Jan. 6 pipe bomb suspect Brian Cole arrested, faces explosives charges

The FBI on Thursday morning arrested a suspect accused of planting pipe bombs outside the Republican and Democratic party headquarters in Washington, D.C., prior to the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot, the Trump administration said.

The suspect, Brian Cole Jr., a 30-year-old resident of Woodbridge, Virginia, is charged with “use of an explosive device,” U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said at a press briefing Thursday afternoon.

The investigation is ongoing and more charges could be filed, Bondi noted, adding that search warrants are currently being executed.

A criminal complaint unsealed after the briefing shows Cole facing a charge of transporting an explosive device in interstate commerce with intent to kill, injure or intimidate or unlawfully destroy property.

Cole is also charged with “malicious destruction or attempted malicious destruction by means of fire and explosive materials.”

The arrest is a massive breakthrough in the nearly five-year federal investigation into who placed the bombs, which did not detonate. The devices were planted on the evening of Jan. 5 and discovered around 1 p.m. ET the next day.

“An individual who is now alleged to have placed multiple explosive devices to blow up multiple people and multiple officials [and] innocent civilians is now arrested,” FBI Director Kash Patel said at the press briefing.

MS NOW, which reported the arrest earlier Thursday morning, said police have not yet determined a motive, citing a law enforcement official.

But two people briefed on the arrest told MS NOW that the suspect has been linked to statements that show support for an anarchist ideology.

Bondi, asked about Cole’s motivations at the briefing, would only say that the DOJ’s probe is ongoing.

Cole is described as a five-foot-six-inch-tall man who “wears corrective eyeglasses,” an unnamed FBI special agent wrote in an affidavit in support of the criminal complaint.

He lives with his mother and other family members and “works in the office of a bail bondsman in northern Virginia,” the agent wrote.

In 2019 and 2020, Cole allegedly bought items that matched the components used to manufacture the pipe bombs, the FBI discovered after obtaining records for his checking account and three of his six credit cards.

The agent said those items included: one-inch-by-eight-inch galvanized pipes; black and galvanized “end caps,” which were used to seal the pipes; nine-volt battery connectors; white kitchen timers; and 14-gauge red and black electrical wire.

The FBI also obtained phone records that showed Cole’s cellphone in the area near the Democratic and Republican National Committee buildings on Jan. 5, 2021, according to the affidavit.

The same evening, Cole’s 2017 Nissan Sentra was observed driving past a license plate reader in D.C. less than half a mile from the spot where the suspect was first observed on foot, the special agent wrote.

The discoveries that led to the arrest did not come from new evidence, but rather from the same trove of material that had mostly been gathered in 2021 and 2022, two sources told MS NOW.

That means the suspect could feasibly have been arrested years earlier — a fact that could cause embarrassment for the FBI, those sources said.

Patel, at Thursday’s presser, touted that the FBI under his leadership “did not discover any new information.”

The agency instead “reexamined every piece of evidence, sifted through all the data,” Patel said, claiming that was “something that the prior administration refused and failed to do.”

As recently as late October, the bureau was offering a $500,000 reward for information that would help authorities identify the Capitol Hill bombing suspect.

Surveillance video released by the FBI shows that around 7:54 p.m. ET on Jan. 5, 2021, a person wearing a face mask, black gloves and a gray hoodie placed a bomb outside the DNC building.

About 22 minutes later, the same person appeared to place a second bomb by the RNC’s offices, according to the footage.

The devices were planted hours before a mob of President Donald Trump‘s supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol as lawmakers prepared to confirm former President Joe Biden‘s 2020 election win.

Nearly 1,600 people were criminally charged in connection with that riot. Trump, in one of his first acts after retaking the White House in January, pardoned the vast majority of them.

When NBC News asked the White House how the administration reconciles its efforts to arrest Cole with Trump’s mass pardons for others who committed crimes — some violent in nature — on Jan. 6, a spokesperson called the comparison “alarming and insulting.”

The timing of the pipe-bomb placement, and the elusiveness of the perpetrator, have made the case a hotbed of conspiracy theories.

Last month, a conservative news site named a former U.S. Capitol Police officer as a possible match for the pipe bomber, based largely on a “gait analysis.” The FBI poured cold water on the story, and the accused officer cleared her name by providing a video of her playing with her puppies at the time the bombs were placed, CBS News reported.

The yearslong investigation was a priority for the FBI, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department and the U.S. Capitol Police.

By January, the FBI said investigators and related partners had visited more than 1,200 residences and businesses, interviewed over 1,000 people, reviewed nearly 40,000 video files and assessed more than 600 tips.

As part of their search for the bomber, the FBI subpoenaed credit card data from box-store retailers to identify people who bought the same type of battery components believed to be used in the devices, MS NOW reported.

Agents then compared those buyers with the owners of phones tracked near the RNC and DNC buildings around the time the bombs were placed — but found no matches, according to MS NOW.

They also analyzed the attempted bomber’s clothing, filing subpoenas for receipts from shoe sellers — and receiving a list of almost 1,200 sales — after identifying what they believed were the suspect’s sneakers, MS NOW reported.

The suspect wore light gray Nike Air Max Speed Turf shoes with a yellow logo, the FBI has said.