Terrorism in the United States

"This Committee cannot live in denial, which is what some would have us do when they suggest that this hearing dilute its focus by investigating threats unrelated to Al Qaeda. The Department of Homeland Security and this committee were formed in response to the al Qaeda attacks of 9/11. There is no equivalency of threat between al Qaeda and neo-Nazis, environmental extremists or other isolated madmen. Only al Qaeda and its Islamist affiliates in this country are part of an international threat to our nation. Indeed by the Justice Department’s own record not one terror related case in the last two years involved neo-Nazis, environmental extremists, militias or anti-war groups."

"Based on fatalities we see terrorism was relatively high in the 1970s, then comparably ‘quiet’ – with exception of major outlying years, 1995 and 2001 – in the decades which followed. Over the last five years there has been a small but steady increase in terrorist deaths in the US. In most years terror attacks caused fewer than 50 deaths per year, and in many years no one died from attacks. With exception of 2001, terrorism accounted for less than 0.01% of all deaths in the US in every year since 1970. For comparison, around 120 people die in road accidents in the United States every day.16 This means the annual death toll from terrorism in most years is equivalent to half a day or less on the country’s roads."

"White supremacist extremists will remain the deadliest domestic terror threat to the United States, according to the Department of Homeland Security's first annual homeland threat assessment, which details a range of threats from election interference to unprecedented storms."

"“Yesterday, presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz responded to the terrorist attacks in Brussels by suggesting that the United States needs to ‘empower law enforcement to patrol and secure Muslim neighborhoods before they become radicalized.’ Research I have been conducting over the past eight years on Muslim-American communities and their relationship with the police shows that Cruz’s proposal is exactly the wrong way to make America safer,” says David Schanzer, an associate professor of the practice at the Sanford School and director of the Triangle Center on Terrorism and Homeland Security. “There is no evidence that entire Muslim-American neighborhoods are at risk of radicalizing to violence. And ‘patrolling’ neighborhoods will do nothing to identify the small number of individuals who may be attracted to ISIS and inclined to engage in violence.” “Our research shows that instead police should build trusting relationships with Muslim-Americans so they can work together to build resilience against violent extremism.”"

"John G. Horgan, who studies terrorism at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell, said the mismatch between public perceptions and actual cases had become steadily more obvious to scholars. “There’s an acceptance now of the idea that the threat from jihadi terrorism in the United States has been overblown,” Dr. Horgan said. “And there’s a belief that the threat of right-wing, antigovernment violence has been underestimated.” Counting terrorism cases is a subjective enterprise, relying on shifting definitions and judgment calls."

"According to data provided by the Department of Justice, the vast majority of individuals convicted of terrorism and terrorism-related offenses since 9/11 came here from outside of our country."

"The FBI for the first time has identified fringe conspiracy theories as a domestic terrorist threat, according to a previously unpublicized document obtained by Yahoo News. (Read the document below.) The FBI intelligence bulletin from the bureau’s Phoenix field office, dated May 30, 2019, describes “conspiracy theory-driven domestic extremists,” as a growing threat, and notes that it is the first such report to do so. It lists a number of arrests, including some that haven’t been publicized, related to violent incidents motivated by fringe beliefs."

"To level set before we begin, I’d like to explain how the FBI works counterterrorism. The FBI categorizes terrorism investigations into two programs: international terrorism and domestic terrorism. International terrorism includes investigations into members of designated foreign terrorist organizations, state sponsors of terrorism, and homegrown violent extremists. The latter are individuals inside the United States, who have been radicalized primarily in the United States, and who are inspired by, but not receiving individual direction from, foreign terrorist organizations. Domestic terrorists are individuals who commit violent criminal acts in furtherance of ideological goals stemming from domestic issues. A majority of our domestic terrorism cases fall into one of four categories: racially motivated violent extremism, anti-government/anti-authority extremism, animal rights/environmental extremism, and abortion extremism."

"[P]reventing acts of terrorism, regardless of ideology, is the FBI’s number one priority."

"Today, as news reports indicated that the U.S. Department of State will – for the first time ever – designate a white supremacist group as a terrorist organization, experts from ADL (the Anti-Defamation League) and George Washington University’s Program on Extremism released a joint report on white supremacist terrorism, urging the government to take further steps to address this emerging threat. The report notes that, for now, none of the 69 organizations designated by the U.S. Department of State as Foreign Terrorist Organizations are white supremacist organizations, despite the dramatic uptick in that threat. The State Department’s expected announcement could alter that status – a historic shift in policy and one that ADL has long supported and applauds. “White supremacists are clearly an international threat, so it is important the Department of State apply designations authority to certain groups and take other meaningful steps,” said Jonathan A. Greenblatt, ADL CEO. “White supremacist violence is spreading across borders and across continents. A terrorist designation is a powerful tool to address this threat.”"