On election day, he headed to the Capitol with a manifesto and a torch
Authorities on Wednesday identified a Michigan man as the person arrested as he tried to enter the U.S. Capitol on Election Day, reeking of fuel and carrying a torch lighter and a flare gun.
Austin Olson, 27, of Westland, Michigan, tried to enter the Capitol Visitor Center just after noon Tuesday, and also carried what appeared to be a manifesto and a letter to Congress, according to the U.S. Capitol Police.
“If our officers did not stop this man, yesterday would have been a very different story than this one,” the Capitol Police chief, J. Thomas Manger, said in a statement. “All of our employees continue to work, together, around the clock during this heightened security environment.”
The incident occurred as voters across the country were casting ballots at the polls, but investigators released no information that definitively tied the incident to the election. Elsewhere in the country, however, dozens of bomb threats were reported across multiple states, many of which the FBI said originated from Russian-run email domains. Several of the threats prompted temporary evacuations that resulted in last-minute extensions of voting schedules, but significant nationwide disruptions were largely avoided.
In the days before the election, two ballot boxes in Oregon and Washington state were set ablaze by incendiary devices that read “Free Gaza.” Investigators have made no arrests in those attacks.
Capitol Police officials said the letter Olson carried to the Capitol on Tuesday appeared to claim that he was protesting the war in the Gaza Strip and the U.S. relationship with Israel.
Accounts that appear to belong to Olson on YouTube and Rumble, two online video-sharing platforms, contain videos espousing a range of anti-government sentiments.
In some of the 31 videos posted on YouTube just a day before his arrest, Olson complained that corporate greed was standing in the way of people achieving the American dream, and noted that the United States had “a history of enslavement, abuse and negligence” toward nonwhite people and others who do not fit in.
In the videos, Olson wore a black beret and a red scarf and read from papers in a red folder. He expressed concerns with the administrations of both President Joe Biden and President-elect Donald Trump, saying that high inflation under the Biden administration was caused by decisions Trump made during his past time in office.
While the police reports did not say whether officers had determined Olson’s motive for trying to enter the Capitol, comments made in a number of his videos suggest that he viewed himself as a potential martyr. “If my persecution and death means the truth lives, I’ll pick up my cross,” Olson said in a video titled “Letter to Congress,” which was published Monday.
Postings to his Rumble account indicate that Olson had aspirations to run for president in 2040.
The Capitol Police said they closed the visitor center for tours for the day while they investigated Tuesday. The Senate was not in session, and the House met briefly at 5 p.m. as scheduled, with few members in attendance.
The Capitol Police said they planned to remain on high alert until the presidential inauguration in January.
In 2021, an assault on the Capitol by protesters seeking to disrupt the certification of the 2020 election resulted in injuries to about 140 police officers, $2.8 million in damages and more than 1,200 prosecutions, according to the Department of Justice.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
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