The U.S. threat landscape poses a daunting but familiar test for Trump in his second term

During his first term as president, Donald Trump saw the height of a violent civil war in Syria, a resurgence of Islamic State activity, and an increase in ISIS-inspired attacks both in foreign as in North American territory.

Eight years later, many of these bogeymen have returned.

In the past eight weeks, Syrian rebels have launched a blitzkrieg offensive, regaining control of the country and then its capital, forcing ruler Bashar al-Assad to flee to Russia for safe haven. Like Trump’s first term, the instability in the Middle East has raised new questions about whether or what role the US should play in Syria, amid concerns that failure to act will further open the power vacuum in Syria, making it ripe for exploitation by Islamic State militants and other terrorist groups.

And on Wednesday, US authorities scrambled to investigate and respond to two separate attacks in New Orleans and Las Vegas. Despite taking place thousands of miles apart, both are being investigated as possible acts of terrorism, a stark indicator that the threat of homegrown extremism remains as pervasive as ever.

Ahead of Trump’s second term, the violence—and the unexpected collapse of Syria’s authoritarian regime—has he asked new questions on how the US can act.

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Options for Trump

Trump, meanwhile, has long opposed the idea of involving US troops in foreign wars. In 2019, he ordered the complete withdrawal of all military personnel from northern Syria.

He reiterated that view in a post last month on Truth Social, saying the US should have “nothing to do with” the situation in Syria.

“Let it play out,” he said.

It is unclear whether, or to what extent, this week’s deadly attacks may have influenced Trump’s decision. Shamsud-Din Jabbar, a Texas native and US Army veteran, killed fourteen people in New Orleans on Wednesday morning as he drove from Houston to Bourbon Street in a rented pickup truck, driving through crowds of people gathered outside the famous string of bars. celebrate the new year Jabbar himself was gunned down by the police.

FBI officials said Jabbar, who had placed an Islamic State flag on the rented vehicle, was “100 percent inspired by ISIS” to carry out the terror attack, although he still it is unclear whether he has any legitimate ties to the group.

Jabbar had committed allegiance to the Islamic State and is believed to have joined the group last summer, officials said. He was also seen on surveillance footage planting two explosive devices in refrigerators along the corners of Bourbon and Orleans streets, and another nearby intersection, though bomb squad teams later secured them.

Separately, the FBI said it is investigating a Las Vegas explosion carried out in a Tesla Cybertruck outside the Trump Hotel in Las Vegas as a possible act of terrorism.

The suspect in this case, Matthew Alan Livelsberger, had been a member of the Elite US Army Special Forces unit before the explosion, and FBI officials on Thursday raided a home in Colorado Springs they said they believed might be connected to the case.

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Should Trump choose to maintain his longstanding opposition to US intervention in “foreign wars,” there are other options he could take to try to quell violent domestic attacks. That could include cracking down on immigration, a policy long embraced by Trump and many Republicans in Congress, to prevent potential threat actors from crossing the border.

In fact, the Department of Homeland Security told reporters in June that it had identified more than 400 migrants from Central Asia and other countries who had been smuggled into the United States by ISIS-linked smuggling groups over the past three years, leading to a flurry of new arrests and “subjects of concern” designations.

DHS officials first said the arrests reported by NBCthey were done out of “an abundance of caution” and noted at the time that they had identified no credible threat to the United States from the migrants, who may simply be trying to find a way to cross into the US.

Still, a border crackdown may not be enough to solve the problem, made especially complex by the role of lone wolf threat actors and people who are radicalized online.

A widespread threat

The FBI has focused heavily on the terrorism risk posed by domestic and local violent extremists, as noted in its most recent report, Global Homeland Threats.

These small groups or individuals pose the greatest risk to national security, the report notes, often using easily accessible weapons such as guns and cars to attack so-called “soft targets,” or groups of civilians massed in places accessible

The “greatest and most immediate domestic international terrorist threat” are individuals who have lived primarily in the United States and who carry out actions inspired by, but not under the express direction of, a foreign terrorist organization such as ISIS, the agency of law enforcement. he said

In early December, the FBI and other authorities warned of an increased risk of vehicle attacks by lone wolf criminals during the holidays, noting in a shared bulletin that threat actors had “conspired and carried out attacks against holiday targets” in previous years, with likely targets including public places with “perceived lower levels of security” that hold large gatherings.

The threat is not going away either. Trump’s first term as president saw multiple attacks carried out by individuals pledging allegiance to ISIS or other jihadist groups, even if they had not been operating under the group’s own direction. These people were responsible for the 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting, the 2017 New York City truck attack, a 2017 machete attack at a Middle Eastern restaurant in Columbus, Ohio, and many more acts of violence.

Vehicle attacks have also increased: Since 2014, there have been at least 16 vehicle attacks in the United States and Europe by people practicing jihad, according to a report by think tank New America.

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And since 2020, the number of domestic terrorism investigations conducted by the FBI has more than doubled, a staggering rate that indicates both the scope and complexity of the growing problem.

Speaking to reporters at a news conference Thursday, FBI officials said New Orleans attack suspect Shamsud-Din Jabbar was “100 percent inspired by ISIS.”

“First of all, let me be very clear on this point,” FBI Deputy Director for Counterterrorism Christopher Raia told reporters. “This was an act of terrorism. It was a premeditated and evil act.”