference. The FBI and a SWAT team allegedly caught them in the Mojave Desert preparing to test explosives meant for the plot, according to First Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Central District of California Bill Essayli and Akil Davis, assistant director in charge of the FBI’s Los Angeles Field Office.

Audrey Carroll, Zachary Aaron Page, Dante Gaffield and Tina Lai, all Los Angeles-area residents, will make their initial appearances in court on Monday on charges of conspiracy and possession of an unregistered destructive device, Essayli said. Federal law enforcement also conducted search warrants around the country in the investigation, with officials in Louisiana and Massachusetts assisting, according to Essayli.

TILF’s Los Angeles branch did not respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment sent via Instagram. The group’s Instagram page is littered with provocative statements such as “peaceful protest will never be enough.”

“Death to America. Death to colonizers. Death to capitalism. Death to imperialism. Is not violent,” TILF said in an Oct. 21 post. “Support of these structures is.”

The group was developing a “detailed, coordinated plot to bomb multiple U.S. companies on New Year’s Eve” that would occur when the clock struck midnight, with Carroll and Page leading the effort, officials said. They also allegedly mulled a follow-up plot to target Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) vehicles and ICE agents.

Defendants purchased bomb-making parts before traveling to a campsite in the desert, and officials also found written material in Page’s residence detailing the terror plot, Davis said.

“What we are doing will be considered a terrorist act,” one defendant said regarding their plans, according to Essayli.

The prosecutor said the probe came as a result of President Donald Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi directing law enforcement to target left-wing domestic terrorists. Officials “intend to file additional charges in the coming weeks” as the investigation proceeds, the Trump appointee said.