Kurt Peipel
Appearances
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
So what they're reporting, yeah, he was a green beret, I mean, decorated green beret, which are, you know, a counterterrorism unit along with a lot of other things that they do. This person drove from Colorado Springs, rented the Tesla Cybertruck and brought it down. It just came out, I think, that he actually shot himself in the head before the bomb exploded.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
So there was a, which is it, you know, again, more of a suicide, but I don't know if a statement, if there wasn't, you know, obviously Elon Musk, Cybertruck, Trump Tower, if there was a statement to be made, they were pretty lucky in that Cybertruck directed the blast, at least is what I'm understanding, blasted up.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
So even the glass didn't break, which is pretty fortunate for the people probably around there or inside the hotel. But right now, they have no speculation on the individual. You know, right now, no motive why we don't like New Orleans, we have a pretty good picture right now compared to, you know, this one where all we know is he was active duty military and now has shown up here.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
Yeah. And I think access to a knowledge, you know, if you talk to like bomb techs in the FBI, they're like, you know, people that don't know what they're doing usually kill them. Like they get blown up or they'll blow out the limb or something. So there's a lot of technical stuff there. You know, the easy thing is throw some gas, throw some fireworks, light it.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
or have some mechanism to light it and then kill yourself, and then it just does its thing. I don't know why he did it. It's interesting that he chose a Cybertruck because it's enclosed, although you could have had any truck buy a cover for it, but that specifically Cybertruck is enclosed. Why he chose that, maybe he thought the battery would do more damage than it really did.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
It's unknown, but I assume that they're, well, unfortunate right now is chasing all those avenues to figure out, especially, you know, I know they just executed a search warrant at his home. I think they just said that, and that's going to be, you know, maybe there's some, obviously, computer forensics that they can go through to see what the individual has done or wanted to do. Mm-hmm.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
And what was interesting about the Vegas one versus New Orleans, like I said, New Orleans, they pretty much identified the individual and then released the name. This one, they identified and then held back for whatever reason they determined at the time that they wanted to have, they wanted to know the name, but they didn't want the public to know the name.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
I'm sure there's a law enforcement investigative reason for that. So maybe they were chasing down those connections. Now they have come back and said it. there are no connections other than military and a few overlaps. You know, Fort Liberty or Bragg is a very big base, so, you know, it's hard to, like, just because you serve there doesn't mean you knew each other.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
And certainly different fields, one was Green Beret, one was an IK guy. So I'm certain that they are drawing all those conclusions and then they're hoping, again, once you get into computer forensics and all that and the telephones, did they have calls? Did they have emails? Did they have, you know, was there any other connection?
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
But I think they said right now, it's as of right now, they're saying there's absolutely no connection, which is interesting. That's a coincidence. Yeah.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
Obviously, I know law enforcement's working on the prevention side. You know, there's a lot of investigation that goes on regardless of that. But how if you're Trump power, what do you do? I mean, you look at overseas, you know, they've been dealing with these types of threats a lot longer than us, especially in the Middle East. You look at 2008, Islamabad, Marriott bombing.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
Thanks, Mike. Thanks for having me.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
I mean, there was a pushback. It wasn't far enough, but there was a pushback. And I don't know if... You know, we talked to security and convenience, and I don't know if Vegas is ready for that, hey, we can't have cars right up front. You know, there's going to have to be a pushback where cars are there, maybe there's shuttles.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
You know, I don't know if Americans are ready for that type of inconvenience, especially in Las Vegas, where you have to harden your security at exterior first before those cars can come in. And I'm sure you've been to Vegas recently. There's no, you can drive up almost anywhere, you know.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
How do you stop a car from parking in front of a hotel? That's really the threat, right? Like, how do you stop a car from parking in front of the hotel?
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
if you don't stop the car out then there is no there's nothing you know i don't think there's a technological solution right now or or a human guard that's going to be able to figure that out really quickly a car stops and no one gets out for 15 seconds like how is that weird you know
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
I think those things need to be taken into account more. I think people get, I don't want to say complacent, they get hey, it hasn't happened here. We're a low threat. Now I would argue Bourbon Street clearly is packed all the time and a car going down that strip, you know, like that's an easy one to figure out. And clearly they knew it.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
And again, I haven't seen the situation where how tight that, you know, that curb was or the sidewalk that he jumped over. Was it, you know, did someone look at that and they're like, there's no way, you know, we can stop them before they get here. Maybe it's because they didn't hear them or... Again, three in the morning, you know, people are clearing out.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
There's a lot of questions that they ask. And I think when you look at crowds, I think cities and city policing is going to have to change a little bit to say, we have got to look at, like, and we say low tech, but hey, if it works, why would you go any higher? You know, if you can get a car and run people over, it's just as effective as almost anything.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
So I think they're going to have to look at it.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
I'm going to assume that after the attack, the scene secured, you know, police are on scene, they've made that safe. What's going to really happen, you know, the Bureau is going to probably bring in some experts, bomb techs, along with the police bomb techs, and then the evidence response teams and maybe other special agents, depending on the needs of, you know, the division at the time.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
But, uh, they're going to immediately start trying to identify it. I think you saw it really in both incidents, but, um, and for certainly into Orleans, they identified the attacker pretty, pretty fast.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
And so they're going to identify that subject as fast as they can, because they're going to want to go, um, interview co-conspiracy or determine if there's any other threats, you know, out there like co-conspirators or anything like that. Um, They're going to do interview all the witnesses. They're going to ask for video, you know, either locally or by cell phone.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
That's going to be a lot of work just to go through all that. But they have identified the Royalene subject. And, you know, initially, the Bureau, the FBI and the police had said that there was other pro conspirators. Now they've come out and said he acted alone. Which is interesting.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
I felt like the FBI has said that they're trying to be more transparent and therefore they're releasing information as it comes, which in an investigation that can change quickly. So now they're saying, originally they said there was co-conspirators, now they're saying they're not.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
It certainly is interesting. Let's say that. I don't know why someone would say that. In my experience, we usually didn't weigh in that early on stuff like that because you just don't know, right? The answer is we don't know what this was. When I grew up in the Bureau of the Default, it was like almost every bomb is a terrorist event until we were proven otherwise.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
So I think in that specific instance, I don't understand why it was said, But someone clearly thought that it wasn't an incident. And then when they pulled out the ISIS flag almost immediately, it was an issue, right? Like you had to come back and say, yes, it is, you know?
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
So, and I think now they're finding a social media and, you know, he posted videos, you know, an hour and a half up to 10 minutes before he committed the event. So where he's declaring himself for ISIS and all that. So I think clearly this in New Orleans, it clearly is a terrorist event.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
Is he not? I mentioned before, obviously, we've talked about the video posts. We've talked about, you know, they're going through all his social media. They're going to look at phones, you know, his contacts, not just domestically, but I mean, your world too. Your old world is, you know, overseas. Did he have overseas contacts? You know, they're going to try to go through...
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
really scour everything that this individual financial, everything that this person has done their whole entire life. They're going to try to go through every bit of it to see who he is at contact with, where does those line up with other things. They're going to talk to people. It's a big human intelligence endeavor now.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
They're probably talking to a ton of individuals, witnesses, like I mentioned before. That is going to be a big lift right now to try to figure out if there were co-conspirators. And I will tell you that obviously they've come out and said they think that this person acted alone. So, they went through it pretty quickly to determine that he wasn't or he didn't have other people involved.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
I haven't seen this site, but I suspect that they will be doing a hot wash, at least I hope they would, to figure out if there is some exchange. What I imagine with this area is that if they put in more secure concrete,
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
Ballards or something like that, that emergency vehicles probably couldn't get down the road until they maybe have a conflict internally of like, hey, we have to have emergency vehicles get in, but you know, where the police cars could move quickly, those ballards probably, the electric ones drop. And so, if they had an emergency, they can get in there.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
And I'm going to guess that's kind of the tension that they're playing with. Interesting, you meant about like, you know, you meant, I think possibly with this too, and this is pure speculation on my half, is this individual ran an electric vehicle. which I don't know if that was intentional, electric vehicles are pretty quiet.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
So, a lot of the same noise that you would hear a car revving up or especially if you were in the crowd, you would hear all these things like really loud engine noise and all these cues that police and other people have are not there.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
So, I don't know if this individual thought about that or not, that if he was revving up to get by the police, they may not have had a normal indication of, hey, someone's coming at us, you know what I mean?
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
I don't know the people involved, but I suspect the people involved, they've done their full assessment of it. And if they've cleared all the IEDs and they've cleared this individual, and now again, no one has a crystal ball to see what could happen. But I think that they wouldn't have opened it if they thought there was an an additional threat.
The President's Daily Brief
PDB Situation Report | January 4th, 2025: Terrorism Hits Home & Beijing’s Strategy for 2025
And I'm sure the police presence down there has grown quite a bit since the incident. So they probably, you know, there's probably a lot of presence, possibly other SWAT teams, things like that, that are a more robust, you know, presence than what was there, you know, a few nights ago. So I would imagine that, yes, it's probably fairly secure down there.