J6 Pipe Bomber’s Motive Revealed In DOJ Pretrial Detention Memorandum

Nearly five years after pipe bombs were planted outside the DNC and RNC headquarters on January 5, 2021, authorities arrested Brian Cole Jr. on December 4, 2025. The 30-year-old from Woodbridge, Virginia, now faces charges for allegedly planting those devices. Within hours of the arrest, major outlets rushed to frame Cole as a MAGA adherent. NBC News reported that Cole “believed conspiracy theories about the 2020 election.” Politico ran with the headline, “Justice Department says Jan. 6 pipe bomb suspect believed election conspiracy theories.”

However, the suspects’ own words belie that claim.

The Department of Justice filed a memorandum on December 29 in support of pretrial detention for Cole. The document dismantles the narrative the media pushed following Cole’s arrest. 

According to the filing, Cole initially denied assembling or planting the bombs during his videotaped interview. He claimed he drove his Nissan Sentra to Washington alone to attend a protest about the election outcome. Cole explained his reasoning: “I didn’t agree with what people were doing, like just telling half the country that they – that their – that they just need to ignore it. I didn’t think that was a good idea, so I went to the protest.”

He also described himself as someone who “has never really been an openly political person” and avoids discussing politics with family to prevent conflict. According to Cole, “no one knows” his political views, including his family. After the 2020 election, “when it first seemed like something was wrong” and “stuff started happening,” he began following the issue on YouTube and Reddit and felt “bewildered.” Cole believed that if people “feel that, you know, something as important as voting in the federal election is being tampered with, is being, you know, being – you know, relegated null and void, then, like, someone needs to speak up, right? Someone up top.”

Cole felt leaders on “both sides, public figures” should not “ignore people’s grievances” or call them “conspiracy theorists,” “bad people,” “Nazis,” or “fascists.” Instead, “if people feel that their votes are like just being thrown away, then . . . at the very least someone should address it.” 

After agents confronted Cole with surveillance video showing him planting the bombs, he admitted he was the individual in the footage. He then walked investigators through the entire process of constructing, transporting, and planting the devices.

Cole stated he assembled the devices in the hours before driving to Washington on January 5, 2021, and cleaned them with disinfectant wipes. He eventually admitted he did not travel to Washington to attend a protest but to plant the devices. 

“When asked why he placed the devices at the RNC and DNC, the defendant responded, ‘I really don’t like either party at this point,’” prosecutors said in their filing, describing the interview. “[Cole] also explained that the idea to use pipe bombs came from his interest in history, specifically the Troubles in Ireland. The defendant denied that his actions were directed toward Congress or related to the proceedings scheduled to take place on January 6.” 

Cole allegedly said in the interview that he had actually intended for the devices to detonate and set 60-minute timers on both after planting them outside of the DNC and RNC. After leaving them, he said he went to his car, picked up food from a restaurant in Virginia and then returned home. 

When agents returned to the subject of motive, Cole explained that “something just snapped” after “watching everything, just everything getting worse.” 

“In his own words, the defendant did so because he did not ‘like either party,’ but ‘they were in charge’ and thus were, in the defendant’s mind, an appropriate target for extreme acts of violence,” prosecutors explained. “The defendant’s choice of targets risked the lives not only of innocent pedestrians and office workers but also of law enforcement, first responders, and national political leaders who were inside of the respective party headquarters or drove by them on January 6, 2021, including the Vice President-elect and Speaker of the House.” 

The DOJ memorandum presents a picture of someone disenchanted with the entire political system rather than a MAGA activist. Cole’s stated motivation centered on frustration with both major parties for their handling of election concerns, and his confession reveals someone who felt compelled to act against the institutions themselves, not in support of one side against the other.