Republicans’ election denialism will lead to violence -- based on cult behavior: Ex-FBI deputy

In a Thursday discussion about President Donald Trump's election loss, a former FBI assistant director for counterintelligence, Frank Figliuzzi, explained that he expects violence from the right-wing to get worse.

Figliuzzi began by lamenting that he's always the guy who comes on television to hand Americans the bad news that the sky is falling, but that his entire professional career is based on detecting when the sky is falling.

"I have no other training than to compare this and what we're seeing here to a radicalization process that leads to a flashpoint that leads to violence," he told MSNBC's Nicolle Wallace. "And the fact that people in suits and ties and expensive shoes who live in nice homes and have advanced degrees, some of them law degrees, and have fancy titles -- they're elected officials -- are all buying into this actually makes this mainstream madness."

He explained that until recently most Americans have operated under the understanding that Trump's attempts to overthrow the election is just more of his "craziness" and "part of some lunatic fringe." Most Americans assume they don't have to worry about it because it's an obvious minority of people who are just "strange."

"But I think what we've gotten over the last two weeks or so, and even in the last two days, is proof positive that this is no longer lunatic fringe stuff," Figliuzzi said. "This is now part of our mainstream. And what does that do from a security perspective? It legitimatized it. And so the numbers will climb in those that tell you, 'This something is wrong with this election process. I can't tell you what it was, but I think it's true.' And what that means is, when you see this radicalization process, when you see it mainstreamed, when you see a flashpoint coming -- meaning the outcome they wanted isn't going to happen. And eventually, a Supreme Court will say, 'no, you got nothing,' and it is the court of the last resort. What cults do in those circumstances, what organization that seek violence do is they do something called 'forcing the end.' They make happen what they wanted to happen when they see it is not really going to happen without them. And that is when the violence occurred and that is what I'm most concerned about."

Watch the interview below: