November 1, 2001: FBI Alerts Business Community About Terrorist Threat, but Not Elected Officials

The FBI alerts InfraGard members (see 1996-2008) of a potential terrorist threat to bridges in California. Officials of Enron are also notified. However, the FBI does not immediately notify California governor Gray Davis, who learns of the threat from his brother, Barry Davis, an employee of the financial firm Morgan Stanley. Davis’s press secretary, Steve Maviglio, later recalls: “[Governor Davis] said his brother talked to him before the FBI. And the governor got a lot of grief for releasing the information. In his defense, he said, ‘I was on the phone with my brother, who is an investment banker. And if he knows, why shouldn’t the public know?‘… You’d think an elected official would be the first to know, not the last.” [Progressive, 2/7/2008]