Legacy Media Fast-Tracks New Narrative on Pipe-Bomber Suspect
“We’ve learned from our sources that he [Cole] is believed to be a Trump supporter. And so, lots of questions …”
Nearly five years after pipe bombs were discovered outside the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee and Republican National Committee in Washington, D.C., a suspect has been arrested in the case. On Thursday, federal agents arrested Brian Cole Jr., 30, of Woodbridge, Virginia. He was charged with “transportation of an explosive device via interstate commerce, and attempted malicious destruction by means of an explosive device.” Attorney General Pam Bondi told reporters that the investigation remains ongoing and that additional charges may be filed.
Investigators linked Cole to the devices using credit-card records for bomb components, cell-phone and license-plate data placing him near the scene, and surveillance footage. The bombs, planted outside the buildings on the eve of the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot, were safely deactivated and caused no injuries.
U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro joined Fox News’ Laura Ingraham on Thursday night to discuss the case. Cole, who is said to be very close to his family, lives with his mother and sisters in the family home and works in his father’s bail-bond business. Neighbors described Cole as a “quiet guy” who was often seen walking his chihuahua.
Cole has no prior arrests. According to Pirro, he has little social life. Nothing was said about his politics.
Cole’s grandmother reportedly described him as “naive” and possibly “autistic.”
On Friday, legacy media outlets began reporting that Cole was a Trump supporter who believed the 2020 presidential election was stolen. This narrative was driven by comments from “anonymous sources familiar with the investigation.”
NPR reported that Cole “told investigators he believed conspiracy theories that the 2020 election was stolen from then-President Trump.”
The Department of Justice said Cole spoke to law enforcement for more than four hours on Thursday in a custodial interview. He expressed views supportive of Trump, and said he believed the 2020 conspiracy theories, according to the person familiar with the investigation, who wasn’t authorized to speak publicly.
The piece goes on to insinuate that the suspect may have planted the devices to distract law enforcement as rioters moved to breach the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
The discovery of the bombs occurred at a critical moment in 2021 — the first was discovered just before the initial breach of rioters at the Peace Circle near the Capitol, and then the second was found as Proud Boys helped flood the Capitol’s west front and the fighting was intensifying.
The story quotes a passage from a book written by former USCP Chief Steven Sund: “I believe the timing and placement of these devices were deliberate diversionary tactics, intended to divert significant resources away from securing the Capitol, which they succeeded in doing.”
NPR wasn’t the outlier here. Nearly every major legacy outlet pushed some variation of the same narrative. During a Friday CBS News report of the story, producer Anna Schechter said, “We’ve learned from our sources that he [Cole] is believed to be a Trump supporter. And so, lots of questions …”
A headline from MSNOW declared, “Pipe bomb suspect confesses and has expressed support for Trump, sources say.”
MS NOW 🙄
BREAKING: Pipe bomb suspect confessed to planting bombs, indicated support for Trump 😂 sources say pic.twitter.com/vhRrZRL2Ka
— Joni Job (@jj_talking) December 5, 2025
Clearly, I have no insight into Cole’s actual political views. But the emerging narrative is starting to resemble the Democrats’ Hegseth hoax, in which anonymous sources claimed War Secretary Pete Hegseth had ordered survivors of a September 2 drug-boat strike to be killed — a claim that quickly fell apart when the truth was revealed.
In fact, a Thursday evening report from The Daily Wire suggests the opposite may be true:
Brian Cole, Jr. worked for a bail bonds company run by his father that worked to free illegal immigrants from ICE facilities and sued the Trump administration’s Department of Homeland Security.
Weeks before 30-year-old Cole Jr. allegedly planted pipe bombs at the headquarters of the Democrat and Republican parties on January 5, 2021, a court ruled against the company in its lawsuit attacking the Trump administration on immigration issues, The Daily Wire has learned. An FBI affidavit in the case notes that the suspect works for a bail bond company and lives with his mother.
Later in 2021, the company held a press conference bemoaning anti-black racism with a left-wing attorney. Cole Sr. and Benjamin Crump, who represented the family of Trayvon Martin, attempted to sic the Biden Department of Justice on a local Tennessee prosecutor who had raised questions about the bail bond company.
Crump also represented George Floyd’s family in their civil suit against Minneapolis, which resulted in a whopping $27 million settlement. Simply put, Crump is a progressive attorney who consistently takes on progressive clients.
Moreover, the Left’s narrative doesn’t jive with the fact that Cole purchased some of the bomb-making materials as early as May 2019, long before anyone knew the 2020 election would turn into such a fiasco.
Yes, Cole’s politics could differ from his family’s — just as Charlie Kirk’s alleged assassin, Tyler Robinson’s views diverged sharply from those of his relatives. But given Cole’s work in his father’s business and his close bond with his mother and sisters, that seems highly unlikely.
Finally, if Cole were truly a MAGA supporter, this case probably would have been solved a long time ago — by the Biden administration.
Once again, we’re watching the Left dive headfirst into a narrative based on anonymous sources they’re hoping are right because they want so badly for it to be true. Perhaps they should put the brakes on and let the facts come out.
Responding to the developing trend in a Friday post on X, conservative podcaster Jesse Kelly wrote: “They’re going to run stories about how this bomber was a right-winger, and by the time they get debunked, the lie will be cemented into your Liberal Aunt Peggie’s head for life. This is what they do. Create a world of make-believe for Democrats to live in.”
They’re going to run stories about how this bomber was a right winger and by the time they get debunked, the lie will be cemented into your Liberal Aunt Peggie’s head for life.
This is what they do. Create a world of make believe for Democrats to live in. https://t.co/bKBaRHcoJF
— Jesse Kelly (@JesseKellyDC) December 5, 2025
Elizabeth writes commentary for Legal Insurrection and The Washington Examiner. She is an academy fellow at The Heritage Foundation. Please follow Elizabeth on X or LinkedIn.
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Comments
Another black white guy?
Yes! Jake Tapper confidently announced that a 30 year old white man had been arrested. Then when they showed his picture a day later, the white man had black skin.
Skin color doesn’t matter. He self-identified as black.
Gosh it’s almost like the young have caught on and called them all fake news.
They don’t even care any more. They are only catering to one audience demographic above a certain age that will still listen to them. The truth and fact based investigations do not matter to them.
I was a reporter when it was an honorable calling. The good old days were never as good as we’d like to think, but it’s been worse and worse since 9/11, and I’ve been calling it out for 20+ years. When I get in a real world conversation about it, I tell the other person that they’ll never meet anyone more cynical about the media because I have been inside when they mostly did their jobs. Disgusted is a mild word for how I feel about the media. Grrrrrrr.
I agree that after the initial shock of 9/11, it all began to go downhill. But once Trump arrived on the scene, the Left lost all pretense of objective coverage. Integrity fell off a cliff. It’s been a textbook example of the “gradually, but suddenly principle.”
Legacy media coverage of the news has simply become what they want people to believe.
The ball started rolling downhill when EBay and Craigslist took the classifieds away in the 1990s. The Internet created thousands of independent publishers, most of them highly partisan. The legacy media’s editorial decline began in earnest in 2002 when the New York Times and 60 Minutes launched the Iraq WMD hoax.
From there is was gradual erosion until Trayvon Martin and “black lives matter.” By the time Trump came along, the skids had been greased. The result: broad lack of trust. The crossing of the Rubicon occurred in October ’24 when Joe Rogan drew 70 million views for interviews with Trump and Vance.
https://news.gallup.com/poll/695762/trust-media-new-low.aspx
Trust may be low. But it doesn’t matter as long as Dem, Independent and Swing voters still watch the MSM. Broadcast TV still has the largest audience. If you watch them or even just have the TTV on, you are soaking up their narratives.
In the words of the late Sen Reid, it works, doesn’t it? They still have a significant audience which is capable of winning elections, particularly in lower turnout contests where Dems are energized and Reps aren’t.
NPR reported that Cole “told investigators he believed conspiracy theories that the 2020 election was stolen from then-President Trump.”
Yes, that is why, having foresight into future events, he went ahead and purchased the bomb making components in September 2020, before the election had taken place.
Yup. Black-white autistic computer nerds from Leftist families are prescient like that.
Good eye.
That and the bombs were meant to divert LE attention from an unplanned event (the breach at the Capitol) hours before said event took place. Seems the suspect is a regular Carnac. (If the breach was planned, there’s no evidence any of the rioters planned it. So who planned it, and how did the suspect become aware of the plan?)
He bought the first components in May 2019! … And, the story has already been debunked. I’m going to write about this today:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15358571/January-6-pipe-bomber-autistic-recluse-computer-nerd-grieving-loss-pet-chihuahua.html
Freedom of the press does not mean freedom to lie. That needs to be repeated over and over again every time if the press is caught lying (again).
Actually, it does mean the freedom to lie. But if the lies are of a certain type, there can still be consequences.
Meh, bring back dueling with harsh consequences for refusing the challenge if it was your ‘slander/lies/libel/statement’ that led to the challenge. Make refusal not just grounds for termination but grounds for any/everyone to disassociate from you/your employer to include termination of contracts and a bar on govt funding.
Do that and after a short period the temperature would get lowered. Either by the ‘departure’ of those prone to engage in conduct provoking a dual or through example.
Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr are in the house,
“Did that little twerp become famous?”
I agree. There’s a difference between “freedom” and “rights.” “Rights” come with obligations and responsibilities and are self-limiting (no innocent person is ever intentionally harmed by someone exercising their rights – as soon as that threshold is breached, the act becomes a crime). Freedom literally means that you’re not subject to any prior restraint and can do anything, including crimes (for which you can be held responsible). Because you’re not in solitary confinement, you’re free to murder your neighbor (although you don’t have a right to murder your neighbor). To be “free” means to be unencumbered by restraint on the pretense that you might commit a crime.
The first amendment protects against prior restraint, and the law of defamation gives pretty much absolute protection for opinion. But make a false assertion of fact that damages someone — especially if that someone is an ordinary person as opposed to a public official or otherwise is a public figure — and learn the consequences.
It’s almost impossible to win a defamation case because you have to demonstrate malice which is a pretty high bar. It happens but not as often as it should.
I do not disagree. This is an example of freedom – there can be no prior restraint (by government) and you are free to harm an innocent person while be subject to responsibility for the harm.
Note that you don’t have a right to do so – the First Amendment does not protect a “right” to harm an innocent party, as the exercise of a right, by definition, is an act that doesn’t intentionally harm an innocent party. The Bill of Rights protects rights by making – theoretically – prior restraint by government impossible. Again, the theory is that you should be left alone as if you have no criminal intent until you actually commit a crime. Then you become responsible for it. But before then, the government can’t, through legislation, restrain you because you might commit a crime. In other words, you’re “free” and have “freedom.” How you use it is up to you.
Only a public figure must demonstrate malice. Private figures do not, and it is therefore much easier for them to win defamation cases.
But in this case no individual has been defamed, so this is irrelevant.
Gee some people seem to be all for the press lying.
Not me at all. The media are quite free to lie, and if they tell certain sorts of lies then they are equally free to pay the price for doing it.
You don’t have to be for something to be against the law banning it.
Yes, it does. The freedom of speech and of the press, a/k/a the freedom of expression, has a very small and known list of exceptions. Defamation is among them, and so is fraud, but lying is not. In this case no individual is being defamed, and no one is being defrauded of money, so the lie is protected expression.
You may want to update this post:
https://x.com/alx/status/1997159648332226744?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1997159648332226744%7Ctwgr%5E1c288eae0f35b020ba88037c847f912de75e0853%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Finstapundit.com%2F760673%2F
Well, of course. Clarity has to come from a foreign source.
The latest CNN “sources say” narrative is Cole’s motive was he believed the 2020 election was stolen from Trump.
https://lite.cnn.com/2025/12/05/politics/accused-pipe-bomber-made-statements
Readers are expected to believe that Cole, who worked with his dad in a business built on freeing ICE detainees, was full-on MAGA.
I don’t know who to believe anymore. CNN is now reporting that Cole pushed Trump out of the way at Butler, while MSNBC is reporting that Cole is “Q.”
I have not seen MSNOW “reporting” that, but feel free to add a link.
While I understand how some of the comments above may have affected your perception, I think your sarcasm detector needs some recalibration.
The media just refuses to let go of the “Big lie” method of “journalism”.
The Big Lie works. They are giving their audience what they want to hear.
If he had been a Trump supporter, he would have been rounded up Jan 7.
An interesting parallel to the “Epstein Files” battles. If those files had material in them to damage DJT, the Dems would have opened, or leaked, them for public consumption in their on-going attacks on DJT. Now we have them pushing the narrative that the “pipe bomber” is/was a Trump supporter. If that were so, as the author mentioned, the Dems would have completed the case, outed the guy to paint Trump as having a gang of “terrorists” planting bombs to overthrow the G. But in both cases they didn’t have any of that because there wasn’t any of it…. They buried and stalled on both because they knew that the truth would damage them…
Here’s a scenario: Trump knows full well who’s in those files, and that a whole lot of them are prominent Democrats. He’s been making a show of reluctance in order to have the Democrats who are NOT named but who somehow think he is named, to “force” their release. Anyone notice that, among others, Hound Dog Bill and his lovely wife Hillary have been silent?
Here’s a good project for someone: Make a list of all the prominent politicians who haven’t said word one about the Epstein files. Then take a close look. LOL
There is nothing in those files that will implicate any other living person in a crime. Perhaps some items may make some Democrats look bad, but nobody cares. The Media will bury it, so Dem and Ind voters will never hear it. Rep voters hearing it is irrelevant because we don’t vote for Democrats anyway.
Cole’s grandmother reportedly described him as “naive” and possibly “autistic.”
How Al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) recruited suicide bombers, according to a Navy SEAL and senior chief in the book The Sheriff of Ramadi:
“Those SOBs go out and recruit kids to do this. Our interrogators were able to get the whole story (from captured AQI recruits). One of them had been sexually abused as a young boy and was told the only way he could reclaim his family honor was to die for Allah in this manner. The senior AQI leaders – the foreigners – won’t do this themselves. They get others to do it. They prey upon kids, young boys and girls who are insecure or have some psychological disorder. Some of them have severe learning disabilities…”
Note that the federal government monitors social media for threats such persons may pose to government officials and the public. The monitoring operation would be perfect cover for recruiting such persons for black ops. Just sayin’.
This wasn’t the first nor the last pipe bomb the left has thrown in the machine. Expect far worse.
Another observation is fentanyl. Those addled nutjobs will do ANYTHING for their golden Fetty calf.
I believe that we should be told the extent, if any, of Cole’s disabilities. My adult son has intellectual disabilities and I am well aware of his weaknesses. If Cole has intellectual disabilities then I don’t think we know the true story right now.
Autistic doesn’t necessarily point to intellectual disabilities. Sometimes it points to intellectual superiority, hampered by crushing social disabilities. I knew my share of those at MIT, and just from his photo, this guy might have blended right into a roomful of them.
Obviously a White MAGA Trump supporter
Just ask Jake Tapper
Thats why the Eff Bee Eye couldn’t find his identity
I think the J6 riot was sketchy, and the pipe bomb story is sketchy. Someone recommended a Substack by “fxregan,” who claims to be an ex-FBI employee. I was not impressed by it. He (she?) wrote there is no evidence for an anti-Trump J6 conspiracy: nothing to see there; move along, move along.
“fxregan” wrote that Cole used seven credit cards to buy bomb-making materials. Sounds odd to me, but maybe some people live like that.
Why would a Trump supporter plant bombs at both the DNC and the RNC, unless he’s a nut (which Cole may be). Or perhaps he’s a patsy in some corrupt scheme?
Cole is clearly a nut. Sometimes, nuts just want to stir the pot and get something going so they can watch it on TV.
” Simply put, Crump is a progressive attorney who consistently takes on progressive clients.”
No. Crump is a race baiter and attention hog that only shows up for black people if there are tv camera’s and money involved so he can throw racism charges around for a payday
Can we just ignore “anonymous sources familiar with the matter” from now on? We just went through this with WaPo and the drug boats.
Simply put, if Crump is on one side of any dispute, you can be pretty sure that justice is on the other side.
Yep. Excellent rule of thumb.