The son of a man accused of planning a violent attack on the southern border says his father is a “compulsive liar” who “talks a big game.”
“He’s not a terrorist,” Joseph Faye, 30, told NBC News on Wednesday. “He talks a big game, but it’s all lies.”
Faye’s father, Paul Faye Sr., was charged with the possession of an unregistered silencer under the National Firearms Act, according to a criminal complaint filed on February 2. Faye Sr. was accused of trying to sell an unregistered AK-47 suppressor to an undercover FBI agent.
According to the criminal complaint, the undercover FBI agent befriended Faye Sr. via the social media platform TikTok.
Faye subsequently told three undercover agents at a meeting in April that he believed the federal government was letting illegal immigrants through the southern border on purpose, per the document.
According to the criminal complaint, Faye Sr. subsequently outlined his plans to attack the southern border. He told an agent that he planned to transport explosives to the border and that he would act as a sniper there.
“I would be on top that roof right there, zeroing out, taking out anybody,” Faye Sr. told an undercover agent during a meeting in December.
But Faye Sr.’s son says his father isn’t much of a marksman.
“We went hunting, and my dad had to shoot at a deer standing still three different times before he hit it,” Joseph Faye said. “He’s not a sniper.”
In fact, the younger Faye said that most of the weapons in his father’s “war room” belonged to him.
According to the criminal complaint, undercover agents spotted numerous firearms, including a Creedmoor rifle, several AR-15 rifles, and a shotgun when they visited him in January.
“I’m a deer hunter. I have hunting rifles. The only gun my father owns is an old shotgun he got from his dad before he died,” Joseph Faye said.
The younger Faye said he’d long suspected his father’s new friends could’ve been undercover agents and had warned him about it.
“I said, ‘They’re feds, they’re undercover cops,’ and he said, ‘No they’re not,'” Joseph Faye told NBC News. “Every time they came to see us, they’d be in different vehicles. They always brought ARs. Once we went out camping with my family and the next thing I know they show up.”
“I told my dad, ‘They’re feds, no doubt about it,'” he added.
