Informant was inside KC Proud Boys chapter, warned FBI of Jan. 6 concerns, records show

The FBI was working with an informant inside the Kansas City Proud Boys chapter in 2020 who warned the agency about the potential for violence on Jan. 6, 2021, according to records a far-right website says it received from a whistleblower.

That informant, a “second-degree” Proud Boy, breached the Capitol along with other members that day, sending text messages to a handler as the insurrection was underway, the records show.

Hundreds of pages of interview transcripts, investigative reports and other documents released in a story published by the Gateway Pundit last week indicate that the informant traveled with other members of the Kansas City Proud Boys to Washington, D.C., chipping in for gas along the way and staying with them in a rental house in Arlington, Virginia.

The Star reviewed the records, which include details that match those in documents laying out charges against Kansas City Proud Boys and earlier reporting done by The Star and other media.

The records, which also include photos and text messages, show that the informant told agents in the FBI’s Kansas City field office in December 2020 that the pro-Trump rally on Jan. 6 “should be a concern,” although he did not point a finger at the Proud Boys.

Many of the details in the documents match those described in a New York Times story published last fall about a Proud Boy who was an FBI informant. The Times, however, did not name the Proud Boys chapter that the informant belonged to, only saying it was from the Midwest. It said the documents were provided on the condition they would not be quoted from directly.

The FBI told The Star it could not comment on specific individuals or documents but issued a general statement on its use of sources.

“The FBI’s mission is to protect the American people and uphold the Constitution of the United States, and intelligence gathering is essential to those efforts,” the agency said in an email from its national press office. “While the FBI’s standard practice is not to discuss its sources and methods, it is important to understand that sources provide valuable information regarding criminal activity and national security matters.”

The Proud Boys are at the forefront of the federal investigation into the Capitol insurrection. Authorities have rounded up more than three dozen members from around the country, including several in leadership positions, on charges ranging from disorderly conduct to assaulting a federal officer to sedition.

The Gateway Pundit said the FBI documents were “leaked to us by a brave whistleblower” and claimed the information exonerated the Proud Boys from any wrongdoing in connection with the Capitol riot.

In his interviews with the FBI, the informant said there was no conspiracy to commit violence on Jan. 6 and that the Proud Boys went to D.C. to protect Trump supporters from Antifa. He also said that when inside the Capitol, the Proud Boys were not destructive and even told protesters not to invade the House chamber and to pick up their trash.

Those statements contradict the substantial volumes of photos and videos from the Capitol attack that show members of the Kansas City Proud Boys pushing against police barricades, threatening officers, inciting the crowd and tampering with retractable metal barriers once inside the building to allow more protesters to enter. The informant would even say later that his opinion changed after he saw video of two people from the KC Proud Boys group taking down the first barrier.

Much of the information the informant provided is consistent with details that prosecutors laid out in their criminal complaints against the Proud Boys, and many of the photos of the Kansas City Proud Boys that the informant gave the FBI are included in the government’s charging documents. The informant’s descriptions also dovetail with information that two of the Proud Boys provided in their signed “statements of offense” when pleading guilty.

Ryan Ashlock’s statement said that he, Christopher Kuehne, Louis Enrique Colon and “another person” left the Kansas City area on Jan. 4, 2020, to drive to Washington, D.C. The other person was not named and wasn’t charged with the rest of the KC group.

Ashlock, of Gardner; Kuehne and William Chrestman, of Olathe; Colon, of Blue Springs; and Arizona siblings Felicia and Cory Konold were indicted by a federal grand jury last year. The indictment alleged that the Proud Boys “planned with each other, and with others known and unknown, to forcibly enter the Capitol on January 6, 2021, and to stop, delay, and hinder the Congressional proceeding occurring that day.”

Chrestman also was charged with threatening to assault a federal law enforcement officer and carrying a wooden ax handle while in the Capitol building and on the grounds.

In a separate indictment, five Proud Boys leaders, including former national chairman Enrique Tarrio, were charged in June with seditious conspiracy in connection with the Capitol riot.

The informant’s name is redacted in the Kansas City FBI documents, but the Gateway Pundit identified the person it said was the informant. Since then, the man’s name has been circulating on dozens of right-wing websites as well as on social media.

According to one document, the informant — called a “confidential human source,” or CHS — warned agents on Dec. 21, 2020, about potential problems arising on Jan. 6.

The informant “stated the rally in Washington, D.C., on January 6th should be a concern,” it said. “CHS shared screenshots of 4Chan channel/pol/ where individuals were calling for a civil war on the 6th. One post stated, ‘a bunch of Trump supporters are bringing guns to DC on the 6th. A major s---storm is bound to ensue between DC police and thousands of unlawfully carrying Trump supporters. How will this play out?’ CHS stated there was lots of talk on /pol and the r/thedonald. Normal conservatives are talking about conceal carrying at the rally, and that it is needed to save America.”

Records show that on Jan. 5, 2021, the informant told the FBI that “the only violence at the rally would be started by the leftist groups. The rally attendees would only resort to violence to defend themselves.”

Screenshots of text messages indicate that on Jan. 6, the informant was communicating with a handler as the riot was underway.

“Pb did not do it, nor inspire,” said a message sent at 12:02 p.m. “The crowd did as a herd mentality. Not organized.”

The informant contacted the Kansas City FBI later that day, the records show.

“CHS stated the Proud Boys were not involved in, nor did they inspire the breaking of the barriers at the U.S. Capitol building,” the FBI report said, although he would later alter that opinion.

The informant told the FBI that the KC Proud Boys entered the Capitol 30 minutes after the building was breached “to help de-escalate Trump supporters and law enforcement.”

He said a law enforcement officer gave a “thumbs up” to the Kansas City Proud Boys “as they were trying to clear the area of people trying to fight law enforcement.” He said none of the group was involved with battery of a law enforcement officer and no one damaged property inside the Capitol. The group then left the building, he said, and returned to the rental house.

But video footage from that day tells a different story of the KC Proud Boys’ involvement. It shows Chrestman wielding an ax handle, encouraging the crowd to storm the Capitol and confronting law enforcement, telling an officer that “You shoot and I’ll take your f------ ass out!”

And a “statement of offense” signed by Colon when he pleaded guilty in April said that on the evening of Jan. 5, he attended a meeting with Chrestman, Kuehne, Ashlock and others.

“At some point during the meeting, another individual said that he did not come to Washington, D.C., to just march around and asked, ‘Do we have patriots here willing to take it by force?’” the document said.

And in Ashlock’s “statement of offense,” he said the Kansas City Proud Boys brought guns — including two AR-15 style rifles — body armor and breathing masks with them to the D.C. area.

A Jan. 14, 2021, FBI report contained a link to a video posted by the Wall Street Journal that showed a man inciting the crowd outside the Capitol and yelling, “Do you want your house back?” When the crowd responded, “Yes!,” the man shouted, “Take it!”

The informant told the FBI the man was “Billy” from Kansas and provided his cell phone number. “Billy” turned out to be Chrestman. (The cell number the informant provided was the one The Star called on three occasions in late January 2021 prior to Chrestman’s arrest, reaching him for brief interviews.)

In a later meeting, the FBI asked the informant if there were any leaders among the KC group.

“I think the biggest voice and the one that most people were paying attention to would be Billy (Chrestman), and he inasmuch admitted that the following day,” said the informant, who told the FBI he rode back to the Kansas City area with Chrestman after the riot. “Because he was like, you know, ‘When you carry around an ax handle, people tend to listen.’”

Another document said the FBI lectured the informant on Jan. 13, 2021, about breaching the Capitol with other Proud Boys.

“The CHS was admonished for entering the Capitol building, and the handling experts explained that the FBI cannot offer any protections if the CHS committed a crime,” it said. “The handling agents asked the CHS to be mindful of self-incrimination during the debrief. The CHS agreed to proceed with the debrief and provided details on multiple individuals who may have violated criminal laws on January 6, 2021.”

A Feb. 5, 2021, FBI report said the informant told agents that “many Proud Boys chapters are disbanding, including Kansas City Proud Boys” because of the concern about being labeled as terrorists. It said “the KCPB are going to ‘keep bonds alive through a new different independent group.’”

On April 5, 2021, the informant met with the FBI in Kansas City for a debriefing on what happened on Jan. 6, according to the documents. The informant said he’d heard about the pro-Trump “Stop the Steal” rally online and that members of the KC Proud Boys talked on the group’s Telegram channel about wanting to go. Those going were “specifically told to not start anything, and to maintain a defensive status while attending the rally.”

The instructions, the informant said, came from the KC Proud Boys leader, who did not go himself.

The members were told to dress similarly and not wear Proud Boys colors, the informant said. They believed Antifa could be at the rally because other Proud Boys had been at a protest in D.C. in December 2020 and encountered them there.

“The KCPB believed they were attending the rally on 1/6/21 to prevent Antifa from attacking Trump supporters,” the informant told the FBI. He said the group decided to take “general protective gear” including flak jackets and helmets.

On the Saturday before they headed to D.C., the informant said, Proud Boys met in central Missouri for a get-together and watched some members advance to “second degree.”

The group left Kansas City in two vehicles on Jan. 4 and stopped for the night outside Lexington, Kentucky, the informant said. Chrestman, he said, drove alone later in a Jeep Wrangler.

They arrived the night of Jan. 5 at the rental house in Arlington. The informant said Kuehne bought orange reflective tape for KC Proud Boys to wear to identify themselves in the crowd so they wouldn’t get into confrontations with other Proud Boys.

The next morning, the informant said, the group took the METRORail Green Line into D.C., then he contacted some Proud Boy Ozark members and arranged to meet them on a street corner. They eventually joined other Proud Boys at the Washington Monument around 10 a.m. The informant said they ran into the Konolds, who asked if they could walk with them. As the large group walked to the Capitol, he told the FBI, “there was no talk or rumors of taking the Capitol building, and no talk of occupying the land surrounding the Capitol building.”

When the barriers outside the Capitol first came down, the informant said in the debriefing, he didn’t think the Proud Boys were involved. But he said he changed his opinion “when they saw the video of Billy (Chrestman) and the Konold girl in the front taking down the first barrier.” According to the documents, the informant contacted a “handling agent” when the first barrier was breached.

The informant said he stood back and watched for one to two hours. At one point, he said, Ashlock was sprayed in the eyes with tear gas and he helped him out of the area. When the crowd moved forward, the informant said, he advanced with it and ended up near the door on the west side of the Capitol. He said there were chants about “stopping the steal” but there was no discussion of stopping the electoral college process.

A court document filed by prosecutors in Chrestman’s case, however, described a different scene. Chrestman made a self-recorded phone call later that day, bragging that “we stormed the Capitol Building, we rushed that s---, we took that house back,” the document said. Then Chrestman added, “me and two others, we were first ones through the gate.”

In the same call, the court filing said, Chrestman told the person on the phone that “I started a revolution. Because once everybody heard about this, and then we cleared out the House, they evacuated the House and everything, to stop those votes.”

The informant told the FBI in his debriefing that some of the group stood outside the Capitol building and talked about whether to go in. He said they eventually decided to do so in order to prevent protesters from taking or damaging property and document those who did. He said he saw people roaming aimlessly in the building and prevented a protester from throwing a chair at an officer. But he also admitted helping Kuehne push a podium underneath a retractable metal barrier to prevent it from closing so more protesters could come in. When the group moved downstairs, he said, he saw glass doors with the words “House of Representatives” on them.

“At that point, the CHS thought the group had gone far enough, made an announcement that the protesters’ voices had been heard and that it was time to go,” the FBI report said. About that time, the informant said, a large group of Capitol Police told them that there had been a shooting. He was ushered out a window by officers, he told the FBI, and because protesters were blocking the stairs, climbed down a nearby conduit.

At 4:38 that afternoon, the documents show, the informant’s handler sent him a text.

“Are you back to safety now? Like hotel or something”

“Rental house, obeying curfew,” the informant replied at 5:17 p.m.

“Good thanks,” the handler said. “You are going to sleep well tonight.”