The FBI said on Thursday it thwarted a plot to overthrow the Michigan state government and kidnap its governor, Gretchen Whitmer, and had probable cause to charge six men with a failed operation that involved reaching out to a militia group.
The operation will be announced at a press conference of law enforcement officials at 13:00 in Grand Rapids, which will be attended by Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel and the state's leading federal prosecutors.
The FBI first got wind that a group of individuals "were discussing the violent overthrow of certain government and law-enforcement components" in early 2020, according to an affidavit by special agent Richard Trask released by the FBI on Thursday.
The alleged plot included reaching out to a militia group, which was not named in the affidavit.
Trask said there was probable cause to charge six men - Adam Fox, Barry Croft, Ty Garbin, Kaleb Franks, Daniel Harris and Brandon Caserta - with conspiring to kidnap Whitmer, a Democrat and frequent critic of Republican President Donald Trump.
In September, Fox posted in an encrypted chat that he did not want a final training exercise to be held in the last week of October because it would not leave enough time to execute the kidnapping before the national election on 3 November, Trask said.
"The group agreed to use the time until the final training exercise to raise money for explosives and other supplies," Trask wrote in the affidavit.