An American missionary held in captivity in Niger for nine months will soon reunite with his family. 
Christian missionary pilot Kevin Rideout is free and safe with American officials after his kidnapping last year, his mission organization said Friday. It is not yet known how he escaped captivity or what group was holding him, but Islamist terror groups run rampant in Niger.
Rideout, a father of four, was working with the Evangelical organization Serving in Mission (SIM) when he was kidnapped from Niamey, Niger, on October 21, 2025. 
“We are grateful to confirm that our good friend and brother in Christ, Kevin Rideout, has been released after over nine months in captivity,” the organization said in a statement. “Kevin is in good health in the care of US officials. He will soon be reunited with Krista [Rideout’s wife], his children, and his extended family.”
President Donald Trump celebrated Rideout&#8217;s freedom, noting that the White House aided the return.
&#8220;I am proud to announce that Kevin Rideout, a wonderful Christian Missionary, is back in United States Custody. Kevin was kidnapped by Jihadi terrorists in West Africa — The epicenter of Islamist terrorism, where there have been more deadly attacks in the past year than anywhere else on Earth,&#8221; Trump posted on Truth Social. &#8220;Kevin, the United States of America looks forward to welcoming you HOME. Glad to have helped!&#8221;
The Trump administration has been focused on securing Rideout’s release since his kidnapping. At the time, they <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2025/11/02/niger-american-missionary-kidnapping-trump/">responded</a> by saying it was a “top priority for the Trump administration to look after the safety of every American.” The New York Times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/14/world/africa/american-missionary-niger-rideout-released.html">described</a> freeing Rideout as a “major priority” for the White House.
The Rideout family thanked everyone for their prayers during the long ordeal. 
“Krista and the rest of Kevin’s family are profoundly grateful for the prayers offered on their behalf by people around the world throughout his captivity, and in particular for the deep level of prayer and support offered by our SIM family,” SIM said. “We ask that you respect the privacy of the family while they reconnect after this time apart.”
SIM works in over 70 countries and is based in Charlotte, North Carolina. 
Rideout was seized from his home roughly 150 yards from Niger’s presidential office, the Washington Post <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2025/11/02/niger-american-missionary-kidnapping-trump/">reported</a> at the time of his kidnapping. 
About 99% of Niger identifies as Muslim, and violent groups like the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara, Boko Haram, and JNIM all have a presence in the West African country. 
Analysts who spoke with the Post believe the kidnapping was most likely carried out by Islamic State Sahel Province, which primarily operates across Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso. 
During the Biden administration, Niger kicked American troops out of the country in the aftermath of a coup and increasing Russian ties. 
Niger comes in as the 26th worst country in terms of Christian persecution, <a href="https://www.opendoors.org/en-US/persecution/countries/niger/">according</a> to watchdog Open Doors. The organization said that Islamist groups often operate with impunity and there is little rule of law in the country. 
“Any Christians living in places dominated by these extremist groups will be targeted. Believers — especially converts from Islam — must worship in secret, living under the constant threat of violence, abduction and death,” Open Doors said in its most recent report.

Kevin Rideout.

Kidnapped American Missionary’s Family Gets The News They’ve Waited Nine Months To Hear

Africa

Christian Persecution

Donald Trump

Islamic terrorists

Muslim

Niger

Radical Islamic Terror

Trump Administration

German police shot and killed a Muslim man who previously tried to join the Islamic State after he rammed a vehicle into Berlin&#8217;s Pride festival on Saturday and then attacked bystanders with a machete, leaving one person dead and several others injured.
<a href="https://www.zeit.de/gesellschaft/2026-07/anschlag-auf-csd-mutmasslicher-attentaeter-abdul-b-offenbar-erschossen">Die Zeit</a>, a national German newspaper, reported that 21-year-old Abdul Ballout was shot and killed by police at a complex in Spandau, one of Berlin&#8217;s largest boroughs. The Associated Press also confirmed the report a short time later.
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/known-islamic-terrorist-on-the-run-unleashed-machete-attack-after-plowing-van-into-crowd?topStoryPosition=undefined&amp;author=Jacob+Wheeler&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=0&amp;row=1&amp;rowHeadline=Top+Stories&amp;rowType=Top+Stories&amp;title=Known+Islamic+Terrorist+On+The+Run+After+Deadly+Berlin+Car-Ramming+Attack">Police launched a massive manhunt</a> for Ballout, who police say deliberately drove a white van into Berlin&#8217;s Tiergarten park around 10 p.m., killing one woman and injuring at least 29 others before attacking festivalgoers with what authorities said may have been a machete. Ballout is said to have fled the &#8220;horrific scene” on foot. German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt <a href="https://x.com/SkyNews/status/2081357342902300677?s=20">connected</a> the attack to radical Islamist ideology.
The BBC reported Sunday <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/c3r2nz9ed3lt?post=asset%3Af7bf096b-0bc4-4496-b0f8-d2def8c5a207#post">Ballout</a> is a German citizen of Lebanese background who was known to police for being part of Berlin&#8217;s &#8220;Islamist scene&#8221; and had previously &#8220;<a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/c3r2nz9ed3lt?post=asset%3A679975ea-dc63-4cff-b17e-cc95f0cbef6f#post">committed a number of crimes</a>.&#8221;Ballout was born in Germany, and his mother became a naturalized German citizen in 2002, three years before his birth, police told the <a href="https://apnews.com/article/germany-berlin-lgbtq-pride-parade-van-ramming-3ba5e3f1becffd0da5f47b29aa08da9d">Associated Press</a>.
<a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2026/07/26/abdul-ballout-berlin-pride-suspect-tried-join-islamic-state/">The Telegraph</a> reported Ballout is a convicted terrorist who tried to join the Islamic State terror group. German authorities previously arrested Ballout in Lebanon after accusing him of attempting to join the Islamic State in Syria and plotting a terrorist attack. Then, he was returned to Germany, where, according to Die Welt, he was sentenced to one year and 10 months in prison for plotting a “serious act of violence that threatened the state.”
This is a breaking story. Stay with The Daily Wire for updates.

Berlin Police

Berlin Terrorist Attacker Shot And Killed By Police

Europe

Germany

Islam

News

Terrorism

A Mexican national pleaded guilty to smuggling thousands of illegal immigrants into the United States, including from heavily Islamic countries with links to terrorism. 
Efrain Zuniga-Garcia admitted Monday in federal court to participating in a “vast” scheme to sneak up to 3,000 foreign nationals into America, including from countries like Pakistan, Afghanistan, Egypt, and Yemen, the Justice Department said. The 38-year-old Zuniga-Garcia was involved in the scheme from November 2020 until September 2023, when he was first charged.  
The smuggling network operated stash houses in Monterrey, Mexico, and Piedras Negras, Mexico, and brought in between 2,500 and 3,000 illegal immigrants. The network also smuggled in foreign nationals from India, Colombia, Guatemala, Honduras, and Ecuador.
The scheme operated at the same time that Border Patrol agents encountered a shocking spike in individuals on the terror watchlist along the porous border that former President Joe Biden oversaw.
Zuniga-Garcia ran the Monterrey stash house where he coordinated the transportation of the illegals by turning them over to “coyotes” who would bring them across the Rio Grande and into the United States, according to the Justice Department. 
He was charged in September 2023 with conspiracy to bring an alien into the United States and three counts of bringing an alien into the United States for financial benefit. Zuniga-Garcia pled guilty to both counts and faces a mandatory minimum of three years in prison upon sentencing. 
Multiple of Zuniga-Garcia’s co-defendants have already been sentenced to prison, including Enil Edil Mejia-Zuniga and Monica Hernandez-Palma. Mejia-Zuniga, an illegal from Honduras who lived in San Antonio, Texas, was <a href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/illegal-alien-honduras-sentenced-prison-vast-alien-smuggling-conspiracy">sentenced</a> to 10 years in prison in July 2025 after being convicted of directing the operation. 
“In an effort to satisfy his greed, Mejia-Zuniga facilitated the illegal movement of thousands of Middle Easterners into the United States,” said U.S. Attorney Justin Simmons for the Western District of Texas at the time. “His actions put our national security at risk.”
Lawmakers have <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/on-9-11-republicans-warn-about-lingering-danger-from-bidens-open-border-policies?author=Leif+Le+Mahieu&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=undefined&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=On+9%2F11%2C+Republicans+Warn+About+Lingering+Danger+From+Biden’s+‘Open-Border+Policies’">warned</a> that Americans could still be facing security challenges after the flood of illegal immigrants during the Biden presidency. The House Homeland Security Committee found that from the start of fiscal year 2021 to the end of Biden’s presidency, Border Patrol agents encountered around 400 individuals on the terror watchlist at the border. From 2017 to 2020, only 14 individuals on the terror watchlist were apprehended at the border, <a href="https://homeland.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/December-24-SS.pdf">according</a> to the committee. During that same time, at least two million illegals who were known “gotaways” entered the country.

Yuma Arizona Border Crossing

Feds Unravel Mexican’s Scheme To Smuggle Middle Easterners Into U.S.

Department of Justice

Illegal Immigation

Mexico

Middle East

Texas

New York Democrats nominated a leftist activist for a state Senate seat who once said 9/11 was the manifestation of “white supremacy” and Western colonialism. 
Aber Kawas, a democratic socialist backed by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, won the nomination for New York’s 12th Senate District with 60% of the vote on Tuesday. Kawas, who has a degree in &#8220;Islamic Liberation Theology,&#8221; previously <a href="https://freebeacon.com/latest-news/socialists-unite-mamdani-throws-support-behind-behind-state-assembly-candidate-who-blamed-9-11-on-america/">faced criticism</a> for her comments on 9/11 that appeared to downplay the terrorist attack and blame it on the policies of the United States. 
&#8220;Finding that the system of capitalism and racism, and white supremacy, etc, have all, and Islamophobia, have all been used, you know, to colonize lands, right, to take resources from other people, and so this is, like, a long trajectory. And we&#8217;re just seeing the manifestations of that continuation, right, with 9/11,” she <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=URdAAEwyI_Q">said</a> in 2017 at an Asian American Writers’ Workshop. 
Kawas is expected to win in November to represent the heavily Democratic district located in Queens.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Mamdani-endorsed Aber Kwas won the Democrat Primary tonight for a State Senate seat in New York.
Here she is saying that 9-11 was America&#8217;s fault because of our &#8220;system of capitalism, racism, white supremacy and islamophobia.&#8221; <a href="https://t.co/ouSUB44nz3">pic.twitter.com/ouSUB44nz3</a>
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) <a href="https://x.com/greg_price11/status/2069615344956612991?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 24, 2026</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.x.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
She added during the workshop that she did not appreciate people &#8220;asking us to respond about, you know, an attack” because “historically, right, you know, a lot of us come from lands that were colonized, lands where wars are being waged, right, and a lot of times because of U.S. policy or the policies in Europe.”
“The idea that we have to apologize for, like, a terror attack that, like, a couple people did, and then there is no apologies or reparations for genocides and for slavery, etc., is something that I kind of find like reprehensible,” she said. 
Kawas describes herself as the “daughter of Palestinian refugees” and says that her father was deported by ICE. Her <a href="https://aberforsenate.com/platform/">platform</a> includes “free” healthcare for illegal immigrants, funding legal services for illegal immigrants, and ending any cooperation between New York law enforcement and ICE.
It was previously <a href="https://x.com/DrewPavlou/status/1990759743640777030">reported</a> that she wrote in a now-deleted Tumblr account that a man <a href="https://archives.fbi.gov/archives/newyork/press-releases/2010/nyfo042710b.htm">convicted</a> of providing material support to al Qaeda named Fahad Hashmi was one of her “imprisoned heroes.” 
&#8220;Therefore each day they are locked up is a day that our hearts cannot be at ease. We cannot rest until each and everyone is free,&#8221; she wrote, according to posts saved by Drew Pavlou. &#8220;Their lives are a sources of inspiration to us for they are living martyrs, teaching us lessons in patience, sacrifice, and integrity. We must strive to keep them in our remembrance and work for their sake, continuing on with the freedom we have, that has unjustly been taken awat [sic] from them.&#8221;
Mamdani-backed democratic socialists swept their primary elections on Tuesday, defeating candidates backed by the Democrat Party establishment.

New Yorkers demonstrate for a rent freeze

Democrats Chose Candidate Who Links 9/11 To ‘White Supremacy’

9/11

New York

New York City

Zohran Mamdani

The kind of third-worldist brainrot that has long been an undercurrent of America&#8217;s far-Left is having a moment.
The &#8220;Blame America First&#8221; crowd used to be confined to the fringes — coffee shop discussions of a million dead Iraqis, Jane Fonda manning a Viet Cong anti-aircraft gun, DSA conference speakers deriding Barack Obama as a war criminal for taking out Based Pan-Africanist Socialist Revolutionary Gaddafi — but now it dominates the Discourse. Podcasters and newsletter writers from Left, Right, and the schizo middle draw millions of clicks by asserting that American projection of force and pursual of interest is the root cause of all the world&#8217;s ills, from Russia-Ukraine to &#8220;genocide in Gaza&#8221; to the Islamic takeover of Europe.
Sadio Camara would likely agree with some version of that anti-Western assessment if you asked him about it. You can&#8217;t, though, because he got blown up by a car bomb last month.
Camara was the Minister of Defense in the West African country of Mali until his untimely yet instructive death on April 25. It was only a few years earlier that he played a key role in overthrowing his own country&#8217;s government, kicking out the United States (and even more so the French), and entering a security partnership with Russia and its mercenaries.
Mali is part of the Sahel region of Africa, alongside Niger and Burkina Faso. The average American could be forgiven for not caring much about this part of the world, but they should at least a little: it&#8217;s rich in rare earth minerals, resources like gold and uranium, and Islamic terrorists. They also sit along key migration routes from sub-Saharan Africa to Europe, which is to say that they have some bearing on how non-European Europe will continue to become in the future.
All three of those countries previously had democratic-ish governments that worked with the United States and France on counter-terrorism. You might recall the <a href="https://www.csis.org/analysis/dods-report-investigation-2017-ambush-niger">tragic ambush</a> in Niger that killed four Green Berets (and 4 Nigeriens) in 2017. Africa has really become a hotspot for Islamic terrorist groups in recent years, and the United States had a major presence in Niger to fight them (and smaller special forces operations in Mali and Burkina Faso).
Then, in the early 2020s, they fell one-by-one to Russian-backed coups that installed military juntas and severed ties with the United States.
&#8220;Move on from the colonial past and hear the anger, the frustration, the rejection that is coming up from the African cities and countryside, and understand that this movement is inexorable,&#8221; Malian government spokesman Abdoulaye Maïga told the UN in 2022. &#8220;Your intimidations and subversive actions have only swelled the ranks of Africans concerned with preserving their dignity.&#8221;
There is a little bit of blame to be attributed to Washington, D.C., at this point in the story. Under President Joe Biden, a delegation of officials visited Niger and more or less gave the junta an ultimatum: stop cozying up to Russia and Iran and work with us instead, or else. At the time, Niger was nearing a uranium agreement with Iran. (Surely that won&#8217;t be relevant down the road!)
They promptly told the Biden administration to kick rocks and booted what remained of America&#8217;s presence from the country, including one of our most critical drone bases in the region which we used to kill terrorists.
&#8220;For Niger it was just very abrupt and very aggressive. They felt that it was the same attitude that the French had,&#8221; Zineb Riboua, a research fellow at the Hudson Institute&#8217;s Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East, told me. &#8220;The military junta asked them to leave.&#8221;
&#8220;Instead of presenting it as an ultimatum, they could have presented an alternative. Instead of doing a uranium deal with Iran, why don&#8217;t you do one with the United States, and you get a school program or something in Niger, something they don&#8217;t have,&#8221; Riboua said. &#8220;A lot of these countries have unemployment issues, and they&#8217;re landlocked countries, so it&#8217;s very hard for them to do trade and be integrated in the region.&#8221;
Alas, with the Western colonial powers gone, things should have been on the upswing for the Sahel. We&#8217;ve got Russia (primarily via its mercenary forces, the Wagner Group) doing security and fighting the terrorists. We&#8217;re trading with Iran and China. All is well.
Then they got mugged by reality. The Russians were killing untold numbers of civilians and still somehow managing to cede ground to the jihadists. In fact, in Burkina Faso and Mali, the Russians and government forces actually killed more civilians last year than the jihadists. The security situation was deteriorating rapidly. Then, things really came to a head in April, with the offensive that killed Camara and countless others.
The April attack even resulted in Russia&#8217;s own mini-Kabul moment, with Russian troops fleeing the region, forced to leave large amounts of weapons behind.
The Sahel juntas, just a few years after declaring themselves strong, independent, anti-Western governments that don&#8217;t need no protecting from Europe and America, found themselves being overrun by Jama&#8217;at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM) and ISIS.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
🚨Urgent – 🇧🇫 Burkina Faso
Une dissidence d’un groupe entier du JNIM a été signalée dans le nord du Burkina Faso, avec son ralliement à la branche de l’État islamique dans la province du Sahel ( ISSP)
Le nombre de combattants concernés serait important. <a href="https://t.co/AXpAFcMsnS">pic.twitter.com/AXpAFcMsnS</a>
— Sahel Alerte (@SahelAlerte) <a href="https://twitter.com/SahelAlerte/status/2044491770755453039?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 15, 2026</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
JNIM are a group of Salafi-jihadist groups, descended in part from al-Qaeda, which now operates in territory larger than every U.S. state besides Alaska, primarily in Mali and Burkina Faso. They&#8217;re the ones who rolled up to Camara&#8217;s house and detonated a car bomb. They&#8217;re probably the closest entity we&#8217;ve seen to peak ISIS since its downfall, seeing as their specific goals are to expel foreign forces and establish a caliphate under sharia law.
Of course, there is still ISIS itself, which is also active here. ISSP (Islamic State-Sahel Province) has taken over large swathes of Niger, and even launched an attack on the capital&#8217;s airport in January (which also housed some Russian mercenaries).
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
The JNIM/FLA coalition attacked and took control of the Malian military base in Hombori, Mopti region in central Mali this morning. <a href="https://t.co/r0k9NrbSHl">pic.twitter.com/r0k9NrbSHl</a>
— Brant (@BrantPhilip_) <a href="https://twitter.com/BrantPhilip_/status/2049780359336763836?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 30, 2026</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
The Trump administration has signaled some willingness to get involved and try to rectify the situation, potentially with a mineral deal of some kind, but who knows if it will come too late. The Islamists are taking all three countries by storm now, and have killed nearly 80,000 people since 2019.
&#8220;We are victims of our wealth — the wealth that imperialists want to seize at all costs, aiming to keep us in slavery. We will secure it,&#8221; said Burkina Faso&#8217;s &#8220;Interim&#8221; President Ibrahim Traoré in 2024.
They probably wish they had stayed under the boot of Western imperialism after all.

TOPSHOT-MALI-UNREST

They Kicked America Out. Now They’re Being Hunted By Jihadists

Al Qaeda

Burkina Faso

DW Opinion

ISIS

Mali

Russia

Joe Kent has resigned as director of the National Counterterrorism Center. He should never have had the job to begin with. 
Kent <a href="https://x.com/joekent16jan19/status/2033897242986209689/photo/1">explained</a> in his resignation letter that he believes Iran posed “no imminent threat to our nation” and that Israel with the help of Israel’s powerful “lobby” is behind the United States “starting” the war. 
These galling, fact-defying claims reveal Kent’s belief in a crank evil conspiracy about Israel and the “Israel lobby,” i.e., the Jews, controlling American foreign policy. It is exceptionally concerning that it was his job to protect the American people from terrorism and he discounts the role Iran plays in threatening the American people as the leading sponsor of terrorism globally. The regime funds, equips, and trains Islamist proxies throughout the Middle East to harass global shipping and attack Americans and our allies. Iran is directly responsible for the maiming and killing of hundreds of Americans since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Kent’s resignation could have simply stated he does not personally support the war and that his conscience prevents him from continued public service. Instead, he used the position from which he resigned to provide him credibility in an effort to undermine Trump, public support for the war, and the success of the war effort. 
There are two critical points to understand in all of this.
One, the political ecosystem that Kent decided to align with, and which supported his rise to influence within the MAGA coalition over the last several years, includes Nick Fuentes and his followers, the so-called Groypers. Nick Fuentes told Tucker Carlson <a href="https://x.com/moymiz/status/2033974462635512061?s=46&amp;t=lyk8m90xboRd4ImqIJ-GGA">a few months ago</a> on his podcast that he spoke with Joe Kent and supported him and his failed congressional campaign. Fuentes also said that Kent’s campaign manager bought a table at Fuentes’ event and introduced Fuentes to Kent. According to National Review reporter Audrey Fahlberg, Joe Kent’s former campaign manager acknowledged sending texts referring to Jews as “f*c*ing ki*es” and writing “heil f*cking Kent” and “allah f*cking akbar.” Kent also <a href="https://x.com/RichWWilliams/status/2033986403982581852?s=20">publicly aligned</a> with Fuentes when he launched his unsuccessful campaign. All of this is public information and did not prevent him from attaining a senior job in the administration. 
How many more people are serving in the Trump administration share these views or are sympathetic to them? Since Hamas carried out the worst attack on the Jews since the Holocaust on October 7, 2023, the United States has experienced a spike in open antisemitism and expressions of sympathy towards Islamist terrorists. College campuses have been awash with organized protesters chanting “from the river to the sea” and other genocidal slogans against the Jewish people. Since the initiation of Operation Epic Fury, there have been four terrorist attacks here at home: a <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/suspect-in-texas-bar-shooting-wore-property-of-allah-clothing-and-iranian-flag-emblem-according-to-ap-source">shooting </a>at a bar in Austin, an <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/mar/15/new-york-mamdani-teen-suspects">attempted bombing </a>in New York City, an <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2026/03/14/us/michigan-synagogue-attack-hnk">attack </a>on the Temple Israel synagogue in Michigan, and a <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2026/03/15/us/mohamed-bailor-jalloh-old-dominion">shooting </a>at Old Dominion University in Virginia. 
This is a time to clearly and decisively marginalize those who traffic in antisemitic views, not elevate them and place them in positions of authority. 
Two, Dana Loesch said it well when she noted that those circling the wagons for Kent’s stand against Operation Epic Fury are not only undermining President Trump now, they are “power-jockeying for 2028.” They insist that Trump betrayed them in taking joint action with Israel in Operation Midnight Hammer to degrade Iran’s nuclear program, and again now in Operation Epic Fury to dismantle the Iranian regime’s ability to threaten the United States and its allies. They ignore the long pattern of Trump’s support for Israel as a valued and highly capable ally, which was a hallmark of his first term. And, they ignore Trump’s support for a world-class military — he recently said he supports a $1.5 trillion defense budget, which would commit the United States to 5% of GDP on defense spending, matching his demands for the rest of NATO — designed not to retreat and pull up the proverbial drawbridge, but to project power across the globe to defend its declared vital interests in the Middle East, Europe, and Indo-Pacific. 
Additionally, they discounted Trump’s willingness in his first term to use military force to destroy the ISIS caliphate and other Iranian leaders and proxies sprawled across the Middle East. They also ignore Trump’s decades-long view that the Islamic Republic could not have a viable nuclear weapon, and that military action was a plausible and legitimate course of action if Iran refused to willingly dismantle its illicit program. Trump did not betray them. They simply could not manipulate Trump into becoming what they are.
Tucker Carlson is already planning to host Joe Kent on his podcast today (Wednesday). We should expect them to try to galvanize more opposition to President Trump’s efforts in Iran. They may be mad about not having power and influence on policy now, but we should expect this pernicious effort to continue into election season where they hope to have better luck.
* * *
Rebeccah L. Heinrichs is a senior fellow at Hudson Institute and the director of its Keystone Defense Initiative. She specializes in US national defense policy with a focus on strategic deterrence.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

US-POLITICS-SECURITY-NOEM

Joe Kent Never Should Have Had This Job

Iran

Joe Kent

National Security

Opinion

Tucker Carlson

Tulsi Gabbard

US-NEWS-CMP-OLD-DOMINION-SHOOTING-GUNMAN-2-VP

I Looked Into Why Terrorists Are Being Let Into Our Country. It’s Worse Than You Think.

I Looked Into Why Terrorists Are Being Let Into Our Country. It's Worse Than You Think.

Matt Walsh

Murder

Old Dominion University

ROTC

Virginia

“You’re worried about Islamic terrorism? That is a false flag or an op.”
If you believe the people who tell you this, you are the sucker.
And if America ignores the very real problem of radical Islam, and you happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, you&#8217;ll end up dead. 
That is the message across America for the last couple of weeks, and it&#8217;s coming in loud and clear.
Yesterday alone, there were two Islamic terror attacks. The first happened at Old Dominion in Virginia, when ISIS-linked Mohamed Bailor Jalloh, 26, stormed a classroom and demanded to know if it was an ROTC class. He then shouted — wait for it — “Allahu akbar!”
I know: you&#8217;re shocked.
He shot and killed the professor, Army Lt. Col. Brandon A. Shah, a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom, Operation Enduring Freedom, and Atlantic Resolve, before a group of heroic cadets jumped into action and stabbed Jalloh to death.
So who was the terrorist? According to the New York Post, he was a naturalized citizen from Sierra Leone and a former Virginia National Guard member.
Were there any red flags? Just a few.
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ep-2387-the-ben-shapiro-show?elementPosition=1&amp;row=0&amp;rowHeadline=Recent+Episodes&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Episodes+Carousel"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-large wp-image-974957" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-1024x171.webp" alt="DailyWire+" width="1024" height="171" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-1024x171.webp 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-300x50.webp 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-768x128.webp 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-1536x256.webp 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-2048x341.webp 2048w" sizes=" (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></a>
Fox News reports that Jalloh was forced to leave the military after he tried to provide material support to ISIS. He was a follower of Anwar al Awlaki, the now-dead leader of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.
The DOJ prosecution documents show Jalloh praised a July 2015 terror attack in Chattanooga, Tennessee, in which a radical Islamist killed four Marines and a Navy sailor. He was actually arrested in 2016 after attempting to buy an assault rifle in Northern Virginia and then sentenced to 11 years in prison. Then he was released just 15 months ago for good behavior.
Good behavior.
So we released an actual, honest-to-God, ISIS-affiliated terrorist into the population for “good behavior.” Did he drop his terror support somehow? If so, what was the evidence that he had? Why did America owe him a free run of the country after he decided to side with an actual, honest-to-God terrorist group?
It should be noted that Jalloh received the victim treatment from leftists in the media. In 2016, The Intercept, a far-left publication, printed a sympathetic piece quoting his family, who said he was set up by the FBI. His brother told The Intercept that Jalloh was just another “Mohammad” who got set up.
The problem, you see, was really Islamophobia. Never radical Islam, just Islamophobia.
So was that attack at Old Dominion the only radical Islamic terror attack of the day? Of course not. Halfway across the country, at one of the biggest Reform Jewish synagogues in America, a radical Muslim suspect named Ayman Mohamed Ghazali, a naturalized U.S. citizen from Lebanon who received a visa as the spouse of a U.S. citizen and was naturalized under the Obama administration, tried to drive an explosive-laden car into the entrance of a preschool with 140 students in attendance. 
According to the New York Post, “He barreled down the hallway before security opened fire, killing the suspect.” That attack started a fire in the building. The driver was killed while he was in the car. Police found in the car a rifle and mortar shells.
The suspect allegedly came from Dearborn Heights, Michigan. The synagogue was located 20 miles north of Dearborn, an Islam-dominated city represented in Congress by radical Islamic terror apologist Rashida Tlaib.
How radicalized is Dearborn? In recent days, some Dearborn mosques have been praising Ayatollah Khamenei. In 2025, the city decided to honor terror-supporting activist Osama Siblani with a street sign. Siblani is a radical Muslim who openly speaks of his pride in terror leaders like deceased Hezbollah head Hassan Nasrallah, whom he called a great leader, saying he was “proud” of him. He also advocated for Hezbollah to make Israel “taste the Lebanon poison.”
When a resident of Dearborn showed up at a city council meeting to protest naming a street after this radical Islamist, the mayor of Dearborn told him to get out of the city and then called him — wait for it — wait for it — wait for it — an Islamophobe.
Unsurprisingly, there were some people in the media who found excuses for the terror attack at the synagogue. Over on GB News, one commentator explained that this was an “Israeli temple” and thus presumably deserving of its fate. The argument here seems to be that if you are a pro-Israel Jew in the United States, then it&#8217;s totally fine for a terrorist to drive a car laden with explosives into your synagogue.
Ryan Grim, formerly of The Intercept, reported that the terrorist had family members recently killed by Israel and its current action against Hezbollah in Lebanon. Even if that&#8217;s true, it makes for a rather strange defense of these terrorist actions. The mass murder of 1,200 Jews on October 7 in Israel has caused precisely zero Jews, zero, to drive an explosives-laden car into a mosque or near a Muslim school.
There&#8217;s just something about radical Islam that isn&#8217;t quite the same.
Of course, as we have been following, the two attacks yesterday were not the first attacks of the last few weeks. Last week, we reported on a radical Islamic terror attack in Austin, Texas, in which a 53-year-old Senegalese immigrant to the United States killed three people and wounded 13 more. He happened to be wearing a sweatshirt that read —wait for it, wait for it — “Property of Allah.”
I know, you&#8217;re shocked.
Over the last weekend, we saw two ISIS-affiliated radical Muslims throw IEDs at a rally outside Gracie Mansion, all of which led the mayor of New York to spend extraordinary efforts condemning — wait for it, wait for it, you&#8217;re not going to believe it — Islamophobia.
How does this radical ideology spread in America?
The answer is twofold. First, we import people who are sympathetic to terrorism, and then addle-pated Americans argue that they ought to be mainstreamed.
That&#8217;s how you end up with Zohran Mamdani — yes, he is a terrorist supporter — as mayor of New York. It&#8217;s how Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar end up in Congress.
What should we do about it? First, we can stop future immigration from radical Islamic countries and other third-world areas where we can&#8217;t vet our immigrants at the source. You cannot import problems from other parts of the world, require zero assimilation, and then pretend that the big issue is “Islamophobia.”
Unfortunately, there are people dedicated to forcing our border wide open.
Secondly, we ought to enforce the law to revoke the citizenship of people who associate with terrorist groups or who favor totalitarian forms of government. That is, in fact, the law under title VIII, U.S. code, section 1484.
If enforced properly, this would mean revocation of citizenship for a wide variety of radical Islamists living in the United States right now. This law is difficult to enforce; it requires a high degree of evidentiary demonstration. But that degree ought to be met when you affiliate with an actual terrorist group, and if it is not, then the law itself ought to be changed to allow for revocation of such citizenship.
It is not our duty to people who seek to destroy America in the name of radical Islam.
Until the law is either enforced to the letter or changed, we have an enormous number of people in the United States who are devotees of radical Islam. What&#8217;s more, we&#8217;ve been told by one entire political party that mentioning this inconvenient fact is tantamount to Islamophobia.
Have Americans seen enough?

TOPSHOT-US-SHOOTING-SYNAGOGUE-MICHIGAN

The Deadly Cost Of Denial

Ben Shapiro

Shooting

Suspected terrorist Emir Balat flashed an ISIS salute three times while being escorted in handcuffs from a police precinct in New York on Monday.
Balat first made the gesture as he emerged from a tunnel outside the precinct where he had been held after being arrested on Saturday. A police officer attempted to cover his hand with a manila folder, but Balat raised his hand above the folder and repeated the gesture. He briefly lowered his hand before raising it a third time as he was placed into a vehicle.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
The 18-year-old was seen holding up his right index finger — a universal salute for the terror group — and grinning at the press while being led by a cop and an FBI agent. Read more at the link in our bio. <a href="https://t.co/9bg83J1HQ1">pic.twitter.com/9bg83J1HQ1</a>
— New York Post (@nypost) <a href="https://twitter.com/nypost/status/2031033866236960770?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 9, 2026</a></blockquote>
ISIS began using the gesture, a raised index finger accompanied by a slight shaking motion, in 2014. The gesture refers to Tawhid, the Islamic belief in the oneness of God.
When taken into custody on Saturday, Balat pledged allegiance to the Islamic State. He wrote, &#8220;All praise is due to Allah lord of all worlds. I pledge my allegiance to the Islamic State. Die in your rage yu [sic] kuffar,&#8221; on a sheet of paper at the police precinct. Police body cam footage showed Balat saying, &#8220;this isn&#8217;t a religion that just stands when people talk about the blessed name of the prophet &#8230; We take action! We take action!&#8221; and &#8220;if I didn&#8217;t do it someone else will come and do it.&#8221;
A federal complaint released Monday adds that Balat stated he wanted to carry out an attack bigger than the Boston Marathon bombing, which Balat said caused &#8220;only three deaths.&#8221;
Eighteen-year-old Balat was arrested Saturday along with 19-year-old Ibrahim Kayumi after an explosive device was thrown into a crowd of protesters and police officers. Balat and Kayumi are no longer being held by the NYPD and will instead be held on federal charges pending further court proceedings.
Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said, “Once again, we were fortunate that the devices used this weekend did not cause the kind of harm that they were certainly capable of causing, but luck is never a strategy.” Tisch added that if the weapons had detonated, they could have caused serious injury or death.
Balat and Kayumi traveled from Pennsylvania to New York City on Saturday morning. Both reportedly grew up in affluent neighborhoods. Balat’s home in Langhorne, Pennsylvania, is estimated to be worth $653,000, while Kayumi’s home is valued at approximately $2.25 million. Balat&#8217;s parents were born in Turkey, and Kayumi&#8217;s are from Afghanistan, <a href="https://x.com/annaschecter/status/2030817903746965817">according to</a> federal officials.

Right-Wing Activists Protest Against New York Mayor Mamdani Outside Gracie Mansion

WATCH: Suspected NYC Terrorist Flashes ISIS Salute Three Times

Afghanistan

Turkey

Shooting At Brown University In Providence Leaves Multiple People Dead And Injured

Violent Migrants Are Invading And Western Leaders Are Surrendering Without A Fight

Brown University

France

Muslim Immigration

Rhode Island

Riots

Violent Crime

Over the Thanksgiving weekend, President Trump went into high gear talking about the necessity of deporting all third-world migrants and of stopping further third-world migration into the United States.
This has been a long time coming — Trump has been saying this for roughly a decade. One of the very first things he did during his first administration was attempt a migration moratorium on a series of countries where vetting was very, very difficult.
All of this is now coming to a head. On Thursday, President Trump said he would permanently pause all immigration from what he called third-world countries.
President Trump <a href="https://x.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1994272683387687053">stated</a>:
<blockquote>Even as we have progressed technologically, Immigration Policy has eroded those gains and living conditions for many. I will permanently pause migration from all Third World Countries to allow the U.S. system to fully recover, terminate all of the millions of Biden illegal admissions, including those signed by Sleepy Joe Biden’s Autopen, and remove anyone who is not a net asset to the United States, or is incapable of loving our Country, end all Federal benefits and subsidies to noncitizens of our Country, denaturalize migrants who undermine domestic tranquility, and deport any Foreign National who is a public charge, security risk, or non-compatible with Western Civilization.
These goals will be pursued with the aim of achieving a major reduction in illegal and disruptive populations, including those admitted through an unauthorized and illegal Autopen approval process. Only REVERSE MIGRATION can fully cure this situation. Other than that, HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO ALL, except those that hate, steal, murder, and destroy everything that America stands for — You won’t be here for long!</blockquote>
This happened in the aftermath of a dual set of stories, one of them being an Afghan national shooting two members of the National Guard, killing one, and the other the unbelievable story of Somali welfare fraud in the state of Minnesota.
DHS Secretary Kristi Noem <a href="https://grabien.com/story?id=558818">stated</a>, “The President is absolutely determined to stop all processes at this point in time from third-world countries until we can have a thorough opportunity to go through these individuals, know that they&#8217;re here for the right intentions, and that they even should be in our country to begin with. He&#8217;s putting Americans first, their safety first.”
The State Department then immediately announced it would pause visa issuance for individuals traveling on Afghan passports, stating, “The department is taking all necessary steps to protect U.S. national security and public safety again.”
Noem said the shooting suspect, who was let in the country by the Biden administration, was later radicalized through connections already in the country, which is significantly more dangerous than just bringing people in from cultures that are non-communicative and non-coalescing with Western civilization.
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ep-2324-the-trump-administration-cracks-down-on-third-world-migration?elementPosition=0&amp;row=2&amp;rowHeadline=Latest+Episodes&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Episodes+Carousel"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter wp-image-974957 size-large" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-1024x171.webp" alt="DailyWire+" width="1024" height="171" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-1024x171.webp 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-300x50.webp 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-768x128.webp 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-1536x256.webp 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-2048x341.webp 2048w" sizes=" (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></a>
If there are people being brought in who are initially somewhat friendly to the United States and then become radicalized in the United States, you have to start asking some pretty serious questions about which organizations in the United States are actually radicalizing people.
The real concern then becomes an Islamization problem inside the United States, which would fit with lone wolf attacks, ISIS-inspired attacks, or ISIS-connected attacks. Those range from the Fort Hood shooting in 2009 all the way through to the 2025 New Orleans truck attack, in which an ISIS-inspired person killed 14 people.
It&#8217;s amazing how terrorist attacks like the latter can completely be memory-holed. It happened at the beginning of this year. 14 people were killed, and we&#8217;ve already forgotten about it because the way the media works is this: If someone is inspired by ISIS or a radical Islamic group and they commit a terror attack in the United States, we simply memory-hole it.
The same thing happened in 2016 with the Orlando nightclub shooting, the deadliest mass shooting in American history at that time, in which a shooter killed 49 people. The shooter in that case pledged allegiance to ISIS.
What did we get? A national debate about whether Christians were too intolerant toward gay people, even though it was an Islamic terror attack.
There was also the 2015 San Bernardino terror attack, in which a couple of people who communicated with ISIS via encrypted messages killed 14 people and injured 22 others.
So radicalization in the United States is a massive problem that requires the FBI and the DOJ to actually follow through on what they are supposed to do: Track down the groups doing the radicalizing, follow them around, and monitor the places where the radicalization is occurring.
That is a significantly harder problem to solve than shutting the borders, which is what President Trump is attempting to do. They are not mutually exclusive. You can shut the borders to immigration and mass migration from third-world countries. We should also track down the groups doing the radicalizing.
In the National Guard case, it seems that the shooter became radicalized after he came to the United States.
The New York Post reports that a leading national refugee agency was warned multiple times about him. Apparently, the shooter&#8217;s behavior was so disturbing that a local community advocate reached out to a refugee organization for help.
This connects with another gigantic story that broke over the course of last week, the amount of Somali welfare fraud in Minnesota. Between 1990 and 2025, the United States has seen significant Somali immigration, with estimates suggesting between 140,000 and 167,000 Somali immigrants settling here.
The fraud scandal in Minnesota is staggering. Over $1 billion in taxpayers’ money was reputedly stolen, more than Minnesota spends annually to run its entire Department of Corrections. The reality is that importing gigantic waves of Somali immigrants into Minnesota, of all places, might create some culture clash.
Reports say that when the allegations were first made about welfare fraud in Minnesota, the first response was, “We can&#8217;t look into this. It&#8217;s racist.”
So President Trump has responded to all of this by doubling down on his suggestion that third-world migration be reversed.
Douglas Murray has a great <a href="https://nypost.com/2025/11/27/opinion/afghan-terror-and-somalia-fraud-shows-why-trump-is-right-on-migrants/">column</a> over in the New York Post in which he states:
<blockquote>You have to be careful with a country. Even a nation as vast in size and huge in population as the United States cannot be endlessly experimented upon. You cannot just leave borders open, or allow in large numbers of people with totally different value systems from your own. That is the mistake many European countries have committed in recent years. They have opened their homes up to people from almost every part of the world where there is civil strife, war or just a lower standard of living.
The results can be seen everywhere. It is the reason why a country like Sweden — that used to be such a placid, decent place — has become one of the most violent countries in the world not actually at war. Grenade attacks, gang-warfare: these things were recently alien to Sweden. Not anymore. It is the same here in the United States — though here the effects are more dispersed, so the problem can be covered up for longer.</blockquote>
He writes that all of this begs the question: Why should a group of people be given sanctuary in the United States, who presumably say they were fleeing from terror, only to use their time in the United States committing fraud to send money to terrorists?
The president of the United States is right about this particular issue.
Democrats, of course, are freaking out about it.
It&#8217;s all coming to a head now, and not just because of the recent shooting of National Guard members in Washington, D.C., or what&#8217;s happening in Minnesota.
It’s happening all over the West because the West has finally decided to wake up to the reality that — through our niceness, kindness, and civility — we should never have allowed our nations to be eaten from within by people who enter and then take advantage of all the benefits, only to fight and destroy that same civilization.

US-POLITICS-TRUMP-MILITARY-HOLIDAY

The Trump Administration Cracks Down On Third-World Migration

illegal immigrants

Immigrants

Kristi Noem

National Guard

In 1946, not too long after the end of World War II, Winston Churchill famously spoke of a “special relationship” between the United Kingdom and the United States — not only as a bond of history and language, but as a partnership grounded in shared principles and moral duty. That same sense of duty must guide us today as we confront the world’s leading state sponsor of terror: the clerical regime in Iran.
Historically, when facing totalitarian regimes, Britain, the US, and other Western powers have placed local dissidents at the center of any discussion about the future of oppressed nations. Yet Iran remains a glaring exception. For reasons that defy logic and morality, successive governments have marginalized the voices of Iranian democrats.
I am one of a growing number of Western politicians on both sides of the Atlantic who believe this should change and to this end, I will speak at the Free Iran Convention in Washington, D.C., on November 15, where more than one thousand Iranian experts, professionals, and academicians from all over the US, will present their vision for a free, democratic Iran.
For nearly half a century, Western policy toward Tehran has prioritized negotiation over accountability, assuming the clerical regime’s grip on power was unshakeable. Many believed Iran’s rulers would never meet the same fate as the Shah — at least not without chaos in the absence of a viable alternative.
That assumption was flawed from the outset. In the immediate aftermath of the 1979 revolution, the forces that helped topple the Shah — chief among them the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK) — remained active, popular, and determined to oppose the theocracy that hijacked the revolution’s promise. The regime responded with brutal repression throughout the 1980s, culminating in the horrific 1988 massacre of around 30,000 political prisoners, most of them MEK members and supporters.
This atrocity was meant to eliminate organized opposition once and for all. It failed. The MEK survived and went on to form the backbone of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), a broad coalition advocating regime change and democratic transition. Yet, tragically, the massacre convinced much of the international community that internal resistance had been extinguished — and that engagement with Tehran was the only realistic path forward.
Encouraged by that misperception (echoed by the regime’s protagonists and lobbyists), the regime deepened its repression at home and aggression abroad. It became the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism, the nation with the highest per-capita rate of executions, and the only non-nuclear-armed state enriching uranium to 60% purity — just short of weapons-grade.
Ironically, by assuming the regime’s permanence, Western leaders helped create a situation where regime change has become essential for global security and human rights. Some progress is evident: the UK, France, and Germany recently triggered the re-imposition of UN sanctions following Washington’s return to a “maximum pressure” strategy.
But it remains unclear whether today’s policymakers grasp how profoundly their predecessors misread the regime’s vulnerability.
That misunderstanding can no longer be excused. Three nationwide uprisings — in 2018, 2019, and 2022 — have shown the Iranian people’s enduring commitment to democratic change. The unity and persistence of their demands reveal the strength of an organized opposition that, despite deadly crackdowns and decades of dismissal by Western analysts, continues to challenge the regime from within.
The Free Iran Convention in Washington builds on this momentum. It follows major gatherings in Brussels and across Europe, where Iranian youth and dissidents reaffirmed their readiness for a democratic transition. The movement’s supporters will call for a coherent Western policy — one that recognizes the NCRI as a credible alternative and supports the Iranian people’s right to determine their future.
Many of us in public life have already joined this cause. In parliaments on both sides of the Atlantic, lawmakers have endorsed resolutions recognizing the NCRI as a legitimate democratic alternative to the current regime and affirming the Iranian people’s right to establish a secular, non-nuclear republic. Maryam Rajavi, the President-elect of the NCRI, has articulated a ten-point plan as a roadmap for a future democratic republic of Iran. It has gained cross-party support of the majority of members of both the US House of Representatives and the UK House of Commons.
It is time for policymakers to act accordingly. The UK and European Union must designate the IRGC as a terrorist organization, and democratic governments should hold Tehran’s leaders accountable for crimes against humanity. Most importantly, the West must acknowledge the Iranian people’s right to overthrow tyranny and build a democratic future.
Appeasement has never delivered stability. Courage, clarity, and solidarity with the Iranian people just might.
* * *
Rt. Hon. John Bercow was the Speaker of the UK House of Commons from 2009 to 2019.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Menu