On Monday, the Rutherford County sheriff’s office released a statement confirming that it had arrested an armed suspect for making threats against Federal Emergency Management Agency employees but had concluded that the suspect had acted alone and that there were not “truck loads of militia” targeting relief workers.

Around 1 p.m. Saturday, an official with the U.S. Forest Service, which is supporting recovery efforts after Hurricane Helene along with FEMA, sent an urgent message to numerous federal agencies warning that “FEMA has advised all federal responders Rutherford County, N.C., to stand down and evacuate the county immediately. The message stated that National Guard troops ‘had come across … trucks of armed militia saying they were out hunting FEMA.’”

“The IMTs [incident management teams] have been notified and are coordinating the evacuation of all assigned personnel in that county,” the email added.