Lawmakers question the FBI's preparedness and response to New Orleans attack that killed 14 people

NEW ORLEANS — Congressional lawmakers demanded answers Wednesday about the FBI's response to the Jan. 1 truck attack in New Orleans that killed 14 people, questioning why the bureau's top official in the city was out of town and raising concerns about its initial, erroneous assertion that the rampage was ''not a terrorist event.''

In a series of letters, Sen. Chuck Grassley, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and Sen. Ron Johnson, chairman of the Senate's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, also suggested Facebook missed red flags and asked the social media company to provide a timeline of when it became aware of threatening videos Shamsud-Din Jabbar posted before he plowed a pickup truck through a crowd of New Year's revelers.

Jabbar, a 42-year-old Texas native and U.S. Army veteran, professed his allegiance to the Islamic State group and an intent to harm others in a series of posts between 1:29 a.m. and 3:02 a.m., according to federal authorities. The Bourbon Street attack began at 3:15 a.m.

Meta Platforms, Facebook's parent company, did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Associated Press.

Police fatally shot Jabbar during an exchange of gunfire at the scene of the deadly crash of the rented pickup truck on Bourbon Street, famous worldwide for its festive vibes in New Orleans' historic French Quarter. Federal investigators so far believe Jabbar acted alone, but are continuing to explore his contacts.

The additional scrutiny from Congress comes amid multiple investigations launched by the city and state into security lapses and law enforcement response. Grassley, a Republican from Iowa, and Johnson, a Republican from Wisconsin, said Congress intends to conduct ''objective and independent oversight'' into the attack.

The lawmakers are also drilling into the FBI's preparedness ahead of a major holiday weekend, including the Sugar Bowl, and a bungled initial communications response that bewildered the public and was at odds with the plain reality that the attack was an act of terror. The FBI recovered a black flag of the Islamic State group from the rented pickup used in the attack.

The special agent in charge of the FBI's New Orleans field office, Lyonel Myrthil, had been vacationing in Europe during the attack and ''took multiple days to return to New Orleans,'' the lawmakers wrote in a letter to bureau, citing ''whistleblower disclosures.''

''These are major public events that a SAC should be present for,'' they wrote, adding the FBI failed to account for Myrthil's absence ''in any of the joint briefings it provided to Congress."

''The public deserves complete transparency and the truth regarding the New Orleans terrorist attack," they said.

The FBI confirmed to the AP that Myrthil had been ''en route to a family vacation out of the country'' but said he ''immediately worked to arrange his flight back to New Orleans, while joining investigative calls until his return'' Jan. 2. The bureau added that then-Deputy Director Paul Abbate ''was not overtly aware" that Myrthil was out of the country but deployed a senior counterterrorism official from FBI headquarters within hours of the incident.

''None of this had any impact on the swiftness of resources and FBI assets that immediately responded and surged to this incident,'' the bureau said in a statement.

The FBI official who described the attack as ''not a terrorist event,'' Alethea Duncan, had been speaking in Myrthil's place. Fox News reported last week that Duncan, an assistant special agent in charge in New Orleans, had been temporarily reassigned.

The FBI did not respond to a question Wednesday about Duncan's status.

Lawmakers also want to know when Meta became aware that Jabbar made recordings using Meta's smart glasses to scout the historic French Quarter by bicycle months before the attack.

They pressed Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg to share if any other posts from Jabbar had ever been flagged or removed by Facebook and whether the attacker used other accounts or pages and if anyone had engaged with his posts. Grassley and Johnson noted other people responsible for mass killings in the U.S. had signaled their intentions on Facebook and other social media platforms.

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Mustian reported from New York and Tucker from Washington.