There are many ways to undermine democracy. In the United States, one of the most persistent threats to democratic rights has been the hoarding of power by largely unaccountable security forces that, in a single-minded drive to protect what they define as national security, have tended to run roughshod over civil liberties and treat activists and dissidents as criminals.

It was the case in the early twentieth century, when the FBI rounded up radicals, foreigners, and draft-evaders. It was the case mid-century, when the COINTELPRO program harassed Matin Luther King Jr and other civil rights protesters. It was the case under George W. Bush, when a newly launched “war on terror” became an excuse to go after law-abiding Muslims and government critics. And it was the case just last year, as a panoply of federal agencies were used by a desperate president Trump to go after protesters, journalists, and immigration lawyers, to name a few.

All of this is particularly relevant in light of a major new investigation by Buzzfeed published last week, examining the details of last year’s highly publicized FBI thwarting of a plot by a Michigan militia to kidnap the state’s Democratic governor, Gretchen Whitmer. At the time, I made a basic point about the whole situation: we should be careful about simply accepting the FBI’s account of the events at face value, not least because the sparse details included in its affidavit called to mind an old and controversial Bureau practice. That would be the FBI’s use of informants and undercover agents to effectively manufacture their own terrorist plots — typically by entrapping down-on-their-luck or mentally unwell Muslim men — which they then foiled and publicized, thereby justifying more money, resources, and powers for the “war on terror.”