    [House Hearing, 116 Congress]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]

                GLOBAL TERRORISM: THREATS TO THE HOMELAND, PART I

    =======================================================================

                                    HEARING

                                   before the

                         COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY
                            HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                         ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS

                                 FIRST SESSION

                                   __________

                               SEPTEMBER 10, 2019

                                   __________

                               Serial No. 116-35

                                   __________

           Printed for the use of the Committee on Homeland Security

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

            Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.govinfo.gov

                                   __________

                    U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
     39-837 PDF             WASHINGTON : 2020

                         COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY

                   Bennie G. Thompson, Mississippi, Chairman
    Sheila Jackson Lee, Texas            Mike Rogers, Alabama
    James R. Langevin, Rhode Island      Peter T. King, New York
    Cedric L. Richmond, Louisiana        Michael T. McCaul, Texas
    Donald M. Payne, Jr., New Jersey     John Katko, New York
    Kathleen M. Rice, New York           John Ratcliffe, Texas
    J. Luis Correa, California           Mark Walker, North Carolina
    Xochitl Torres Small, New Mexico     Clay Higgins, Louisiana
    Max Rose, New York                   Debbie Lesko, Arizona
    Lauren Underwood, Illinois           Mark Green, Tennessee
    Elissa Slotkin, Michigan             Van Taylor, Texas
    Emanuel Cleaver, Missouri            John Joyce, Pennsylvania
    Al Green, Texas                      Dan Crenshaw, Texas
    Yvette D. Clarke, New York           Michael Guest, Mississippi
    Dina Titus, Nevada
    Bonnie Watson Coleman, New Jersey
    Nanette Diaz Barragan, California
    Val Butler Demings, Florida
                           Hope Goins, Staff Director
                     Chris Vieson, Minority Staff Director

                                C O N T E N T S

                                  ----------
                                                                       Page

                                   Statements

    The Honorable Bennie G. Thompson, a Representative in Congress
      From the State of Mississippi, and Chairman, Committee on
      Homeland Security:
      Oral Statement.................................................     1
      Prepared Statement.............................................     3
    The Honorable Mike Rogers, a Representative in Congress From the
      State of North Carolina, and Ranking Member, Committee on
      Homeland Security:
      Oral Statement.................................................     4
      Prepared Statement.............................................     5
    The Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee, a Representative in Congress
      From the State of Texas:
      Prepared Statement.............................................     6

                                   Witnesses

    Mr. Peter Bergen, Vice President, Global Studies & Fellows, New
      America:
      Oral Statement.................................................     9
      Prepared Statement.............................................    11
    Mr. Ali H. Soufan, Founder, The Soufan Center:
      Oral Statement.................................................    20
      Prepared Statement.............................................    21
    Mr. Brian Levin, Director, Center for the Study of Hate &
      Extremism, California State University, San Bernardino:
      Oral Statement.................................................    29
      Prepared Statement.............................................    31
    Mr. Thomas Joscelyn, Senior Fellow, Foundation for the Defense of
      Democracies:
      Oral Statement.................................................    48
      Prepared Statement.............................................    50

               GLOBAL TERRORISM: THREATS TO THE HOMELAND, PART I

                                  ----------

                          Tuesday, September 10, 2019

                         U.S. House of Representatives,
                                Committee on Homeland Security,
                                                        Washington, DC.
        The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:05 a.m., in
    room 310, Cannon House Office Building, Hon. Bennie G. Thompson
    [Chairman of the Committee] presiding.
        Present: Representatives Thompson, Langevin, Richmond,
    Payne, Rice, Correa, Small, Rose, Underwood, Slotkin, Clarke,
    Titus, Barragan; Rogers, King, McCaul, Katko, Ratcliffe,
    Walker, Higgins, Lesko, Taylor, and Guest.
        Chairman Thompson. The Committee on Homeland Security will
    come to order.
        The committee is meeting today to receive testimony on
    ``Global Terrorism Threats to the Homeland, Part One.''
        To begin I want to note that tomorrow marks the 18th
    anniversary of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. We
    remember those who were lost that terrible day in New York, at
    the Pentagon, and at Shanksville, Pennsylvania. They and their
    loved ones are on Americans' minds and our hearts at this time,
    especially.
        Today I am pleased to welcome our distinguished panel of
    witnesses, and appreciate their testimony before the committee.
    That said, I want to say for the record it is unacceptable that
    the Secretary of Homeland Security, FBI director, and acting
    director of National Counterterrorism Center refused a
    bipartisan invitation to testify at this hearing.
        This committee has a long-standing practice of holding an
    annual hearing to examine threats to the homeland. We continue
    to face threats from foreign terrorist organization and home-
    grown violent extremists. Communities like El Paso have
    suffered unspeakable tragedy from domestic terrorist attacks
    recently. Agreeing to come before the committee at the end of
    October, over 3 months after our request was made, is not
    sufficient.
        We will continue to engage the administration and ensure
    this committee has the information necessary to carry out its
    oversight responsibilities. As another year passes Members of
    Congress, especially on this committee, are reminded of the
    duty we have to counter the terrorism threats of today and
    tomorrow.
        Despite organizational setbacks and loss of physical
    territory, foreign terrorist organizations like ISIS and al-
    Qaeda remain capable and committed, conducting external attacks
    and influencing like-minded groups and individuals outside of
    Iraq and Syria, perpetrating a circle of violence and extremist
    rhetoric. One such attack took place on Easter Sunday this
    year, when a terrorist group inspired by ISIS killed over 250
    people during coordinated attacks on 3 churches and a hotel in
    Sri Lanka.
        Alarmingly, a recent Pentagon inspector general's report
    stated that ISIS was resurging in Syria after the
    administration's decision to withdraw U.S. troops from the
    country, refuting President Trump's own statements about ISIS
    being defeated. The United States must find ways to responsibly
    and adequately support partners on the ground, and advance
    efforts to keep ISIS from re-establishing itself.
        Additionally, al-Qaeda and its affiliates are still active
    across parts of Africa, the Middle East, and South Asia, and
    the instability in some of these regions is ripe for jihadism
    to flourish. In fact, just last month the State Department's
    counter-terrorism coordinator, Ambassador Nathan Sales, stated
    al-Qaeda is as strong as it has ever been, and has let ISIS
    absorb the brunt of the world's counter-terrorism efforts,
    while patently reconstituting itself. In Somalia the al-Qaeda-
    linked group al-Shabaab conducted an attack on a hotel, killing
    26 people, including 2 American citizens, this past July.
        While we can't lose focus on terrorist groups like these,
    we are also facing a growing domestic terrorist--and
    particularly white nationalist--threat to our homeland.
    Addressing this threat, which is often transnational in nature,
    has long been--taken a back seat to other threats faced by the
    United States. Earlier this year the mosque shootings in
    Christchurch, New Zealand, which left 51 dead, exemplify the
    growing transnational connections between white nationalist
    terrorists who inspire and communicate with each other across
    the world.
        Just last month in El Paso, Texas 22 people were killed
    when a 21-year-old white nationalist terrorist opened fire on a
    WalMart, using an AK-47-style assault rifle. The shooter drove
    10 hours from his home in Allen, Texas to El Paso, specifically
    to target Hispanics. In April a 19-year-old white nationalist
    terrorist opened fire using an AR-15-style assault rifle inside
    the Chabad of Poway synagogue on the last day of Passover in
    Poway, California, killing a 60-year-old woman. These attacks
    did not originate in a vacuum, but of--these white nationalist
    terrorists who killed people in Poway, California and El Paso,
    Texas, cited Brandon, the terrorist who carried out the
    Christchurch mosque attacks in New Zealand as an inspiration.
        Sadly, these are just a few of the deadly domestic
    terrorism attacks linked to white supremacy extremism from this
    year. Over the last decade over 70 percent of extremist-related
    killings in the United States were committed by right-wing
    extremists, many of whom flock to social media and on-line
    platforms to espouse their hateful and violent rhetoric.
        Like other terrorists and terrorist groups, white
    supremacist extremists take advantage of social media and on-
    line platforms to promulgate their ideology and promote
    violence. On June 26 I held a hearing examining social media
    companies' efforts to counter on-line terror content and
    misinformation. Just last week the committee deposed the owner
    of 8chan, an on-line platform that has been linked to at least
    3 acts of deadly white supremacist extremist violence.
        While we cannot lose focus on the foreign terrorist threat
    to the United States, we have to simultaneously address the
    real and persistent threat of domestic terrorism. Certainly we
    can do both.
        Last month, I met with acting DHS Secretary, Kevin
    McAleenan, in Jackson, Mississippi to discuss domestic
    terrorism at the public launching of the Homeland Security
    Advisory Council Subcommittee for the Prevention of Targeted
    Violence Against Faith-Based Communities.
        Additionally, my legislation, the Domestic and
    International Terrorism Data Act, was reported by the committee
    by voice vote. The bill would require the Government to publish
    an annual public report outlining domestic terrorist incidents
    and exactly what the Government is doing to address these
    incidents. It would also require DHS to research how domestic
    terrorists are linked with transnational terrorist movements,
    including white supremacist movement.
        I look forward to the committee taking up additional
    domestic terrorism legislation later this month.
        Again, I thank the witnesses for joining us today, and
    expect a productive discussion on this important matter.
        [The statement of Chairman Thompson follows:]
                    Statement of Chairman Bennie G. Thompson
                               September 10, 2019
        To begin, I want to note that tomorrow marks the 18th anniversary
    of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. We remember those that
    were lost that terrible day in New York, at the Pentagon, and in
    Shanksville, Pennsylvania. They and their loved ones are on Americans'
    minds and in our hearts at this time especially.
        Today, I am pleased to welcome our distinguished panel of witnesses
    and appreciate their testimony before the committee. That said, I want
    to say for the record it is unacceptable the Secretary of Homeland
    Security, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) director, and acting
    director of the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) refused a
    bipartisan invitation to testify at this hearing. This committee has a
    long-standing practice of holding an annual hearing to examine threats
    to the homeland. We continue to face threats from foreign terrorist
    organizations and home-grown violent extremists, and communities like
    El Paso have suffered unspeakable tragedy from domestic terrorist
    attacks recently. Agreeing to come before the committee at the end of
    October, over 3 months after our request was made, is not sufficient.
    We will continue to engage the administration and ensure this committee
    has the information necessary to carry out its oversight
    responsibilities.
        As another year passes, Members of Congress--especially on this
    committee--are reminded of the duty we have to counter the terrorism
    threats of today and tomorrow. Despite organizational setbacks and loss
    of physical territory, foreign terrorist organizations like ISIS and
    al-Qaeda remain capable and committed of conducting external attacks
    and influencing like-minded groups and individuals outside of Iraq and
    Syria, perpetuating a circle of violence and extremist rhetoric. One
    such attack took place on Easter Sunday this year, when a terrorist
    group, inspired by ISIS, killed over 250 people during coordinated
    attacks on 3 churches and hotels in Sri Lanka. Alarmingly, a recent
    Pentagon inspector general report stated that ISIS was resurging in
    Syria after the administration's decision to withdraw U.S. troops from
    the country, refuting President Trump's own statements about ISIS being
    defeated.
        The United States must find ways to responsibly and adequately
    support partners on the ground and advance efforts to keep ISIS from
    reestablishing itself. Additionally, al-Qaeda and its affiliates are
    still active across parts of Africa, the Middle East, and South Asia.
    And the instability some of these regions is ripe for Jihadism to
    flourish. In fact, just last month, the State Department's
    Counterterrorism Coordinator Ambassador Nathan Sales stated ``al-Qaeda
    is as strong as it has ever been'' and has ``let ISIS absorb the brunt
    of the world's counterterrorism efforts while patiently reconstituting
    itself.'' In Somalia, the al-Qaeda linked group ``al-Shabaab''
    conducted an attack on a hotel, killing 26 people, including two
    American citizens, this past July. While we can't lose focus on
    terrorist groups like these, we are also facing a growing domestic
    terrorist--and particularly white nationalist--threat to our homeland.
    Addressing this threat, which is often transnational in nature, has
    long been taken a back seat to other threats faced by the United
    States.
        Earlier this year, the mosque shootings in Christchurch, New
    Zealand, which left 51 dead, exemplified the growing transnational
    connections between white nationalist terrorists who inspire and
    communicate with each other across the world. Just last month in El
    Paso, Texas, 22 people were killed when a 21-year-old white nationalist
    terrorist opened fire on a Walmart using an AK-47-style assault rifle.
    The shooter drove 10 hours from his home in Allen, Texas, to El Paso
    specifically to target Hispanics. And in April, a 19-year-old white
    nationalist terrorist opened fire using an AR-15-style assault rifle
    inside the Chabad of Poway synagogue on the last day of Passover, in
    Poway, California, killing a 60-year-old woman. These attacks did not
    originate in a vacuum. Both of these white nationalist terrorists who
    killed people in Poway, California and El Paso, Texas cited Brenton
    Tarrant, the terrorist that carried out the Christchurch mosque attacks
    in New Zealand as an inspiration. And sadly, these are just a few of
    the deadly domestic terrorism attacks linked to white supremacy
    extremism from this year. Over the last decade, over 70 percent of
    extremist-related killings in the United States were committed by
    right-wing extremists, many of whom flock to social media and on-line
    platforms to espouse their hateful and violent rhetoric.
        Like other terrorists and terrorist groups, white supremacist
    extremists take advantage of social media and on-line platforms to
    promulgate their ideology and promote violence. On June 26, I held a
    hearing examining social media companies' efforts to counter on-line
    terror content and misinformation. Just last week, the committee
    deposed the owner of 8chan, an on-line platform that has been linked to
    at least 3 acts of deadly white supremacist extremist violence. While
    we cannot lose focus on the foreign terrorist threat to the United
    States, we have to simultaneously address the real and persistent
    threat of domestic terrorism. And we can certainly do both.
        Last month, I met with Acting DHS Secretary Kevin McAleenan in
    Jackson, Mississippi to discuss domestic terrorism at the public
    launching of the Homeland Security Advisory Council's Subcommittee for
    the Prevention of Targeted Violence Against Faith-Based Communities.
    Additionally, my legislation, the Domestic and International Terrorism
    DATA Act, was reported by the committee by voice vote. The bill would
    require the Government to publish an annual public report outlining
    domestic terrorist incidents and exactly what the Government is doing
    to address these incidents. It would also require DHS to research how
    domestic terrorists are linked with transnational terrorist movements,
    including white supremacist movements. I look forward to the committee
    taking up additional domestic terrorism legislation later this month.

        Chairman Thompson. With that I now recognize the Ranking
    Member of the full committee, the gentleman from Alabama, Mr.
    Rogers, for 5 minutes for the purpose of an opening statement.
        Mr. Rogers. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We are once again at
    the anniversary of September 11, 2001. Thousands of innocent
    Americans lost their lives that morning. Our Nation has not
    been the same since.
        Those horrible acts were carried out by an organized,
    trained, and determined terrorist network. Thousands of brave
    men and women have given their lives to eliminate this threat
    to our homeland and our way of life. This anniversary is a
    somber reminder of those sacrifices.
        During the past 18 years the United States and our allies
    dealt a decisive blow to al-Qaeda. Most recently, we have
    broken the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, ISIS. However, we
    cannot lose sight of the continued danger posed by al-Qaeda and
    its affiliates. Al-Qaeda is rebuilding, expanding its ranks and
    safe havens, and remains intent on attacking the United States.
        Since the Arab Spring and the rise of ISIS, al-Qaeda and
    its affiliates have grown to approximately 40,000 members.
    Their ranks now include battle-hardened specialists and bomb
    makers. This new generation of experts has honed their skills
    in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, and Northern Africa. Al-Qaeda
    participation in battles throughout the Middle East and Africa
    have also rebuilt the credibility of a once shattered
    organization.
        The group's propaganda operation is also learning, as well.
    They watched ISIS recruit thousands, including young men from
    al-Qaeda's own ranks, using the latest social media tools. They
    have--now they are exploiting the same tools. Public statements
    from al-Qaeda senior leaders on social media platforms have
    increased by 67 percent over the last several years.
        The terror organization is reintroducing its movement, and
    targeting a new generation of fighters. Their message is clear:
    A continued commitment to target the United States homeland,
    and a call for unity across jihadist factions.
        Recent U.S. airstrikes targeting al-Qaeda fighters hiding
    and plotting external attacks in Syria prove the group remains
    a serious threat. The FBI told us in May that they are actively
    investigating over 1,000 cases of individuals in the United
    States inspired by al-Qaeda and other foreign terrorist
    organization.
        This committee exists because of the horrific attack
    carried out by al-Qaeda. Though oversight and legislation--
    through oversight and legislation, it is our job to ensure DHS
    can prevent another attack. Unfortunately, since Democrats took
    the Majority, we haven't had a single full committee oversight
    hearing focused on the threat from foreign terrorists, nor have
    we moved to a--moved a comprehensive DHS authorization bill to
    strengthen the Department's ability to prevent attacks. Our
    recent focus on domestic terrorism is important, but we cannot
    let the Department or this committee lose sight of the serious
    and on-going threat from foreign terrorists.
        I hope our witnesses today will articulate the challenges
    facing DHS, and provide recommendations to enhance our ability
    to defeat those--these and other emerging threats to our
    homeland.
        Finally, I share the Chairman's frustration that DHS, FBI,
    and the National Counterterrorism Center could not be here
    today. Our committee has a long-standing tradition of hearing
    from these witnesses each fall. Like Chairman Thompson, I
    expect them to appear before this committee as soon as
    possible.
        With that I yield back my time.
        [The statement of Ranking Member Rogers follows:]
                               September 10, 2019
                    Statement of Ranking Member Mike Rogers
        We are once again at the anniversary of September 11, 2001.
    Thousands of innocent Americans lost their lives that morning. Our
    Nation has not been the same since.
        Those horrible acts were carried out by an organized, trained, and
    determined terrorist network. Thousands of brave men and women have
    given their lives to eliminate this threat to our homeland and our way
    of life.
        This anniversary is a somber reminder of their sacrifices. During
    the past 18 years, the United States and our allies dealt a decisive
    blow to al-Qaeda.
        More recently we've broken the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria
    (ISIS).
        However, we cannot lose sight of the continued danger posed by al-
    Qaeda and its affiliates. Al-Qaeda is rebuilding, expanding its ranks
    and safe havens, and remains intent on attacking the United States.
        Since the Arab Spring and the rise of ISIS, al-Qaeda and its
    affiliates have grown to approximately 40,000 members. Their ranks now
    include battle-hardened specialists and bomb makers.
        This new generation of experts has honed their skills in Iraq,
    Afghanistan, Syria, and Northern Africa.
        Al-Qaeda's participation in battles throughout the Middle East and
    Africa have also rebuilt the credibility of a once shattered
    organization. The group's propaganda operation has been learning as
    well.
        They watched ISIS recruit thousands, including young men from al-
    Qaeda's own ranks, using the latest social media tools.
        Now they're exploiting the same tools. Public statements from al-
    Qaeda senior leaders on social media platforms have increased by 67
    percent over the past several years.
        The terror organization is reintroducing its movement and targeting
    a new generation of fighters.
        Their message is clear: A continued commitment to target the U.S.
    homeland and a call for unity across jihadist factions.
        Recent U.S. airstrikes targeting al-Qaeda fighters hiding and
    plotting external attacks from Syria prove that the group remains a
    serious threat.
        The FBI told us in May that they are actively investigating over
    1,000 cases of individuals in the United States inspired by al-Qaeda
    and other foreign terrorist organizations.
        This committee exists because of a horrific attack carried out by
    al-Qaeda.
        Through oversight and legislation, it is our job to ensure DHS can
    prevent another attack.
        Unfortunately, since Democrats took the majority, we haven't had a
    single full committee oversight hearing focused on the threat from
    foreign terrorists.
        Nor have we moved a comprehensive DHS authorization bill to
    strengthen the Department's ability to prevent attacks.
        Our recent focus on domestic terrorism is important, but we cannot
    let the Department, or this committee, lose sight of the serious and
    on-going threat from foreign terrorists.
        I hope our witnesses today will articulate the challenges facing
    DHS and provide recommendations to enhance our ability to defeat these
    and other emerging threats to our homeland.
        Finally, I share the Chairman's frustration that DHS, the FBI, and
    the National Counter Terrorism Center could not be here today.
        Our committee has a long-standing tradition of hearing from these
    witnesses each fall.
        Like Chairman Thompson, I expect them to appear before the
    committee as soon as possible.

        Chairman Thompson. Thank you. Other Members of the
    committee are reminded that, under committee rules, opening
    statements may be submitted for the record.
        [The statement of Honorable Jackson Lee follows:]
                   Statement of Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee
                               September 10, 2019
        Chairman Thompson and Ranking Member Rogers, thank you for this
    opportunity to receive testimony on ``Global Terrorism: Threats to the
    Homeland.''
        I thank today's witnesses for coming before the committee to offer
    testimony on this important topic.
        Witnesses:
       Mr. Peter Bergen, vice president, Global Studies & Fellows,
            New America;
       Mr. Ali Soufan, founder, The Soufan Center;
       Mr. Brian Levin, director, Center for the Study of Hate &
            Extremism, California State University, San Bernardino; and
       Mr. Thomas Joscelyn, senior fellow, Foundation for the
            Defense of Democracies (Republican witness).
        I will never forget September 11, 2001.
        Tomorrow marks the 18th anniversary of the attacks that killed
    2,977 men, women, and children.
        I stood on the East Front steps of the Capitol on September 11,
    along with 150 Members of the House of Representatives and sang ``God
    Bless America.''
        As a Member of the House Committee on Homeland Security since its
    establishment today's hearing is of importance to me.
        I am supportive of efforts to employ effective approaches to
    interdicting, disrupting, and dismantling terrorist networks.
        The previous administration focused on how best to use our Nation's
    soft power and military power for minimizing, eliminating, and
    containing terrorists' threats in the region, with a full understanding
    that over-aggressive actions militarily can pull our country into a
    precipitous military struggle that would be open-ended.
        Unfortunately, this administration has diminished the role and the
    capacity of the State Department to keep manageable threats in check,
    while doing the hard work of coalition building so that there would be
    effective burden sharing for actions taken.
        Regrettably, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Federal
    Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and the National Counterterrorism Center
    (NCTC) declined to participate in the hearing, citing scheduling
    conflicts, despite a bipartisan request from the committee well in
    advance.
        How can the United States provide a credible bulwark against
    terrorists threats abroad if we cannot get this administration to get
    over its reticence to speaking before committees in this Congress.
        Incredible as it is, the President was planning to meet this
    weekend with the Taliban at Camp David, an organization directly linked
    to the September 11, 2001 attacks on our Nation, while at the same time
    he discourages his political appointees and acting department heads to
    participate in this hearing to assess the threats posed by
    international terror groups, which include the Talban.
        The benefits of the collaborative work done by all levels of law
    enforcement was evidenced by the work done by local, State, and Federal
    law enforcement during Hurricane Harvey and the resulting flood.
        Homeland security and National defense are not and should not be
    made into political issues.
        Our Nation needs our best efforts on the behalf of peace and
    security abroad to assure that we have peace and security at home.
                               september 11, 2001
        September 11, 2001 remains a tragedy that defines our Nation's
    history since that faithful day for many reasons, but the final chapter
    will be written by those who are charged with keeping our Nation and
    its people safe while preserving the way of life that terrorists seek
    to change.
        One of the enduring challenges for Members of this committee is how
    we guide the work of the Department of Homeland Security to ensure that
    September 11 never happens again.
        I offer my thanks and gratitude to the 9/11 Commission Chaired by
    New Jersey Governor Thomas H. Kean and Vice Chair Former Congressman
    Lee H. Hamilton Vice for their work in investigating the events of
    September 11, 2001 and making recommendations to the Nation and the
    Congress on what we need to do to avoid another September 11.
        The 9/11 Commission report provided the fullest possible account of
    the events surrounding 9/11 and identified lessons learned.
        The report chronicled the activities of al-Qaeda which revealed the
    sophistication, patience, discipline, and deadliness of the
    organization to carry out the attacks of September 11.
        From the Commission's work, we learned of the lack of imagination
    among our law enforcement and National intelligence community in
    understanding how dangerous al-Qaeda was to the security of the United
    States and the safety of our citizens.
        We were aware of the threat al-Qaeda posed from attacks carried out
    against Americans and American interests in the 1990's through the year
    2001.
        On February 26, 1993, a truck bomb was detonated below the North
    Tower of the World Trade Center--killing 6 people.
        It was intended to cause both the North and South Towers to
    collapse and if it had been successful thousands would have died on
    that day.
        On August 7, 1998, 224 people were killed and more than 5,000
    injured by bombs exploding almost simultaneously at the U.S. embassies
    in Nairobi, Kenya and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
        On October 12, 2000, 17 sailors aboard the USS Cole were killed by
    an al-Qaeda attack using a small boat packed with explosives.
        On September 11, 2001, 2,977, which included 2,504 civilians, were
    killed when al-Qaeda operatives hijacked 3 planes and used them as
    guided missiles to attack both World Trade Towers and the Pentagon.
                    victims of the september 11, 2001 attack
        At the World Trade Center site in Lower Manhattan, 2,753 people
    were killed when hijacked American Airlines Flight 11 and United
    Airlines Flight 175 were intentionally crashed in the north and south
    towers.
        Of those who perished during the initial attacks and the subsequent
    collapses of the towers, 343 were New York City firefighters, another
    23 were New York City police officers and 37 others were officers at
    the Port Authority.
        The victims ranged in age from 2 to 85 years.
        At the Pentagon in Washington, 184 people were killed when hijacked
    American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the building.
        Near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, 40 passengers and crew members
    aboard United Airlines Flight 93 died when the plane crashed into a
    field.
        It is believed that the hijackers crashed the plane in that
    location, rather than the target of the U.S. Capitol, after the
    passengers and crew attempted to retake control of the flight.
        The act of those passengers to stop the hijackers likely saved the
    lives of thousands of their fellow Americans that day.
        The heroic work done by the first responders who rushed into the
    burning Twin Towers and the Pentagon saved lives.
        We will forever remember the law enforcement and firefighters lost
    their lives in the line of duty on September 11.
        This Nation shall forever be grateful for their selfless sacrifice.
        I visited the site of the World Trade Center Towers in the
    aftermath of the attacks and grieved over the deaths of so many of our
    men, women, and children.
        I watched as thousands of first responders, construction workers,
    and volunteers worked to recover the remains of the dead, and removed
    the tons of debris, while placing their own lives and health at risk.
        The men and women who worked at ``Ground Zero'' were called by a
    sense of duty to help in our Nation's greatest time of need since the
    bombing of Pearl Harbor.
        Under the leadership of President Obama, Osama bin Laden was found
    and killed and the prosecution of al-Qaeda has left them without the
    capacity to launch major operations within the United States.
        Congress in response to the new challenges that our first
    responders would face created the Homeland Security Grant Program.
        The grant program would address the challenges that were
    undermining first responder efforts at Ground Zero and the Pentagon.
        Over time Congress has modified the program to provide for more
    targeted investments. First responders and emergency managers across
    the country have testified before our committee that without these
    much-needed grant funds, preparedness, planning, and training
    activities would not be what they are today.
        The Federal Emergency Management Agency's National Preparedness
    Report shows States have high confidence in the capability areas that
    have benefited from Homeland Security investments--such as operational
    coordination, situational assessment, and public alerts and warnings--
    and low confidence in capability areas that have received less funding.
        Unfortunately, the last year the Homeland Security Grant prograin
    was fully funded was fiscal year 2010 when Congress appropriated $2.75
    billion for this program.
        In fiscal year 2012--1 year later the funding level was only $1.35
    billion, although the funding level in 2013 had increased to $1.5
    billion--sequestration further reduced the amount available to be
    awarded to States.
        In both fiscal years 2014 and 2015 the Homeland Security Grant
    program was $1.5 billion.
        We know that the funding provided by the Homeland Security Grant
    program has had a significant impact on the ability of first responders
    to react to terrorist events.
        The Boston attacks resulted in the tragic killing of 3 and the
    injuring of more than 260 men, women, and children awaiting the arrival
    of runners in the Boston Marathon.
        This low number of fatalities came as a direct result of the
    training of first responders to meet the security, rescue, and recovery
    needs of those directly impacted by the attack.
                             new terrorist threats
        Today, this Nation faces new threats from terrorists.
        Domestic Terrorism, Extremism, Homegrown Violent Extremism, and
    International Terrorism are all threats that our Nation must access and
    address.
        Groups and individuals inspired to commit terrorist acts are
    motivated by a range of personal, religious, political, or other
    ideological beliefs-there is no magic fonnula for defining how a person
    may become a terrorist.
        Further, the complexity of adding social media as a new source of
    recruitinent for violent extremists is complicating the efforts of law
    enforcement, domestic security and National defense.
        The most difficult challenges our Nation has faced since the
    attacks of September 11, 2001, is the prevention of terrorist's acts
    planned by ``Lone Wolves.''
        Domestic terrorist incidents, particularly from far-right
    extremists, are on the rise, including recent mass shootings in Poway,
    California and El Paso, Texas.
        This week will mark the 18th anniversary of the September 11, 2001
    terrorist attacks, this hearing allows committee Members to gather
    information about the state of terrorism around the world and how
    policy makers can support those charged with securing the Nation.
        Mr. Chairman, I yield back.

        I welcome our panel of witnesses for today. Our first
    witness, Mr. Peter Bergen, is a vice president of Global
    Studies and Fellows, and the director of the International
    Security and Future of War Programs for New America. In
    addition to being a journalist and documentary producer, Mr.
    Bergen held teaching positions at the Kennedy School of
    Government at Harvard University, and the School of Advanced
    International Studies at Johns Hopkins University.
        Next we are joined by Mr. Ali Soufan, the chief executive
    officer of the Soufan Group, and founder of the Soufan Center.
    The Soufan Center--Mr. Soufan is a former FBI supervisory
    special agent who investigated and supervised highly sensitive
    and complex international terrorism cases, including the East
    Africa Embassy bombing, the attack on the USS Cole, and the
    events surrounding the attacks on September 11.
        Our third witness is Mr. Brian Levin. Mr. Levin is a
    criminologist and civil rights attorney, and professor of
    criminal justice, and director of the Center for the Study of
    Hate and Extremism at California State University, San
    Bernardino, where he specializes in analysis of hate crime,
    terrorism, and legal issues.
        Finally, we welcome Mr. Thomas Joscelyn. Mr. Jocelyn is a
    senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, and
    is senior editor of FDD's Long War Journal. Much of his
    research focuses on how al-Qaeda and ISIS operate around the
    globe.
        Without objection, the witnesses' full statements will be
    inserted in the record.
        I now ask each witness to summarize his statement for 5
    minutes, beginning with Mr. Bergen.

      STATEMENT OF PETER BERGEN, VICE PRESIDENT, GLOBAL STUDIES &
                          FELLOWS, NEW AMERICA

        Mr. Bergen. Thank you, Chairman Thompson and Ranking Member
    Rogers and the distinguished Members of the committee.
        I wanted to briefly address what happened over the weekend
    at Camp David, because I think it has some relevance to what we
    are discussing today.
        I think President Trump made the right decision, mostly
    because this wasn't really a peace agreement, but a withdrawal
    agreement. We have seen from our own past history that
    withdrawing from these countries can actually impact the United
    States and our allies in ways that are not beneficial to our
    National security.
        Secondarily, this agreement was being conducted without the
    Afghan Government. After all, they are the elected
    representatives of the Afghan people. The Taliban are unelected
    theocrats, and we are treating them as a potential government-
    in-waiting, rather than an insurgent group.
        Third, we have an Afghan election coming up on September
    28. President Ghani is going to run. He almost certainly will
    win. It is the fourth election we have had in Afghanistan. We
    in the United States, and the U.S. Government, has for some
    reason treated negotiations with the Taliban as a priority,
    rather than shoring up the election system in Afghanistan, and
    the legitimately-elected government.
        So I am glad that we have had this outcome. President Ghani
    will have a lot more leverage to say, ``We need a seat at the
    table in the next round of negotiations with the Taliban.''
        Bby the way, President Obama reduced the troops in
    Afghanistan from 100,000 to the 8,500 level that we are about
    to get to very soon. He didn't do that with any permission from
    the Taliban or any negotiation with the Taliban. He just did
    it. We don't need their permission to get to the right troop
    level. I think 8,500 or something around that is a reasonable
    level to carry out the counter-terrorism mission that we need
    to do for the foreseeable future.
        So, turning now to kind-of the question of where we are
    today, 18 years after 9/11. If I had come before your committee
    in 2002 and said, ``In the next 18 years, 104 Americans are
    going to be killed by jihadi terrorists,'' that would have
    seemed--in the United States, that would have seemed an
    absolutely absurd prediction. But that is what has happened.
        Why has that happened? There is, I think, three big
    reasons.
        First of all, the actions of people like Ali Soufan, to my
    left, the actions of people on this committee, the actions of
    so many hundreds of thousands of other Americans, we--our
    offensive capabilities have, as Ranking Member Rogers
    mentioned, have inflicted a great deal of damage on al-Qaeda.
        I mean al-Qaeda, the organization that attacked us on 9/11,
    is essentially a local jihadist group in Pakistan with no
    ability to attack us here in the United States. That could
    change if we, for instance, left Afghanistan tomorrow, because
    over time these groups can regroup.
        So our offensive capabilities, the drone program, and our
    defensive capability--just think about the activities of this
    committee, which didn't exist on 9/11, or DHS didn't exist, TSA
    didn't exist, the National Counterterrorism Center didn't
    exist. Our intelligence budget was $20 billion. Now it is $80
    billion a year. I can go on and on with all the things that we
    have done to make the country safer.
        So, therefore, it is not surprising that we haven't been
    attacked by foreign terrorist organizations successfully in the
    United States since 9/11. Again, if I came before you in 2002
    and made that prediction, it would have seemed absurd. But the
    fact is our offensive capabilities, our defensive capabilities,
    and also public knowledge have reduced and managed this threat.
        Now, ``manage'' is a useful verb, I think, in this context,
    because we are never going to win in any conventional sense.
    What we need to do is manage this threat to a level that,
    basically, is not going to interfere with our way of life in a
    meaningful way, as 9/11 did.
        Now, turning to the domestic terrorism threat, which
    Ranking Member Rogers also mentioned, the white right-wing
    threat, the fact is that that is as important a threat to
    United States today as the jihadi threat. New America, where I
    work, and my colleague, Melissa Salyk-Yirk, here is here with
    me, and David Sterman, who also prepared some of this
    testimony, we have been tracking the question of right-wing
    terrorism for a long time.
        Now, I mentioned the figure of 104 jihadi terrorists who
    have been killed, who--104 victims of jihadist terrorism in the
    United States since 9/11. Well, in the mean time, 109 Americans
    have been killed by right-wing terrorists. Then--and I don't
    want to leave those 2 ideologies by themselves, because people
    motivated by black nationalist ideology have killed 8 people in
    the last 2 years. People motivated by a kind of ideological
    misogyny have killed 8 people in the last several years. So we
    face a range of threats from a range of ideologies, and
    prioritizing any one ideology in this context is mistaken.
        Finally, I would like to say, in terms of the ISIS issue,
    obviously it is very good that we defeated them territorially.
    But ISIS wasn't really the problem. ISIS was a symptom of some
    very deep problems in the Middle East, which are not going
    away: Sectarianism; collapse of governance; terrible economies;
    massive immigration into Europe; the rise of European ultra-
    nationalist parties, which fuels this in Europe. Unfortunately,
    those underlying conditions continue to exist.
        Thank you.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Bergen follows:]
                       Prepared Statement of Peter Bergen
                               September 10, 2019
            what are the terrorist threats to the united states? \1\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \1\ Thanks to David Sterman and Melissa Salyk-Virk of New America
    for their inputs to this testimony.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Since the 9/11 attacks, no foreign terrorist organization has
    successfully directed or carried out a deadly attack in the United
    States. With ISIS's territorial collapse, the threat posed by the group
    has receded. It has been more than a year since the last lethal
    jihadist terrorist attack in the United States, and the number of
    jihadist terrorism cases in the United States has declined
    substantially since its peak in 2015. However, ``home-grown'' jihadist
    terrorism, including that inspired by ISIS, is likely to remain a
    threat. While ISIS's inspirational power has lessened in recent years,
    white supremacist extremism is increasingly inspiring deadly violence.*
    The most likely threat to the United States comes from ``home-grown''
    terrorists inspired by a mixture of ideologies including jihadist, far
    right, and idiosyncratic strains, who are radicalized via the internet
    and take advantage of the availability of semi-automatic firearms in
    the United States. The ``travel ban'' is not an effective response to
    any of these threats.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        * This number includes a small number of people who died before
    being charged but were widely reported to have engaged in jihadist
    terrorism-related criminal activity.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        The threat to the United States from jihadist terrorism is
    relatively limited. New America's ``Terrorism in America After 9/11''
    project tracks the 479 cases of individuals who have been charged with
    jihadist terrorism-related activity in the United States since
    September 11, 2001.\2\ In the 18 years since 9/11, individuals
    motivated by jihadist ideology have killed 104 people in the United
    States. Every one of those deaths is a tragedy, but they are not
    national catastrophes as 9/11 was. The death toll from jihadist
    terrorism over the past 18 years is far lower than what even the most
    optimistic of analysts projected in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11
    attacks. Al-Qaeda and its breakaway faction, ISIS, have failed to
    direct a successful attack in the United States since the 9/11 attacks
    and none of the perpetrators of the 13 lethal jihadist attacks in the
    United States since those attacks received training from a foreign
    terrorist group.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \2\ Peter Bergen, David Sterman, Albert Ford, and Alyssa Sims,
    ``Terrorism in America After 9/11,'' New America, Accessed July 3,
    2018, https://www.newamerica.org/in-depth/terrorism-in-america/.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        ISIS did manage to inspire an unprecedented number of Americans to
    conduct attacks and otherwise engage in jihadist activity. In 2015, 80
    people were charged \2\ in the United States with jihadist terrorism
    activity, the highest number in the post-9/11 era. More than three-
    quarters of all deaths caused by jihadists in the United States since
    the 9/11 attacks occurred in 2014 or later, the period when ISIS came
    to prominence.
        However, there has not been a deadly jihadist terrorist attack in
    the United States in more than a year. The last lethal attack was a
    March 2018 stabbing in Florida that killed 1 person. The perpetrator
    was a 17-year-old who admitted being inspired in part by ISIS.\3\ Even
    in this case, the perpetrator appears to have been influenced by a
    range of extremist ideologies, including white supremacy.\4\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \3\ ``Incident/Investigation Report Case No. 17-000176'' (Jupiter
    Police Department, January 12, 2017), https://htv-prod-
    media.s3.amazonaws.com/files/juvenile-report-deadly-stabbing-suspect-
    1520986286.pdf.
        \4\ Paul Mueller, ``Former Homeland Security Official Says Better
    Communication Needed in Wake of Stabbing,'' CBS 12, March 14, 2018,
    https://cbs12.com/news/local/former-homeland-security-official-says-
    better-communication-needed-in-wake-of-stabbing.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        ISIS's ability to inspire violence in the United States has
    suffered in the wake of its territorial losses, but policy makers
    should not expect ISIS's territorial collapse to remove the threat of
    ISIS-inspired terrorism in the United States. Sayfullo Saipov's truck
    ramming attack that killed 8 people in Manhattan in October 2017
    happened the same month that ISIS lost control of its capital in Raqqa,
    Syria.
        While the number of terrorism cases isn't an exact proxy for levels
    of threat, it certainly says something about the scale of the threat.
    The number of cases of individuals charged with jihadist terrorism-
    related crimes has dramatically decreased since 2015 when it was at its
    peak with 80 cases. There have been 19 such cases as of the end of
    September 6, 2019.
        The relatively limited jihadist terrorist threat to the United
    States is in large part the result of the enormous investment the
    country has made in strengthening its defenses against terrorism in the
    post-9/11 era. The United States spent $2.8 trillion on
    counterterrorism efforts from 2002 to 2017, constituting almost 15
    percent of discretionary spending during that time frame.\5\ That
    effort has made the United States a hard target.\6\ On 9/11, there were
    16 people on the U.S. ``No Fly'' list.\7\ In 2016, there were 81,000
    people on the list.\8\ Before 9/11, there was no Department of Homeland
    Security, National Counterterrorism Center, or Transportation Security
    Administration. As a result, in January 2019, Director of National
    Intelligence Dan Coats testified that the United States is a
    ``generally inhospitable operating environment'' for home-grown violent
    extremists compared to most Western countries.\9\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \5\ ``Counterterrorism Spending: Protecting America While Promoting
    Efficiencies and Accountability,'' Stimson Center, May 2018, https://
    www.stimson.org/sites/default/files/file-attachments/
    CT_Spending_Report_0.pdf.
        \6\ This draws on: Peter Bergen, Emily Schneider, David Sterman,
    Bailey Cahall, and Tim Maurer, 2014: Jihadist Terrorism and Other
    Unconventional Threats (Washington, DC: Bipartisan Policy Center,
    2014), https://bipartisanpolicy.org/library/2014-jihadist-terrorism-
    and-other-unconventional-threats/.
        \7\ Steve Kroft, ``Unlikely Terrorists on No Fly List,'' CBS News,
    October 5, 2006, www.cbsnews.com/news/unlikely terrorists-on-no-fly
    list/.
        \8\ ``Feinstein Statement on Collins Amendment,'' Office of Senator
    Dianne Feinstein, June 23, 2016, https://www.feinstein.senate.gov/
    public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=F02871C5-A023-4DEF-AEC3-
    EDAF34BEA2BF.
        \9\ Daniel R. Coats, ``Statement for the Record: Worldwide Threat
    Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community,'' Senate Select
    Committee on Intelligence (2019), https://www.dni.gov/files/ODNI/
    documents/2019-ATA-SFR_SSCI.pdf?utm_source=Gov%20Delivery%20Email-
    &utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=Media%20Contacts%20Email.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        By the beginning of the Trump administration, the jihadist threat
    inside the United States was overwhelmingly lone-actor, ISIS-inspired
    attacks such as Sayfullo Saipov's 2017 vehicular ramming in Manhattan.
    This threat has stressed law enforcement, given the diversity of the
    perpetrators and the lack of organization needed to conduct such
    attacks. However, it is still a far cry from the type of attack that
    al-Qaeda carried out on 9/11.
        Law enforcement and intelligence services will still need to combat
    and monitor the threat to the homeland from foreign terrorist
    organizations. Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula's attempt to bring
    down a U.S.-bound passenger jet in 2009 with a bomb hidden in a
    terrorist's underwear and the case the same year in which 3 Americans
    trained with al-Qaeda and returned with a plan to bomb the New York
    City subway, and the 2010 failed Times Square bombing by Faisal
    Shahzad, who trained with the Pakistani Taliban, are reminders of this.
    But the fact is that these failed attempts by Foreign Terrorist
    Organizations (FTO) occurred a decade ago indicating that these FTOs
    were having quite a difficult time launching successful attacks in the
    United States whatever their goals might be to do so.
     the most likely terrorist threat: individuals inspired by a range of
                         ideologies and white supremacy
        Today, the terrorist threat to the United States is emerging from
    across the political spectrum, as ubiquitous firearms, political
    polarization, images of the apocalyptic violence tearing apart
    societies across the Middle East and North Africa, racism, and the rise
    of populism have combined with the power of on-line communication and
    social media. This mixture has generated a complex and varied terrorist
    threat that crosses ideologies and is largely disconnected from
    traditional understandings of terrorist organizations.\10\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \10\ Peter Bergen and David Sterman, ``The Real Terrorist Threat in
    America,'' Foreign Affairs, October 30, 2018, https://
    www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/2018-10-30/real-
    terrorist-threat-america.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Since the 9/11 attacks, individuals inspired by jihadist ideology
    have killed 104 people in the United States. However, individuals
    inspired by far-right ideology (including white supremacist, anti-
    Government, and anti-abortion views) have killed 109 people. On August
    3, 2019, Patrick Crusius, a 21-year-old white man, allegedly shot and
    killed 22 people at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas after posting a
    manifesto that described his motive as a purported ``Hispanic
    invasion.''\11\ The attack was the deadliest far-right attack in the
    post-9/11 era.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \11\ Peter Bergen and David Sterman, ``The Huge Threat to America
    That Trump Ignores,'' CNN, August 4, 2019, https://www.cnn.com/2019/08/
    04/opinions/el-paso-dayton-far-right-threat-bergen-sterman/index.html.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Individuals inspired in part by black nationalist ideology have
    killed 8 people since 9/11, and individuals inspired by forms of
    ideological misogyny also killed 8 people during this period, for
    instance, a shooter killed 6 in Isla Vista, California, in 2014 in
    attacks he framed in terms of his hatred for women.\12\ And last year,
    a gunman killed 2 women at a yoga studio in Tallahassee, Florida, using
    the same rationale.\13\ The diversity of terrorists' political
    motivations warns against overly focusing on any single ideology.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \12\ https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-43892189.
        \13\ https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/local/yoga-
    shooting-incel-attack-fueled-by-male-supremacy/.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Though there are many ideological strands, and attackers'
    ideological reference points are often in flux or complex, one
    particular ideological strand--white supremacy--stands out as a
    particular danger. Since the inauguration of President Donald Trump,
    the United States has seen a spate of deadly white supremacist
    terrorist attacks. Every deadly far right attack in this period
    identified by New America had a nexus to white supremacy--together
    killing 43 people; 4 times the number of people killed by jihadist
    terrorists in the same period. There were also more than 3 times as
    many deadly far-right attacks with connections to white supremacy in
    the same period as lethal jihadist attacks.
        According to Michael McGarrity, assistant director of the FBI's
    counterterrorism division, and Calvin Shivers, deputy assistant
    director of the criminal investigative division, ``individuals adhering
    to racially motivated violent extremism ideology have been responsible
    for the most lethal incidents among domestic terrorists in recent
    years, and the FBI assesses the threat of violence and lethality posed
    by racially-motivated violent extremists will continue.'' In July 2019
    the FBI Director Christopher Wray, testified that there have been about
    100 domestic terrorism-related arrests during the past 9 months.
        White supremacist terrorist attacks and violence more generally,
    appears to be increasingly interlinked and internationalized. A study
    by The New York Times determined that ``at least a third of white
    extremist killers since 2011 were inspired by others who perpetrated
    similar attacks'' and that the connections crossed international
    borders. Crusius who carried out the attack at the Walmart in El Paso
    in August had posted a manifesto on 8chan, an on-line message board
    often featuring racist postings, about his support for the terrorist
    who had killed 50 worshippers at 2 mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand
    6 months earlier.
        Just as school shooters learn from other school shooters,
    terrorists learn from other terrorists. Notably, the terrorist who
    carried out the Christchurch attack had posted a manifesto to 8chan
    just before he carried out the attacks at the mosques. Crusius's on-
    line manifesto referred to a ``Hispanic invasion'' of Texas as the
    rationale for his imminent terrorist attack in El Paso. Trump has also
    described migrants coming across the Southern Border as an
    ``invasion.'' However, Crusius said his views about immigrants predated
    Trump becoming President.
                the territorial defeat of isis in syria and iraq
        Over the past year, the United States and its partners have
    successfully eliminated all of ISIS's territory in Iraq and Syria. In
    March, the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) liberated ISIS's
    last piece of territory in Syria in Baghuz. The loss of its territory
    in Iraq and Syria dramatically undercut ISIS's claim that it is the
    caliphate, because the caliphate has historically been a substantial
    geographic entity, such as the Ottoman Empire, as well as a theological
    construct.\14\ The so-called caliphate also allowed the organization to
    have a constant influx of money through the taxation and extortion of
    millions of subjects, oil sales, ransoms and antiquities sales.\15\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \14\ Peter Bergen, ``Is the Fall of Mosul the Fall of ISIS?,'' CNN,
    July 11, 2017, http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/11/opinions/isis-loss-of-
    mosul-and-its-future-bergen/index.html.
        \15\ Callimachi, ``ISIS Caliphate Crumbles as Last Village in Syria
    Falls.''
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        As ISIS's territorial caliphate collapsed, there was a noticeable
    decline in its propaganda capability. Key propaganda outputs including
    ISIS's English-language magazine Rumiyah ceased publication.\16\
    According to Europol's 2019 report, ISIS's losses ``had a significant
    impact on its digital capabilities,'' leaving its weekly Arabic Al-Naba
    newsletter as its only regular output.\17\ The United Nations Sanctions
    Monitoring Team's January 2019 assessment said that ``the propaganda
    machinery of the ISIL core is further decentralizing, and the quality
    of its material continues to decline.''\18\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \16\ ``Twenty-First Report of the Analytical Support and Sanctions
    Monitoring Team.''
        \17\ ``Terrorism Situation and Trend Report 2019 (TE-SAT)''
    (EUROPOL, 2019), https://www.europol.europa.eu/activities-services/
    main-reports/terrorism-situation-and-trend-report-2019-te-sat.
        \18\ ``Twenty-First Report of the Analytical Support and Sanctions
    Monitoring Team.''
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
                   limits to isis's defeat in syria and iraq
        While ISIS's territorial collapse represents a major success for
    the counter-ISIS coalition, the group remains capable of exploiting
    current and potential future instability in Iraq and Syria to improve
    its position. The U.N. Sanctions Monitoring Committee in February 2019
    assessed that in Iraq, the group's transition ``into a covert network
    is well advanced'' and that ISIS poses a ``major threat'' in the form
    of assassinations of officials and ``frequent attacks'' on
    civilians.\19\ Indeed, precursors of ISIS previously demonstrated their
    ability to continue operations in areas where it has lost territory
    during the ``surge'' of U.S. troops in Iraq in 2008.\20\ A particular
    concern is the Al Hol refugee camp in Kurdish-controlled Syria where
    70,000 mostly women and children from countries around the world are
    warehoused. ISIS's ideology is alive and well in the camp according to
    multiple government and media reports.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \19\ ``Twenty-Third Report of the Analytical Support and Sanctions
    Monitoring Team.''
        \20\ Daniel Milton and Muhammad al-'Ubaydi, ``The Fight Goes On:
    The Islamic State's Continuing Military Efforts in Liberated Cities''
    (West Point: Combating Terrorism Center, June 2017), https://
    ctc.usma.edu/app/uploads/2017/07/The-Fight-Goes-On.pdf; Brian Fishman,
    ``Redefining the Islamic State'' (New America, August 18, 2011),
    https://www.newamerica.org/international-security/policy-papers/
    redefining-the-islamic-state/.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        However, there are other factors that may limit the group's ability
    to achieve a resurgence in the near-term. Iraq has exited the ISIS
    crisis in far better shape than conventional wisdom expected at the
    outset of the counter-ISIS campaign, providing a stronger basis for
    preventing an ISIS resurgence having faced it once already.\21\ In
    addition, the presence in the region of U.S. forces as well as the
    U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces and the well-trained Iraqi Counter
    Terrorism Service makes an ISIS resurgence less likely. However, the
    territorial defeat of ISIS in Syria and Iraq does not mean the defeat
    of the organization as a whole, let alone the larger jihadist movement.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \21\ Douglas Ollivant and Bartle Bull, ``Iraq After ISIS: What To
    Do Now'' (New America, April 24, 2018), https://www.newamerica.org/
    international-security/reports/iraq-after-isis-what-do-now/
    introduction; After ISIS: What Is Next in the Middle East (Future of
    War Conference: New America, 2018), https://www.youtube.com/
    watch?v=P2KitBX24Bc.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
                           isis beyond syria and iraq
        On Easter Sunday, April 21, 2019, terrorists killed more than 250
    people in coordinated bombings of 3 churches and 3 hotels in Sri
    Lanka.\22\ The 2 groups tied to the attacks are ISIS \23\ and National
    Thowheed Jamath (NTJ).\24\ ISIS claimed the attack 2 days after it took
    place, and later reporting indicated that multiple family networks
    coordinated the bombings. According to the United Nations Secretary
    General's July 2019 report on the threat posed by ISIS, Abu Bakr al-
    Baghdadi, ISIS's leader, was not aware of the attack before it
    happened.\25\ However, the attackers were sufficiently connected to
    ISIS's network that ISIS was able to release video of the attack via
    its official platforms.\26\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \22\ Roshni Kapur, ``Sri Lanka's Easter Sunday Bombings: Moving
    Forward,'' Middle East Institute (blog), May 7, 2019, https://
    www.mei.edu/publications/sri-lankas-easter-sunday-bombings-moving-
    forward; Amarnath Amarasingam, ``Terrorism on the Teardrop Island:
    Understanding the Easter 2019 Attacks in Sri Lanka,'' CTC Sentinel 12,
    no. 5 (June 2019), https://ctc.usma.edu/app/uploads/2019/05/CTC-
    SENTINEL-052019.pdf.
        \23\ Jeffrey Gettleman, Dharisha Bastians, and Mujib Mashal, ``ISIS
    Claims Sri Lanka Attacks, and President Vows Shakeup,'' The New York
    Times, April 23, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/23/world/asia/
    isis-sri-lanka-blasts.html.
        \24\ Ethirajan, Anbarasan. ``Sri Lanka Attacks: The Family Networks
    behind the Bombings.'' BBC News, May 11, 2019. https://www.bbc.com/
    news/world-asia-48218907.
        \25\ ``Ninth Report of the Secretary-General on the Threat Posed by
    ISIL (Da'esh) to International Peace and Security and the Range of
    United Nations Efforts in Support of Member States in Countering the
    Threat'' (United Nations Security Council, July 31, 2019), https://
    undocs.org/S/2019/612.
        \26\ Amarasingam, ``Terrorism on the Teardrop Island: Understanding
    the Easter 2019 Attacks in Sri Lanka.''
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        The Sri Lanka attack illustrates ISIS's ability to inspire attacks
    outside of Syria and Iraq. And it is not a stand-alone case. Since 2017
    ISIS, and its supporters, have conducted attacks in more than 25
    countries.\27\ Even so, there is reason for optimism. The United
    Nations Sanctions Monitoring Team reported a ``substantial reduction in
    global external attacks'' associated with ISIS in 2018.\28\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \27\ Jin Wu, Derej Watkins, and Rukmini Callimachi, ``ISIS Lost Its
    Last Territory in Syria. But the Attacks Continue,'' New York Times,
    March 23, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/03/23/world/
    middleeast/isis-syria-defeated.html.
        \28\ ``Twenty-Third Report of the Analytical Support and Sanctions
    Monitoring Team.''
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        ISIS's ability to conduct such attacks is bolstered by two
    overlapping sources of international strength. One is its on-line
    networks--or what some have termed a ``Virtual Caliphate''--which
    produce and spread propaganda but also provide advice for attacks while
    helping ISIS's central organization claim ties to attacks carried out
    by militants thousands of miles away. The second factor is ISIS's more
    official structure of wilayat (provinces) and affiliates. In January
    2019, the U.N. Sanctions Monitoring Team reported that a centralized
    ISIS leadership remains that ``communicates and provides resources to
    its affiliates, albeit at a reduced level.''\29\ Al-Qaeda's continued
    existence and maintenance of its own affiliate network after Osama Bin
    Laden's death warns against dismissing the ability of the group to
    maintain a coherent albeit reduced network after territorial or
    leadership losses.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \29\ ``Twenty-Third Report of the Analytical Support and Sanctions
    Monitoring Team.''
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        ISIS has shown some evidence of its ability to build or sustain its
    brand and affiliate structure in the wake of the territorial collapse
    in Syria and Iraq. In April 2019, it claimed its first attack in the
    Democratic Republic of Congo, announcing a Central African
    ``province.''\30\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \30\ Steve Wembi and Joseph Goldstein, ``ISIS Claims First Attack
    in the Democratic Republic of Congo,'' New York Times, April 19, 2019,
    https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/19/world/africa/isis-congo-attack.html;
    Rukmini Callimachi, ``ISIS, After Laying Groundwork, Gains Toehold in
    Congo,'' New York Times, April 20, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/
    04/20/world/africa/isis-attack-congo.html.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        On the other hand, the strength of ISIS's affiliates should not be
    overestimated. Giving ISIS too much credit for its control over
    affiliates with pre-existing constituencies or exaggerating its
    affiliates' strength can aid ISIS's media strategy of portraying itself
    as in control of a highly centralized, globalized Caliphate even in the
    wake of its territorial defeat in Iraq and Syria.\31\ Many of ISIS's
    affiliates and provinces are either struggling or are under substantial
    military pressure. In Libya, once viewed as a potential fallback for
    the group, ISIS lost its hold of the city of Sirte in late 2016.\32\
    Yet the group appears to continue to pose a resilient terrorist
    threat.\33\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \31\ For a discussion of these risks see, for example: Daveed
    Gartenstein-Ross and Nathaniel Barr, ``Neither Remaining Nor Expanding:
    The Islamic State's Global Expansion Struggles,'' War on the Rocks,
    February 23, 2016, https://warontherocks.com/2016/02/neither-remaining-
    nor-expanding-the-islamic-states-global-expansion-struggles/.
        \32\ Lachlan Wilson and Jason Pack, ``The Islamic State's
    Revitalization in Libya and Its Post-2016 War of Attrition,'' CTC
    Sentinel 12, no. 3 (March 2019), https://ctc.usma.edu/islamic-states-
    revitalization-libya-post-2016-war-attrition/.
        \33\ Wilson and Pack; ``Twenty-Third Report of the Analytical
    Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team.''
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        In other areas, where ISIS held less power, affiliates are facing
    even tougher environments. In January 2019, the U.N. Sanctions
    Monitoring Committee reported that ISIS ``in Yemen now has only a few
    mobile training camps and a dwindling number of fighters,'' that the
    group is not economically self-sufficient, that it recruits few foreign
    fighters, and that its activities in Al-Bayda ``now consist mainly of
    protecting the group's leaders and their family members.''\34\ Some
    affiliates have also seen the deaths of important leaders. For example,
    Abdulhakim Dhuqub, ISIS's second in command in Somalia, was killed by a
    U.S. airstrike in April 2019 in Xiriiro, Somalia.\35\ Abu Sayed
    Orakzai, also known as Sad Arhab and the leader of ISIS in Afghanistan,
    was killed by an airstrike by Afghan and coalition forces in
    Afghanistan in August 2018.\36\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \34\ ``Twenty-Third Report of the Analytical Support and Sanctions
    Monitoring Team.''
        \35\ Kyle Rempfer, ``US Killed No. 2 Leader of ISIS-Somalia,
    Officials Say,'' Air Force Times, April 15, 2019, https://
    www.airforcetimes.com/news/your-air-force/2019/04/15/us-killed-number-
    two-leader-of-isis-somalia-officials-say/.
        \36\ Ehsan Popalzai, Ryan Browne, and Eric Levenson, ``ISIS Leader
    in Afghanistan Killed in Airstrike, US Says,'' CNN, August 26, 2018,
    https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/26/world/isis-leader-afghanistan-strike/
    index.html.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        The ISIS affiliate in Afghanistan, however, continues to mount
    large-scale attacks as it did last month when an ISIS suicide bomber
    killed 63 people attending a wedding in the Afghan capital, Kabul. This
    attack underlined how careful the United States must be as it
    negotiates a withdrawal of forces with the Taliban. The United States
    must continue to maintain sufficient counterterrorism capacity to
    ensure that ISIS, al-Qaeda, and elements of the Taliban that reject any
    kind of peace agreement with the Afghan government do not threaten the
    Afghan State or regroup sufficiently to plot attacks in the West.
                           the resiliency of al-qaeda
        Even as ISIS suffers repeated setbacks, al-Qaeda has shown
    resiliency in the face of the counterterrorism campaigns directed
    against it and the challenge from within the jihadist movement posed by
    the rise of ISIS. In August, al-Qaeda marked the 31st anniversary of
    its founding, making the group one of the longest-lasting terrorist
    groups in history.\37\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \37\ For one discussion of terrorist group longevity, see: Jodi
    Vittori, ``All Struggles Must End: The Longevity of Terrorist Groups,''
    Contemporary Security Policy 30, no. 3 (December 2009): 444-66, https:/
    /doi.org/10.1080/13523260903326602.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Eighteen years after 9/11, al-Qaeda continues to operate across
    North Africa and South Asia despite the heavy losses it has sustained,
    including the death of its founder, Osama bin Laden, and of dozens of
    other al-Qaeda leaders who have been killed in drone strikes in
    Pakistan and Yemen. Al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent, Al-Qaeda in
    the Arabian Peninsula, and Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb all retain
    capacity for sustained local attacks.
        In Syria, al-Qaeda's fortunes are far from clear, though any
    accounting must acknowledge a substantial al-Qaeda presence in the
    country. Al-Qaeda in Syria has undergone changes to its naming and
    organizational design. Initially known as the Nusra Front or Jabhat al-
    Nusra, al-Qaeda in Syria adopted the name Jabhat Fateh al-Sham in July
    2016 to distance itself from al-Qaeda core, though then-Director of
    National Intelligence James Clapper labeled it a ``PR move . . . to
    create the image of being more moderate.''\38\ In January 2017 another
    rebranding occurred, with the group taking the name Hayat Tahrir Al-
    Sham (HTS).\39\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \38\ Bryony Jones, Clarissa Ward, and Salma Abdelaziz, ``Al-Nusra
    Rebranding: New Name, Same Aim? What You Need to Know,'' CNN, August 7,
    2016, http://www.cnn.com/2016/08/01/middleeast/al-nusra-rebranding-
    what-you-need-to-know/index.html.
        \39\ ``Tahrir Al-Sham: Al-Qaeda's Latest Incarnation in Syria,''
    BBC, February 28, 2017, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-
    38934206.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Despite its presence in a number of countries, al-Qaeda has not
    demonstrated a capability to strike the West in a decade and a half.
    The last deadly attack in the West directed by al-Qaeda was the July 7,
    2005 bombing of London's transportation system, which killed 52
    commuters.\40\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \40\ Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, or AQAP, trained 2 brothers
    in Yemen in 2011 who, more than 3 years later, attacked the Paris
    offices of Charlie Hebdo, a satirical magazine. It is far from clear if
    AQAP had any real role in directing this attack beyond providing
    training years before the attack took place. For more on this attack
    see: Maria Abi-Habib, Margaret Coker, and Hakim Al Masmari, ``Al Qaeda
    in Yemen Claims Responsibility for Charlie Hebdo Attack,'' Wall Street
    Journal, January 14, 2015, https://www.wsj.com/articles/yemens-al-
    qaeda-branch-claims-responsibility-for-charlie-hebdo-attack-1421231389.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        It is possible that al-Qaeda could feed off of ISIS's setbacks to
    regain leadership of the global jihadist movement.\41\ The U.N.
    Sanctions Monitoring Team notes that al-Qaeda remains stronger than
    ISIS in some regions, and that its leader Ayman al-Zawahiri released
    more statements than ISIS's leader in 2018.\42\ On the other hand, al-
    Qaeda has its own troubles with the death of Hamza bin Laden, who was
    widely believed to have been being groomed for leadership.\43\ Hamza
    had appeared in al-Qaeda propaganda videos since he was a child. In
    recent years, he also had started releasing statements that positioned
    himself as one of al-Qaeda's ideologues--for instance, Hamza released a
    statement in 2016 calling for unity among the jihadist militants
    fighting in Syria. Earlier this year the U.S. State Department
    announced $1 million reward for information about Hamza. Despite
    Hamza's increasing public profile there was no evidence to suggest that
    he played a successful operational role in al-Qaeda organizing
    terrorist attacks around the world.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \41\ Bruce Hoffman, ``The Coming ISIS-al Qaeda Merger,'' Foreign
    Affairs, March 29, 2016, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2016-
    03p-29/coming-isis-al-qaeda-merger.
        \42\ ``Twenty-Third Report of the Analytical Support and Sanctions
    Monitoring Team.''
        \43\ ``Twenty-Fourth Report of the Analytical Support and Sanctions
    Monitoring Team Submitted Pursuant to Resolution 2368 (2017) Concerning
    ISIL (Da'esh), Al-Qaida and Associated Individuals and Entities''
    (United Nations Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team, July
    15, 2019), https://undocs.org/S/2019/570; Julian E. Barnes, Adam
    Goldman, and Eric Schmitt, ``Son of Qaeda Founder Is Dead,'' New York
    Times, July 31, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/31/us/politics/
    hamza-bin-laden-al-qaeda.html.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        The possibility of parts of ISIS and al-Qaeda merging also cannot
    be ruled out. At the very least, al-Qaeda's ability to remain resilient
    after decades of counterterrorism efforts suggests that ISIS remnants
    may similarly be able to continue on long after losing its hold on
    Syria and Iraq.
                           the resiliency of jihadism
        Beyond the fates of particular organizations, the jihadist movement
    has proven resilient in the Middle East, parts of the Sahel, North
    Africa and the Horn of Africa, as well as South Asia. This is in large
    part because of continuing instability across these regions.\44\
    Underlying stressors include the Sunni-Shia sectarian conflict that
    overlaps with the Saudi-Iran regional proxy war playing out in Syria,
    Yemen, and elsewhere; state collapse across the Middle East and North
    Africa, most extensively in Iraq, Libya, Syria, and Yemen; high
    unemployment and economic strain in much of the region; and an on-going
    youth bulge.\45\ This combination of factors, along with trends that
    reduce the barriers to entry to jihadist organizing including the
    sustained use of social media, make it likely that instability will
    continue in the Middle East and North Africa and that this instability
    will enable jihadist activity for the foreseeable future.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \44\ Examining the Global Terrorism Landscape, Subcommittee on
    Middle East, North Africa and International Terrorism (Committee on
    Foreign Affairs) Cong., 1-12 (2019) (testimony of Ali Soufan).
        \45\ This draws on: Peter Bergen, ``Normandy, Istanbul, Dhaka,
    Nice, Baghdad, Orlando: WHY?'' CNN, July 26, 2016, https://www.cnn.com/
    2016/07/26/opinions/why-terrorist-attacks-opinion-peter-bergen/
    index.html.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Further escalations in either the U.S.-Iran or the Saudi-Iran
    conflicts could provide fresh fuel for jihadists. A major escalation or
    war would likely fuel apocalypticism in the region and do so in a way
    that aligns with the jihadist ideology that has framed Iran and Shia
    Muslims as enemies; the consequences could be similar to the regional
    catastrophe triggered by the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq.\46\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \46\ Jesse Morton and Amarnath Amarasingam, ``How Jihadist Groups
    See Western Aggression Toward Iran,'' Just Security, April 16, 2018,
    https://www.justsecurity.org/54946/jihadist-groups-western-aggression-
    iran/.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
                            key trends in terrorism
    Low-Tech Attacks: Firearms, Knives, and Vehicles
        The United States should expect low-tech forms of violence (reliant
    on firearms, knives, and vehicular rammings) to remain the most common
    type of terrorist violence in the West.\47\ Of the 8 jihadist attacks
    in the West in 2019 identified by New America, only 1 involved
    explosives. In 6 of the 8 attacks, a knife or other bladed weapon was
    used. In one attack, the perpetrator attempted but failed to carry out
    a vehicular ramming. Of the 108 jihadist attacks in the West since 2014
    identified by New America, only 18 have involved explosives. Of the 14
    deadly jihadist attacks in the United States since 9/11, only 2
    involved explosives. In contrast, 10 involved firearms.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \47\ For the purposes of New America's database, the West is
    defined as consisting of Western Europe, the United States, Canada, and
    Australia. While we recognize that there is substantial variation in
    the threat among these locations, we believe that the countries making
    up this region share similar patterns with regard to the jihadist
    threat that are distinct form other regions and worthy of examination.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Explosives and TATP \48\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \48\ This draws on: Peter Bergen, ``Paris Explosives are a Key Clue
    to Plot,'' CNN, November 17, 2015, http://www.cnn.com/2015/11/17/
    opinions/bergen-explosives-paris-attacks/index.html.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        The attacks involving explosives in the West since 2014 can be
    divided into two categories: (1) Those involving TATP, triacetone
    triperoxide, which has long been the bomb of choice for jihadists in
    the West due to the ease of acquiring the components to make it, as
    compared to military-grade explosives; and (2) those involving
    improvised explosives. Seven of the 18 attacks in the West involving
    explosives since 2014 involved TATP. Eleven involved other improvised
    explosives.
        TATP can be built using the common household ingredient hydrogen
    peroxide, which is used to bleach hair. Though generally more
    accessible than military-grade explosives in the West, making a TATP
    bomb is tricky because the ingredients are highly unstable and can
    explode if improperly handled. The danger of building TATP bombs
    without training can be seen in the case of Matthew Rugo and Curtis
    Jetton, 21-year-old roommates in Texas City, Texas.\49\ They didn't
    have any bomb-making training and were manufacturing explosives in 2006
    from concentrated bleach when their concoction blew up, killing Rugo
    and injuring Jetton. The pair had no political motives: They had just
    wanted to blow up vehicles for fun.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \49\ Cindy George, ``Man Going to Prison for 1906 Texas City
    Apartment Blast,'' Houston Chronicle, June 17, 2008, http://
    www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/article/Man-going-to-prison-for-06-
    Texas-City-apartment-1658835.php.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        TATP therefore can indicate that a perpetrator received training or
    direction from a foreign terrorist group. Indeed, 3 of the 7 attacks
    involving TATP since 2014--the 2015 Paris bombings, the 2016 bombings
    of the Brussels metro and airport by the same ISIS cell, and the 2017
    bombing of an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester, England--were
    directed by ISIS.
        The 4 other attacks since 2014 involving TATP--the September 2017
    bombing at the Parsons Green tube station in London in which the bomb
    failed to fully explode; the August 2017 attacks in Barcelona where
    traces of TATP were found at a suspected bomb factory tied to the plot;
    a June 2017 failed bombing of the Brussels metro that killed only the
    perpetrator; and a May 2019 attack in which a 24-year-old Algerian man
    exploded a bomb that included TATP in Lyon, France, injuring 14
    people--had no known operational link to ISIS.\50\ These attacks
    account for less than 5 percent of all inspired or enabled attacks and
    only a third of inspired or enabled attacks involving explosives.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \50\ Aurelien Breeden, ``Lyon Bomb Suspect Told Police He Pledged
    Allegiance to ISIS,'' New York Times, May 30, 2019, https://
    www.nytimes.com/2019/05/30/world/europe/lyon-france-bombing.html; Ian
    Cobain, ``Parsons Green Bomb Trial: Teenager `Trained to Kill by ISIS,'
    '' Guardian, March 7, 2018, https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/
    mar/07/parsons-green-tube-bombing-ahmed-hassan-on-trial; Laura Smith-
    Spark, Erin McLaughlin, and Pauline Armandet, ``Explosive TATP Used in
    Brussels Central Station Attack, Initial Exam Shows,'' CNN, June 21,
    2017, http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/21/europe/brussels-train-station-
    attack/index.html; Paul Cruickshank, ``Source: Early Assessment Finds
    TATP at Barcelona Attackers' Bomb Factory,'' CNN, August 19, 2017,
    http://www.cnn.com/2017/08/18/europe/spain-terror-attacks-tatp/
    index.html.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        All of the attacks involving TATP occurred in Europe and none
    occurred in the United States, and is a sign of the greater development
    of and diffusion of expertise and technology in jihadist networks in
    Europe compared to the United States.
        Eight ISIS-inspired attacks and 3 ISIS-enabled attack in the West
    since 2014 used other explosives. For example, Tashfeen Malik and Syed
    Rizwan Farook, who killed 14 people in San Bernardino, California, had
    built pipe bombs using Christmas lights and smokeless powder.\51\ They
    learned the bomb recipe they used from Inspire, the English-language
    propaganda magazine of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, whose article
    ``Make a Bomb in the Kitchen of Your Mom'' was also used by the Boston
    Marathon bombers.\52\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \51\ Richard Esposito, ``San Bernardino Attackers Had Bomb Factory
    in Garage,'' NBC News, December 4, 2015, http://www.nbcnews.com/
    storyline/san-bernardino-shooting/san-bernardino-attackers-had-bomb-
    factory-garage-n474321.
        \52\ Adam Nagourney, Richard Perez-Pena, and Ian Lovett, ``Neighbor
    of San Bernardino Attackers Faces Terrorism Charges,'' New York Times,
    December 17, 2015, https://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/18/us/san-
    bernardino-enrique-marquez-charges-justice-department.html; Scott
    Malone, ``DIY bomb instructions, device remains shown at Boston
    trial,'' Reuters, March 19, 2015, http://www.reuters.com/article/us-
    boston-bombings-trial-idUSK- BN0MF14F20150319.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    The Use of Armed Drones by Terrorist Groups
        The United States should expect the use of armed drones by
    terrorist groups and other non-state actors to expand. In August 2018,
    Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro was the target of a bungled
    assassination attempt utilizing 2 quadcopter drones rigged with
    explosives during a speech in Caracas.\53\ He blamed far-right
    political opponents for what he called an assassination attempt.\54\
    This imaginative, yet forbidding, attack has not only raised concerns
    over the possibility of taking out a head of state with drones, but the
    possibility of attacks at public events, parades, sporting events, etc.
    Already, groups such as ISIS, Hezbollah, the Houthis in Yemen, and
    Hamas, among others, have all used drones in varying capacities, such
    as for surveillance and for armed attacks.\55\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \53\ Peter Bergen and Melissa Salyk-Virk, ``Attack of the Assassin
    Drones,'' CNN, August 07, 2018, https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/07/
    opinions/attack-of-the-assassin-drones-bergen-salyk-virk/index.html.
        \54\ ``Apparent Drone Attack in Venezuela Highlights Growing
    Concern for U.S.,'' CBS News, August 6, 2018, https://www.cbsnews.com/
    news/maduro-venezuela-apparent-drone-attack-highlights-growing-concern-
    in-us/.
        \55\ ``Drone Wars: The Next Generation Report,'' May 2018, accessed
    June 26, 2019, https://dronewarsuk.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/dw-
    nextgeneration-web.pdf.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        ISIS has deployed drones extensively. In January 2017, ISIS
    announced in its newsletter ``al-Naba'' the establishment of the
    ``Unmanned Aircraft of the Mujahideen,'' an operational unit organized
    to engineer and deploy drones in combat.\56\ The terror network has
    been experimenting with drone technology since at least 2015, when
    Kurdish fighters in Syria shot down two small commercial drones
    reportedly belonging to the group--both of which were armed with
    explosives.\57\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \56\ Joby Warrick, ``Use of Weaponized Drones by ISIS Spurs
    Terrorism Fears,'' Washington Post, February 21, 2017, https://
    www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/use-of-weaponized-
    drones-by-isis-spurs-terrorism-fears/2017/02/21/9d83d51e-f382-11e6-
    8d72-263470- bf0401_story.html?utm_term=.11aab1591ca9.
        \57\ David Hambling, ``ISIS is Reportedly Packing Drones with
    Explosives Now,'' Popular Mechanics, December 16, 2015, http://
    www.popularmechanics.com/military/weapons/a18577/isis-packing-drones-
    with-explosives/.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        The Houthi rebels in Yemen have also been actively using drones. In
    the first half of 2019, they attacked the Jizan and Abha airports \58\
    in southern Saudi Arabia, as well as Saudi oil pipelines.\59\ The
    multiple airport attacks have led to significant civilian injuries.
    This escalation does not show signs of stopping in the near future.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \58\ ``Yemen's Houthis Attack Saudi's Abha Airport, Injuring
    Civilians,'' Saudi Arabia News, Al Jazeera, July 02, 2019, https://
    www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/07/yemen-houthis-claim-attack-saudi-arabia-
    abha-airport-190702005421808.html.
        \59\ Marwa Rashad, ``Yemen's Houthis Target Two Saudi Airports with
    Multiple Drone Attacks,'' Reuters, June 15, 2019, https://
    www.reuters.com/article/us-yemen-security-saudi-drone/yemens-houthis-
    target-two-saudi-airports-with-multiple-drone-attacks-idUSKCN1TG0M3.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Though ISIS and the Houthis are the clearest cases of sustained
    armed drone campaigns by non-state actors, numerous other groups have
    used drones in combat or maintain the capability to do so. Non-state
    actor UAV use has been seen in as many as 20 countries or territories,
    but only a fraction are used as weapons.\60\ In most cases, UAV use has
    been for intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition,
    reconnaissance, or logistics, and often used for criminal activities
    such as trafficking or smuggling.\61\ In November 2018, Nigeria's
    president announced that Boko Haram had acquired and begun using
    drones.\62\ In July 2018, Russia claimed that one of its military bases
    in Syria was again attacked by drones,\63\ though the responsible group
    is unknown. The PKK used drones against Turkish soldiers in August
    2017.\64\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \60\ Michael Kameras, Bethany McGann, and Jenny Sue Ross, ``U-AV TO
    ACT NOW: A Pilot-Less Study of Trends in Non-State Actor UAV Use and
    Related U.S. Government Policy Recommendations'' (Washington, DC:
    George Washington University, April 2019).
        \61\ Kameras, McGann, and Ross.
        \62\ ``Nigeria Says Boko Haram Now Uses Drones, Mercenaries Against
    Military,'' November 30, 2018, http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2018-
    11/30/c_137642456.htm.
        \63\ ``Unidentified Drones Attack Russian Khmeimim Airbase in
    Syria,'' Uawire.org., July 17, 2018, accessed July 3, 2019. https://
    uawire.org/unidentified-drones-attack-russian-khmeimim-airbase-in-
    syria#.
        \64\ Gurcan Metin, ``Turkey-PKK `drone-wars' escalate,'' Al-
    Monitor, September 18, 2017, http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/
    2017/09/turkey-pkk-drone-conflict-escalates.html.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Hezbollah and Hamas were early adopters of drone technology and
    maintain an armed drone capability. In 2004, Hezbollah flew a military-
    grade drone, reportedly acquired from Iran, over Israeli airspace.\65\
    The Lebanese militant group also conducted strikes in Syria in 2014
    with an armed drone and in 2016 with over-the-counter drones armed with
    small explosives.\66\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \65\ David Axe, ``Hezbollah Drone Is a Warning to the U.S.,'' Daily
    Beast, August 17, 2016, http://www.thedailybeast.com/hezbollah-drone-
    is-a-warning-to-the-us.
        \66\ Ibid; Peter Bergen and Emily Schneider, ``Hezbollah Armed
    Drone? Militants' New Weapon,'' CNN.com, September 22, 2014, http://
    www.cnn.com/2014/09/22/opinion/bergen-schneider-armed-drone-hezbollah/
    index.html.

        Chairman Thompson. Thank you for your testimony.
        I now recognize Mr. Soufan to summarize his statement for 5
    minutes.

         STATEMENT OF ALI H. SOUFAN, FOUNDER, THE SOUFAN CENTER

        Mr. Soufan. Thank you, Chairman Thompson, Ranking Member
    Rogers, distinguished Members. Thank you for hearing my
    statement today.
        Tomorrow marks 18 years since al-Qaeda murdered nearly
    3,000 people on American soil. As we honor the dead, we
    remember too the importance of remaining vigilant.
        Today I draw 4 main conclusions: First, both al-Qaeda and
    the so-called Islamic State remain potent threats; second, in
    addition to the jihadi challenge, we now face clear danger from
    white supremacist extremism; third, there are important
    similarities between these two groups of extremists; but
    fourth, under its current approach, the U.S. Government is at a
    clear disadvantage when it comes to combating white supremacy.
        The Islamic State is still today one of the richest jihadi
    groups in history, with access to hundreds of millions of
    dollars looted from Iraq and Syria. Its figurehead, Abu Bakr
    al-Baghdadi, has survived. It presides over global affiliates,
    so-called provinces, all the way from the Sahel to Afghanistan.
    Meanwhile, al-Qaeda continues to mutate and grow, with tens of
    thousands of members across the world, more than 100 times as
    many as the group had on September 11, 2001.
        Both the groups are more than capable of inspiring home-
    grown extremists inside the United States. The radicalization
    is reinforced now by images of detention camps like Al Hol in
    Syria, where thousands of children from ISIS members are being
    kept.
        But it is not only jihadi terrorism that threatens our
    homeland. In Charleston, Pittsburgh, Poway, El Paso,
    Charlottesville, and elsewhere across this Nation Americans
    have suffered violence on the hands of white supremacist
    extremists. According to a study by the ADL, in 2018 white
    supremacists killed 3 times as many Americans as the Islamists.
    In May of this year a senior FBI official testified that the
    Bureau is pursuing about 850 domestic terrorism investigations,
    a significant majority of them targeting white supremacists.
        The threat bears a striking resemblance to what we saw with
    jihadism. White supremacists from around the world are
    increasingly forming global networks, much as jihadis did in
    the years leading to 9/11. Supremacists make a propaganda
    warning of an alleged great replacement of whites in the same
    way jihadis talk about supposed war against Islam. White
    supremacists promote violence as an appropriate way to defend
    the purity of the race, just as jihadis use violence to protect
    the purity of their religion. Both groups recruit followers and
    reinforce their messages through social media. While jihadis
    make martyrdom videos, supremacists post on-line manifestos.
    Where jihadis travel to fight in places like Syria and
    Afghanistan, white supremacists now have their own theater in
    which they learn to combat: Eastern Ukraine.
        Recent research shows that around 17,000 foreigners from 50
    countries, including the United States, have gone to fight in
    that conflict. In describing their mission, some white
    supremacists have used the term ``white jihad.'' One neo-Nazi
    group recently adopted the name ``The Base.'' Translated into
    Arabic, ``The Base'' is al-Qaeda.
        These similarities should inform our strategy. Terrorism,
    after all, is terrorism, regardless of race, faith, ideology,
    or creed.
        Our current framework allows for the designation of
    transnational groups as foreign terrorist entities. This gives
    the U.S. authorities 3 main advantages: First, they can monitor
    communications between people connected to the designated
    groups, even among U.S. citizens operating on U.S. soil;
    second, they can share intelligence on the designated groups
    with our allies; third, they can bring charges for providing
    material support to their designated groups, charges that carry
    severe penalties.
        These are important tools. Allies such as the United
    Kingdom and Canada already designated violent supremacist
    entities as terrorist organizations. But so far no white
    supremacist groups have been designated by the United States,
    despite the threat they pose. We need to recognize the
    international nature of this threat, and start treating white
    supremacist terrorists the way we treat other global
    terrorists. Only then can we give our law enforcement the tool
    they need to meet the challenge.
        Eighteen years ago we grossly underestimated the rising
    threat of jihadi terrorism. That inattention cost us dearly on
    September 11, 2001. I cannot say what form the jihadi
    supremacist equivalent of 9/11 might take, but we should not
    wait to find out before we act.
        Thank you.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Soufan follows:]
                      Prepared Statement of Ali H. Soufan
                               September 10, 2019
                                  introduction
        Chairman Thompson, Ranking Member Rogers, distinguished Members:
    Thank you for hearing my testimony today.
        During this session on global terrorism and threats to the
    homeland, my aim is to provide a brief overview of the threat landscape
    while focusing in particular on the challenges facing the United States
    in protecting the homeland from terrorist attacks. We are reminded of
    the importance of remaining vigilant, particularly given tomorrow's
    somber 18-year anniversary of the al-Qaeda attacks on the United States
    on September 11, 2001. But even after untold trillions of dollars \1\
    spent and thousands of lives lost in the name of counter-terrorism, the
    threat landscape is arguably more complex today than it was nearly 2
    decades ago. The threat from al-Qaeda and other Salafi-jihadist groups
    like the so-called Islamic State remain, joined by the challenges posed
    by violent white supremacist extremism (WSE), an ideology with a
    foothold in the United States and with tentacles stretching across the
    globe, from Ukraine to New Zealand and beyond.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \1\ No official number exists for the combined cost of the ``Global
    War on Terror,'' but estimates range between $3 trillion and $6
    trillion (National Defense Budget Estimates for fiscal year 2019; the
    Costs of War project at Brown University's Watson Institute of
    International and Public Affairs).
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Thank you for the opportunity to present this testimony.
        In my years of tracking, analyzing, and ultimately trying to
    disrupt terrorist organizations, I draw 4 main conclusions about the
    current state of global terrorism and threats to the U.S. homeland.
    First, both al-Qaeda and the Islamic State remain a threat to the
    United States homeland, even as both organizations look different than
    they did just a year ago at this same time, given important
    geopolitical developments. Second, in addition to the challenges posed
    by combating Salafi-jihadist organizations, there is a clear and
    present threat posed by violent white supremacy extremism (WSE) and
    violent white supremacy. Third, there are important similarities
    between Salafi-jihadist organizations and violent white supremacist
    extremists, especially in areas such as the use of violence, operating
    on the internet, recruitment, propaganda, financing, and the
    transnational nature of the networks. Fourth, the U.S. Government is at
    a disadvantage, largely due to the lack of comprehensive legislation
    and available tools, when it comes to combating the threat posed by
    violent white supremacist extremists, but there are still important
    lessons that can be gleaned from studying the fight against al-Qaeda
    and the Islamic State.
                       the current state of global jihad
        Months after the collapse of the territorial caliphate in Iraq and
    Syria, the Islamic State remains a viable threat to the United States
    and the international community writ large. The organization's leader,
    Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is alive and on the lam, while in the group's
    former strongholds, it is reconstituting its networks and waging a low-
    level campaign of political assassinations, ambushes, and guerilla
    warfare-style attacks.\2\ IS will be able to continue making money,
    even without a stranglehold on territory, and still has access to
    hundreds of millions of dollars that will aid its efforts to rebuild
    its organization.\3\ A United Nations report recently warned that IS
    ``could launch international terrorist attacks before the end of the
    year'' in Europe.\4\ The United States remains vulnerable from home-
    grown violent extremists inspired by Islamic State propaganda,
    reinforced in the eyes of would-be jihadists by the daily images coming
    from detention camps like al-Hol, in Syria.\5\ Over the past several
    months, there have been several arrests of American citizens seeking to
    plan attacks on U.S. soil on behalf of the Islamic State.\6\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \2\ Eric Schmitt, Alissa J. Rubin, and Thomas Gibbons-Neff. ``ISIS
    Is Regaining Strength in Iraq and Syria.'' The New York Times, August
    19, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/19/us/politics/isis-iraq-
    syria.html; Louisa Loveluck and Mustafa Salim. ``Hundreds of Islamic
    State Militants Are Slipping Back into Iraq. Their Fight Isn't Over.''
    Washington Post, July 21, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/
    middle-east/hundreds-of-islamic-state-militants-are-slipping-back-into-
    iraq-their-fight-isnt-over/2019/07/21/1fbe4262-a259-11e9-a767-
    d7ab84aef- 3e9_story.html.
        \3\ Patrick Johnston, Mona Alami, Colin P. Clarke, and Howard J.
    Shatz. ``Return and Expand? The Finances and Prospects of the Islamic
    State After the Caliphate.'' RAND Corporation, 2019, https://
    www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR3046.html.
        \4\ Nick Cumming-Bruce, ``ISIS, Eyeing Europe, Could Launch Attacks
    This Year, U.N. Warns.'' The New York Times, August 3, 2019, https://
    www.nytimes.com/2019/08/03/world/middleeast/islamic-state-attacks-
    europe.html.
        \5\ Bethan McKernan, ``Inside Al-Hawl Camp, the Incubator for
    Islamic State's Resurgence.'' The Guardian, August 31, 2019, https://
    www.theguardian.com/world/2019/aug/31/inside-al-hawl-camp-the-
    incubator-for-islamic-states-resurgence; Vivian Yee, ``Guns, Filth and
    ISIS: Syrian Camp Is `Disaster in the Making.' '' The New York Times,
    September 3, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/03/world/middleeast/
    isis-alhol-camp-syria.html; Loveluck, Louisa, and Souad Mekhennet. ``At
    a Sprawling Tent Camp in Syria, ISIS Women Impose a Brutal Rule.''
    Washington Post, September 3, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/
    world/at-a-sprawling-tent-camp-in-syria-isis-women-impose-a-brutal-
    rule/2019/09/03/3fcdfd14-c4ea-11e9-8bf7-cde2d9e09055_story.html.
        \6\ Madeleine Carlisle, ``19-Year-Old Queens Man Arrested for
    Intending to Commit an Attack on Behalf of ISIS.'' Time, August 30,
    2019, https://time.com/5665735/queens-teen-isis-attack/; Michael
    Kunzelman, ``Man Indicted on Terror Charge in Alleged ISIS-Inspired
    Plot.'' NBC4 Washington, August 29, 2019, http://www.nbcwashington.com/
    news/local/Maryland-Man-Indicted-on-Terror-Charge-in-Alleged-ISIS-
    Inspired-Plot-558764191.html.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Al-Qaeda, for its part, also seems determined to strike the United
    States. In a message from April 2017, Zawahiri reiterated the
    importance of al-Qaeda's global struggle.\7\ The next month, messages
    from both Osama bin Laden's son Hamza (now allegedly deceased) and AQAP
    emir Qassim al-Raimi both released videos urging al-Qaeda's followers
    to launch attacks in the West.\8\ Yet another speech from Zawahiri,
    this one titled ``America is the First Enemy of the Muslims'' and
    released in March 2018, incited al-Qaeda's followers to strike the
    United States.\9\ A recent United Nations assessment of al-Qaeda's
    links to groups in Syria observed the following in reference to Hay'at
    Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) and Tanzim Huras al-Din (HAD): ``HTS and HAD are
    assessed to share a history and an ideology but to differ on policy.
    HTS centered its agenda on [Syria], with no interest in conducting
    attacks abroad. HAD, by contrast, was said to have a more international
    outlook.''\10\ None of this should be surprising, as al-Qaeda's
    overarching narrative has always been that the West is at war with
    Islam.\11\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \7\ Charles Lister, ``How al-Qa'ida Lost Control of Its Syrian
    Affiliate,'' CTC Sentinel, Vol. 11, Iss. 12, February 2018, p. 6,
    https://ctc.usma.edu/al-qaida-lost-control-syrian-affiliate-inside-
    story/.
        \8\ Aaron Y. Zelin, ``Introduction,'' in Aaron Y. Zelin, ed., How
    al-Qaeda Survived Drones, Uprisings, and the Islamic State: The Nature
    of the Current Threat, Washington Institute for Near East Policy,
    Policy Focus 153, June 2017, p. 6, https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/
    policy-analysis/view/how-al-qaeda-survived-drones-uprisings-and-the-
    islamic-state.
        \9\ Tore Refslund Hamming and Pieter Van Ostaeyen, ``The True Story
    of al-Qaeda's Demise and Resurgence in Syria,'' Lawfare, April 8, 2018,
    https://www.lawfareblog.com/true-story-al-qaedas-demise-and-resurgence-
    syria; see also, Thomas Joscelyn, ``Al Qaeda Chief Says America is the
    `First Enemy' of Muslims,'' Long War Journal, March 21, 2018, https://
    www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2018/03/al-qaeda-chief-says-america-is-
    the-first-enemy-of-muslims.php.
        \10\ Letter dated 15 July 2019 from the Chair of the Security
    Council Committee pursuant to resolutions 1267 (1999), 1989 (2011) and
    2253 (2015) concerning Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (Da'esh),
    al-Qaeda and associated individuals, groups, undertakings, and entities
    addressed to the President of the Security Council. https://undocs.org/
    S/2019/570.
        \11\ Colin P. Clarke and Charles Lister, ``Al-Qaeda is Ready to
    Attack You Again,'' Foreign Policy, September 4, 2019, https://
    foreignpolicy.com/2019/09/04/al-qaeda-is-ready-to-attack-you-again/.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
            the rising threat of violent white supremacist extremism
        But it is not only jihadi terrorism that threatens the U.S.
    homeland. As the Anti-Defamation League reports, in 2018 violent white
    supremacist extremists were responsible for 3 times as many deaths in
    the United States as were Islamists.\12\ Moreover, in May of this year,
    a senior FBI official testified to Congress that the bureau is pursuing
    about 850 domestic terrorism investigations, a ``significant majority''
    of which are related to white supremacist extremists.\13\ Out of
    necessity, U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agencies are well
    aware of the threat posed to the U.S. homeland from domestic terrorism.
    From Pittsburgh to Poway and El Paso to Charlottesville, violent white
    supremacist extremism plagues the United States on a regular basis, but
    this threat is not just local in nature.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \12\ ``Murder and Extremism in the United States in 2018,'' Anti-
    Defamation League, https://www.adl.org/murder-and-extremism-2018.
        \13\ David Shortell, ``FBI is Investigating More than 850 Domestic
    Terrorism Cases,'' CNN.com, May 8, 2019, https://www.cnn.com/2019/05/
    08/politics/fbi-domestic-terrorism-cases/index.html.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        The attacks in Norway and New Zealand invited closer scrutiny on
    WSE, and revealed that similar to the global jihadist movement, violent
    white supremacists and other elements of the radical ideology maintain
    international linkages and continue to forge global networks with
    ideologues \14\ radicalizing individuals across the globe. Both Breivik
    and Tarrant drew inspiration from grievances from other countries and
    causes, while each presented himself as a defender of global European
    white civilization.\15\ And while the attacks at Utoya and Christchurch
    are among the most prominent of those perpetrated by WSEs, there have
    also been linkages between WSE ideologies and attacks in the United
    States (California, Florida, Kansas, New Mexico, Oregon, South
    Carolina, Wisconsin) Canada, Germany, the United Kingdom, and
    Sweden.\16\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \14\ Some prominent ideologues in the WSE movement include: James
    Mason, Greg Johnson, Martin Lichtmesz, Frodi Midjord, and Kevin
    MacDonald, among others.
        \15\ Daniel Byman, ``Right-Wingers Are America's Deadliest
    Terrorists,'' Slate, August 5, 2019, https://slate.com/news-and-
    politics/2019/08/right-wing-terrorist-killings-government-focus-
    jihadis-islamic-radicalism.html;. see also, Daniel Byman, ``Right-Wing
    Terrorism Has Gone Global,'' Slate, March 15, 2019, https://slate.com/
    news-and-politics/2019/03/new-zealand-mosque-attacks-global-right-wing-
    terrorism.html.
        \16\ Weiyi Cai and Simone Landon, ``Attacks by White Extremists are
    Growing. So Are Their Connections,'' New York Times, April 3, 2019,
    https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/04/03/world/white-extremist-
    terrorism-christchurch.html.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Yet the emerging epicenter or WSE seems to be located in Russia and
    Ukraine. There are extensive ties between the Russian government and
    far-right groups in Europe.\17\ Russian disinformation efforts on-line
    have fueled anti-immigrant sentiment in countries like Sweden, fueling
    resentment among native-born Swedes and newly-arrived immigrants from
    the Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia. In 2015, Sweden accepted
    163,000 asylum seekers, primarily from Afghanistan, Somalia, and
    Syria.\18\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \17\ Robert Levinson, ``The Fight in the Right: It is Time to
    Tackle White Supremacist Terrorism Globally,'' War on the Rocks, August
    22, 2019, https://warontherocks.com/2019/08/the-fight-in-the-right-it-
    is-time-to-tackle-white-supremacist-terrorism-globally/.
        \18\ Jo Becker, ``The Global Machine Behind the Rise of Far-Right
    Nationalism,'' New York Times, August 10, 2019, https://
    www.nytimes.com/2019/08/10/world/europe/sweden-immigration-
    nationalism.html?rref=collection%2Fbyline%2Fjobecker&action=click&conten
    tCollection=-
    undefined®ion=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlaceme
    nt=- 1&pgtype=collection.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        In Ukraine, the aforementioned Azov Battalion has actively
    recruited foreign fighters motivated by white supremacy and neo-Nazi
    beliefs, including many from the West, to join its ranks and receive
    training, indoctrination, and instruction in irregular warfare.\19\ The
    group has cultivated a relationship with members of the Atomwaffen
    Division \20\ as well as with U.S.-based militants from the Rise Above
    Movement,\21\ or RAM, which the FBI has labeled a ``white supremacy
    extremist group'' based in Southern California. The Azov Battalion also
    maintains a political wing, offering ideological education, and ties to
    a growing vigilante street movement which can be counted on for
    violence, intimidation, and coercion.\22\ On the other side of the
    conflict in Ukraine, Russian groups like the Russian Imperial Movement
    and its paramilitary unit, the Imperial Legion volunteer unit, also
    attract and train foreign fighters motivated by white supremacy and
    neo-Nazi beliefs.\23\ Just as jihadists have used conflicts in
    Afghanistan, Chechnya, the Balkans, Iraq, and Syria to swap tactics,
    techniques, and procedures (TTPs) and solidify transnational networks,
    so too are WSEs using Ukraine as a hub or battlefield laboratory, where
    an estimated 17,000 people from over 50 countries has traveled to
    actively participate in the on-going conflict.\24\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \19\ ``IntelBrief: The Transnational Network That Nobody is Talking
    About.'' Soufan Center 22 March 2019, https://thesoufancenter.org/
    intelbrief-the-transnational-network-that-nobody-is-talking-about/;
    Oren Dorell, ``Volunteer Ukrainian Unit Includes Nazis,'' USA Today,
    March 10, 2015, https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2015/03/10/
    ukraine-azov-brigade-nazis-abuses-separatists/24664937/.
        \20\ Oleksiy Kuzmenko, `` `Defend the White Race:' American
    Extremists Being Co-opted by Ukraine's Far-Right,'' Bellingcat,
    February 15, 2019, https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2019/
    02/15/defend-the-white-race-american-extremists-being-co-opted-by-
    ukraines-far-right/.
        \21\ Criminal Complaint, United States of America v. Robert Paul
    Rundo, Robert Boman, Tyler Laube, and Aaron Eason, United States
    District Court, Central District of California, https://int.nyt.com/
    data/documenthelper/421-robert-rundo-complaint/0f1e76cdeef814133f24/
    optimized/full.pdf.
        \22\ Tim Hume, ``Far-Right Extremists Have Been Using Ukraine's War
    as a Training Ground. They're Returning Home,'' Vice News, July 31,
    2019, https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/vb95ma/far-right-extremists-
    have-been-using-ukraines-civil-war-as-a-training-ground-theyre-
    returning-home.
        \23\ Michael Carpenter, ``Russia Is Co-Opting Angry Young Men.''
    The Atlantic, August 29, 2018, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/
    archive/2018/08/russia-is-co-opting-angry-young-men/568741/; Josephine
    Huetlin, ``Russian Extremists Are Training Right-Wing Terrorists From
    Western Europe.'' The Daily Beast, August 2, 2017, https://
    www.thedailybeast.com/russian-extremists-are-training-right-wing-
    terrorists-from-western-europe.
        \24\ Kacper Rekawak, Not Only Syria? The Phenomenon of Foreign
    Fighters in Comparative Perspective, GLOBSEC, 2017.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
               comparing jihadists & white supremacist extremists
        Although the threat of WSE violence has been omnipresent, as
    outlined in earlier sections discussing the history and evolution of
    the movement, the lion's share of studies and analysis has focused on
    jihadi violence. The impact of the al-Qaeda attacks of September 11,
    2001 was so significant that for the past 2 decades, al-Qaeda and now
    the Islamic State garner far more media attention than terrorist groups
    not motivated by Salafi jihadism.\25\ And while there are obviously
    important differences between jihadis and white supremacist extremists,
    there are also important similarities that can help inform best
    practices and lessons learned in how these organizations can be
    successfully countered. Writing in the New York Times, Max Fisher
    recently observed, ``The ideological tracts, recruiting pitches and
    radicalization tales of the Islamic State during its rise echo, almost
    word-for-word, those of the white nationalist terrorists of
    today.''\26\ John R. Allen and Brett McGurk agree, assessing that while
    WSE attacks ``may differ from Islamic State attacks in degree,'' they
    are also ``similar in kind: driven by hateful narratives,
    dehumanization, the rationalization of violence and the glorification
    of murder, combined with ready access to recruits and weapons of
    war.''\27\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \25\ Controlling for target type, fatalities, and being arrested,
    attacks by Muslim perpetrators received, on average, 357% more coverage
    than other attacks. See Erin M. Kearns et al., ``Why Do Some Terrorist
    Attacks Receive More Media Attention Than Others?'' Justice Quarterly,
    36: 6, 2019, pp. 985-1022.
        \26\ Max Fisher, ``White Terrorism Shows `Stunning' Parallels to
    Islamic State's Rise,'' New York Times, August 5, 2019, https://
    www.nytimes.com/2019/08/05/world/americas/terrorism-white-nationalist-
    supremacy-isis.html.
        \27\ John R. Allen and Brett McGurk, ``We Worked to Defeat the
    Islamic State. White Nationalist Terrorism is an Equal Threat,''
    Washington Post, August 6, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/
    opinions/we-worked-to-defeat-the-islamic-state-white-nationalist-
    terrorism-is-an-equal-threat/2019/08/06/e50c90e8-b87d-11e9-bad6-
    609f75bfd97f_story.html.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Utility of Violence
        Like jihadis, white supremacist extremists justify the use of
    extreme violence, in some cases bordering on anomie, by citing self-
    defense, inherently necessary because of the violence used by their
    adversaries. Both groups often deploy metaphors in their writings and
    propaganda that reflect a firm belief that their societies are under
    siege and that only violence can halt the ``invaders.''\28\ For
    jihadis, this means an assault on Muslims by the West, which seeks to
    destroy Islam and humiliate the ummah. Conversely, white supremacist
    extremists fear encroachment from multiculturalism, immigration, and
    the so-called ``Islamization'' of society. White supremacist extremists
    propaganda relies on themes related to so-called ``replacement
    theory,'' or ``the great replacement,'' which is the idea that Western
    culture is under assault from demographic shifts favoring non-white
    immigrants, something WSEs believe is the deliberate strategy of a
    shadowy cabal of (mostly) Jewish elites.\29\ The conspiracy theory
    claims an ``intellectual'' basis in the work of French philosopher
    Albert Camus and American eugenicist Madison Grant.\30\ The
    exemplification of this violent ideology was captured in the motivation
    of Robert Bowers, the terrorist who attacked the Tree of Life Synagogue
    in Pittsburgh, PA in October 2018. Bowes appeared to target the Tree of
    Life because of what he perceived as the synagogue's assistance for
    immigrants from Muslim-majority countries.\31\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \28\ Sulome Anderson, ``The Twin Hatreds,'' Washington Post, March
    22, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/posteverything/wp/2019/
    03/22/feature/how-white-supremacy-and-islamist-terrorism-strengthen-
    each-other-online/.
        \29\ Rosa Schwartsburg, ``The `White Replacement Theory' Motivates
    Alt-Right Killers The World Over,'' The Guardian, August 5, 2019,
    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/aug/05/great-
    replacement-theory-alt-right-killers-el-paso; see also, Jacob Davey and
    Julia Ebner, `` `The Great Replacement: The Violent Consequences of
    Mainstreamed Extremism,' '' Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD),
    2019, https://www.isdglobal.org/isd-publications/the-great-replacement-
    the-violent-consequences-of-mainstreamed-extremism/.
        \30\ John Eligon, ``The El Paso Screed, and the Racist Doctrine
    Behind It,'' New York Times, August 7, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/
    2019/08/07/us/el-paso-shooting-racism.html.
        \31\ Masha Gessen, ``Why The Tree of Life Shooter Was Fixated on
    the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society,'' New Yorker, October 27, 2018,
    https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/why-the-tree-of-life-
    shooter-was-fixated-on-the-hebrew-immigrant-aid-society.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Violence is viewed by both groups as something that it both
    utilitarian, but at times theatrical, intended to inspire followers
    while terrorizing others. Only through extreme violence can these
    groups achieve their goals, which requires inducing a climate of fear
    that can in turn be used to reshape society in the image they seek to
    create.\32\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \32\ Ali Soufan, ``I Spent 25 Years Fighting Jihadis. White
    Supremacists Aren't So Different,'' New York Times, August 5, 2019,
    https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/05/opinion/white-supremacy-
    terrorism.html.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Cycle of Violence
        In addition to serving as both the means and the end for both
    jihadists and WSEs, violence is also intended to beget further
    violence, contributing to a tit-for-tat cycle that inspires followers
    and provokes a reaction from those not considered within the
    terrorists' in-group. Extreme violence serves as a complement to
    identity politics and the two are inextricably linked in ways that do
    not always appear obvious. The perceived threat to the identity of
    these groups is the ``exact mirror image'' of each other.\33\ The
    comparison even extends to the naming of groups within these movement,
    as neo-Nazis recently adopted the name ``The Base'' for a new social
    networking platform connecting various elements of the extreme
    right.\34\ ``The Base'' was the name selected by Osama bin Laden for
    his group, which when translated into Arabic means ``al-Qaeda.'' In
    terms of organizational structure, white supremacists adopted the
    leaderless resistance model of terrorism before jihadists ever did,
    relying on attacks by lone actors as a means of minimizing infiltration
    of the movement by Federal law enforcement agents in the 1980's.\35\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \33\ Kathy Gilsinan, ``How White-Supremacist Violence Echoes Other
    Forms of Terrorism,'' The Atlantic, March 15, 2019, https://
    www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2019/03/violence-new-zealand-
    echoes-past-terrorist-patterns/585043/.
        \34\ Ben Makuch and Mack Lamoureux, ``Neo-Nazis Are Organizing
    Secretive Paramilitary Training Across America,'' Vice News, November
    20, 2018, https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/a3mexp/neo-nazis-are-
    organizing-secretive-paramilitary-training-across-america.
        \35\ Bruce Hoffman, ``Back to the Future: The Return of Violent
    Far-Right Terrorism in the Age of Lone Wolves,'' War on the Rocks,
    April 2, 2019, https://warontherocks.com/2019/04/back-to-the-future-
    the-return-of-violent-far-right-terrorism-in-the-age-of-lone-wolves/.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Jihadi violence in the Middle East and North Africa has contributed
    to civil war and state failure, which in turn has driven migration of
    predominantly Muslim societies to Europe. As European countries receive
    ever-increasing applications for asylum--in 2015, the European Union
    received more than 1.3 million applications for asylum--segments of
    domestic populations in countries like Germany, France, the United
    Kingdom and elsewhere throughout the continent have perceived the
    demographic shift as threatening to their traditional values.\36\ In
    some cases, this has led to the growth of movements like PEGIDA, or
    Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West.\37\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \36\ Julia Ebner, The Rage, London: I.B. Tauris & Co. Ltd, London,
    2017, p.79.
        \37\ Katrin Bennhold, ``One Legacy of Merkel? Angry East German Men
    Fueling the Far Right,'' New York Times, November 5, 2018, https://
    www.nytimes.com/2018/11/05/world/europe/merkel-east-germany-
    nationalists-populism.html.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        To extremists on both sides, the current state of world affairs is
    presented as an existential threat to their way of life, and
    exclusionist ideologies fuel a pushback against societal change.\38\
    Extremists also feel emboldened, convinced that violence will lead to
    revolutionary change. ``Murderous Muslim militants, like America's most
    dangerous young men, feel destiny if not righteous wrath behind
    them.''\39\ Both movements also see attacks contributing to an
    ``inspirational contagion'' which will strengthen their respective
    organizations while encouraging further plots.\40\ Each attack builds
    on the last and can have a cumulative effect, reinforcing the validity
    of propaganda that both jihadists and violent white supremacist
    extremists promote.\41\ As Simon Cottee notes, ``jihadists and far-
    right violent extremists feed off each other, cynically exploiting the
    outrages of their enemies as a spur and justification for further
    retaliatory bloodshed.''\42\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \38\ Melissa Etehad, ``White Supremacists and Islamic State
    Recruits Have More in Common Than You Might Think,'' Los Angeles Times,
    August 7, 2019, https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2019-08-07/
    domestic-terrorism-white-supremacists-islamic-state-recruits.
        \39\ Reuel Marc Gerecht, ``Violent Young Men, Here and Abroad,''
    The Wall Street Journal, August 13, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/
    violent-young-men-here-and-abroad-11565737090.
        \40\ Clint Watts, ``America Has a White Nationalist Terrorism
    Problem. What Should We Do?'' Foreign Policy Research Institute (FPRI),
    May 1, 2019, https://www.fpri.org/article/2019/05/america-has-a-white-
    nationalist-terrorism-problem-what-should-we-do/.
        \41\ Rita Katz, ``New Zealand Shooting: White Supremacists and
    Jihadists Feed Off Each Other,'' Daily Beast, March 20, 2019, https://
    www.thedailybeast.com/new-zealand-shooting-white-supremacists-and-
    jihadists-feed-off-each-other?ref=author.
        \42\ Simon Cottee, ``What Right-Wing Violent Extremists and
    Jihadists Have in Common,'' National Post, April 5, 2019, https://
    nationalpost.com/opinion/what-right-wing-violent-extremists-and-
    jihadists-have-in-common.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Virtual Laboratories/Use of Internet
        The use of the internet itself is not new for terrorist groups, the
    Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN) in Mexico successfully
    harnessed power of the internet as early as 1994.\43\ WSE groups have
    also long been adept to operating in the on-line space.\44\ The
    internet helps perpetuate a ``feedback loop of radicalization and
    violence'' that is intended to accelerate the time table toward an
    apocalyptic end of times.\45\ There are legitimate concerns that the
    internet has ``accelerated the radicalization process,'' although
    research demonstrates that there also remains a significant off-line,
    or in-person component to how individuals radicalize.\46\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \43\ Bruce Hoffman, Inside Terrorism, 3d ed., New York: Columbia
    University Press, 2017, p. 210.
        \44\ Kathleen Belew, ``The Right Way To Understand White
    Nationalist Terrorism,'' New York Times, August 4, 2019, https://
    www.nytimes.com/2019/08/04/opinion/el-paso-terrorism.html.
        \45\ Max Fisher, ``White Terrorism Shows `Stunning' Parallels to
    Islamic State's Rise,'' New York Times, August 5, 2019, https://
    www.nytimes.com/2019/08/05/world/americas/terrorism-white-nationalist-
    supremacy-isis.html.
        \46\ Melissa Etehad, ``White Supremacists and Islamic State
    Recruits Have More in Common Than You Might Think,'' Los Angeles Times,
    August 7, 2019, https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2019-08-07/
    domestic-terrorism-white-supremacists-islamic-state-recruits. See also,
    https://www.lawfareblog.com/stop-isis-recruitment-focus-offline.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        In many ways, social media has exacerbated the issue by helping
    connect transnational nodes of like-minded individuals and groups. In
    the current environment, jihadis have flocked to sites like Telegram
    while WSEs and their supporters operate on Gab and 8chan. It serves as
    a medium for both radicalization and recruitment, as well as terrorist
    learning. WSEs have curated an on-line library of terrorist manuals and
    manifestos, while jihadists have created magazines like Inspire and
    Dabiq that have taught others how to conduct attacks.\47\ It is also
    now well-documented that WSEs have used the internet to study terrorist
    tactics used by jihadists to improve their own capabilities.\48\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \47\ Ali Soufan, ``I Spent 25 Years Fighting Jihadis. White
    Supremacists Aren't So Different,'' New York Times, August 5, 2019,
    https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/05/opinion/white-supremacy-
    terrorism.html.
        \48\ Frank Gardner, ``The Unlikely Similarities Between the Far
    Right and IS,'' BBC, March 30, 2019, https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-
    47746271.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Propaganda
        Propaganda, media and public relations, and information operations
    of both jihadis and WSEs describe an existential battle between good
    and evil that form the cornerstone of these movements' ideological
    beliefs. For jihadis, this eternal struggle is often framed in terms of
    the battle against the Zionist-Crusader alliance, while for violent
    white supremacist extremists, it is the call of racial holy war, or
    RAHOWA, that most resonates with its adherents. Both movements are also
    dualistic in nature, offering binary choices to potential followers to
    become part of the ideological in-group or risk being labeled as an
    enemy, apostate, or outsider.\49\ The propaganda of jihadis and WSEs
    each portray members as defenders of a unique culture and bulwarks
    against cultural elites deemed unworthy of legitimacy.\50\ And both
    jihadis and white supremacist extremists promote anti-Semitism, aspects
    of austere social conservatism, and variations of obscure and
    antiquated eschatology.\51\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \49\ Scott Stewart, ``What White Supremacism and Jihadism Have in
    Common,'' Stratfor, March 26, 2019, https://worldview.stratfor.com/
    article/what-white-supremacism-and-jihadism-have-common.
        \50\ Jim Sciutto, ``The Striking Similarities Between the KKK and
    Islamist Jihadis,'' CNN.com, August 17, 2017, https://www.cnn.com/2017/
    08/17/opinions/striking-similarities-between-jihadis-and-kkk-sciutto/
    index.html.
        \51\ Imogen Richards, ``Right-Wing Extremism, Salafi Jihadism, and
    The War on Terror,'' ADI, April 2019, https://adi.deakin.edu.au/news/
    right-wing-extremism-salafi-jihadism-and-the-war-on-terror.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Each group also seeks to actively undermine the foundations of
    liberal democratic societies, which should be destroyed through
    violence and remade by a small vanguard of true believers.\52\ Both
    movements have also recognized the importance of key figures who have
    become an inspiration for the fringes of their respective movements.
    Jihadists revered the sermons of the American-born preacher and al-
    Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula figurehead Anwar al-Awlaki, whose
    radical views inspired numerous jihadi terrorists to launch
    attacks.\53\ White supremacist extremists also have their own martyrdom
    figures, the most famous of which is Anders Breivik, the terrorist
    responsible for the attacks in Norway that killed 77 people at a summer
    camp for children back in 2011.\54\ Breivik has been lauded as a
    ``Saint'' and ``Commander'' and whose beliefs were cited as inspiration
    by the Christchurch attacker Brenton Tarrant.\55\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \52\ Daniel Byman, ``Terrorism and the Threat to Democracy,''
    Brookings Policy Brief, February 2019, https://www.brookings.edu/
    research/terrorism-and-the-threat-to-democracy/.
        \53\ Alexander Melagrou-Hitchens, ``Why Awlaki Mattered,'' Wall
    Street Journal, October 3, 2011, https://www.wsj.com/articles/
    SB10001424052970204612504576606522230694328.
        \54\ Colin P. Clarke, ``The Cult of Breivik,'' Slate, March 18,
    2019, https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/03/anders-breivik-new-
    zealand-right-wing-terrorism-inspiration.html.
        \55\ Lizzie Dearden, ``Revered as a Saint by Online Extremists, How
    Christchurch Shooter Inspired Copycat Terrorists Around the World,''
    Independent, August 25, 2019, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/
    australasia/brenton-tarrant-christchurch-shooter-attack-el-paso-norway-
    poway-a9076926.html.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Recruitment
        Terrorist propaganda serves as a key avenue for exposing potential
    supporters to radical ideologies and helping to recruit new members
    into extremist movements. While jihadis have long circulated martyrdom
    tapes and beheading videos, WSEs have livestreamed their attacks, as
    occurred in Christchurch, and published long manifestos that often
    reference previous high-profile attacks. By spreading these types of
    videos, extremists on both sides are attempting to reach individuals,
    primarily young men (though not exclusively) who may be alienated from
    broader society, feel marginalized or discriminated against, and who
    are disconnected from their communities.\56\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \56\ Melissa Etehad, ``White Supremacists and Islamic State
    Recruits Have More in Common Than You Might Think,'' Los Angeles Times,
    August 7, 2019, https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2019-08-07/
    domestic-terrorism-white-supremacists-islamic-state-recruits.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Victimization forms a commonality across both movements, as does a
    distrust of political leaders and public institutions and a feeling of
    helplessness or ineptitude about how to find success and fulfillment in
    modern society.\57\ Self-empowerment is a key element of the recruiting
    pitch, while both jihadis and WSEs focus on themes of ``purity,''
    militancy, and physical fitness.\58\ The martial aspects of recruitment
    appealed to generations of al-Qaeda militants who answered the call of
    holy war, traveling to training camps to learn guerilla warfare tactics
    and bombmaking techniques. In Ukraine, violent white supremacy
    extremist groups have bonded over shared interest in mixed martial arts
    and so-called ``ultimate fighting'' competitions. The Azov Battalion
    has used this venue as a method for growing its network, including with
    Neo-Nazis from the United States and the West who have traveled to
    Ukraine to forge bonds with white supremacist extremists from Europe
    and elsewhere.\59\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \57\ Jim Sciutto, ``The Striking Similarities Between the KKK and
    Islamist Jihadis,'' CNN.com, August 17, 2017, https://www.cnn.com/2017/
    08/17/opinions/striking-similarities-between-jihadis-and-kkk-sciutto/
    index.html.
        \58\ Ali Soufan, ``I Spent 25 Years Fighting Jihadis. White
    Supremacists Aren't So Different,'' New York Times, August 5, 2019,
    https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/05/opinion/white-supremacy-
    terrorism.html.
        \59\ Michael Colborne, ``Friday Night Fights With Ukraine's Far
    Right,'' New Republic, July 9, 2019, https://newrepublic.com/article/
    154434/friday-night-fights-ukraines-far-right.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Financing
        Financing is another area where similarities exist between how
    jihadists raise money and how white supremacist extremists seek to fund
    their organizations. Like jihadis, U.S. and overseas violent white
    supremacy organizations and individuals have leveraged both licit and
    illicit forms of finance, including a range of criminal activities, to
    sustain operations. In the post-9/11 era it has become much more
    difficult for jihadist groups to operate in the licit financial system,
    but as the Islamic State proved, it is possible to raise and spend
    money locally through a range of activities, from oil trafficking to
    extortion, and still remain a financially viable terrorist organization
    capable of governing large swaths of territory while simultaneously
    planning external operations.
        Both crowdfunding and cryptocurrencies are a popular method of
    funding for white supremacist extremists, who have leveraged content
    creation social media platforms, such as Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook
    to seek funding. The intersection and overlap between social media,
    crowdfunding websites, and payment systems facilitate peer-to-peer
    (P2P) financial transactions in a manner that has served as an
    accelerant for violent white supremacy extremism fundraising. While it
    is impossible to precisely quantify the scope of the WSE's financial
    power it is, without question, very significant. Advances in technology
    and the power of social media and crowdfunding has allowed for both
    violent and non-violent radical right actors to avail themselves of a
    large number of like-minded donors who share similar fears. Playing on
    these fears in order to monetize hatred and discord is big business.
                lessons learned from combating global terrorism
        Our current counterterrorism framework was set up in the immediate
    aftermath of 9/11 to deal exclusively with foreign terrorist groups
    like al-Qaeda. For example, the law allows for the monitoring of
    communications between people connected with foreign terrorist groups--
    even if they are United States citizens operating on American soil--and
    the sharing of the resulting intelligence among American agencies and
    with our allies. But those monitoring and intelligence-sharing tools
    cannot be used against those connected with terrorist groups based in
    the United States--no matter how dangerous--or even when these
    individuals have connections with WSE transnational groups that have
    been designated as terrorist organizations by our allies. This is
    today's reality because domestic terror supporters are protected by
    free speech laws in ways that jihadis (including those who are United
    States citizens) are not, and we have yet to designate transnational
    WSE organizations.
        Since 2001, a long list of people have been indicted on a charge of
    providing material support to designated foreign terrorist entities
    like al-Qaeda. But for domestic terrorist organizations, material
    support charges are impossible because there is no mechanism for
    designating domestic terrorist groups as such. Moreover, domestic
    terror charges are harder to prove and carry penalties inadequate to
    the gravity of the offense. Even the Oklahoma City bomber, Timothy
    McVeigh, the worst domestic terrorist in the Nation's history, was not
    charged with any terrorism offense for precisely this reason.
        Many of our allies have already changed their own laws to allow
    more robust investigations of domestic terrorists. Britain's domestic
    intelligence agency, MI5, for example, can now use many of the same
    methods against domestic extremism that they have long deployed against
    al-Qaeda, thanks to laws passed following 9/11.
        The FBI should also be able to use many of the same counter-
    terrorism tools against domestic extremism as they currently have
    available for countering the Salafi-jihadist threat, with appropriate
    safeguards for our Constitutional freedoms. But this can happen only if
    Congress updates our post-9/11 legislation to allow domestic terror
    groups to be designated in the same way as foreign ones. Our allies--
    including Germany, Canada, and the UK--have designated domestic
    terrorist organizations, and we must consider doing the same or at
    least designate the groups designated by our allies as Foreign
    Terrorist Organizations (FTOs). This will allow our law-enforcement
    agencies access to the full suite of monitoring tools and our
    prosecutors the ability to bring meaningful charges for aiding domestic
    terrorism.
        Twenty years ago, we grossly underestimated the rising threat of
    Islamist terrorism. That inattention cost us dearly on Sept. 11, 2001.
    We cannot afford to wait for the white-supremacist equivalent.

        Chairman Thompson. Thank you for your testimony.
        I now recognize Mr. Levin to summarize his statement for 5
    minutes.

      STATEMENT OF BRIAN LEVIN, DIRECTOR, CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF
     HATE & EXTREMISM, CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY, SAN BERNARDINO

        Mr. Levin. Thank you. Chairman Thompson, Ranking Member
    Rogers, and Members of the committee, my name is Professor
    Brian Levin, and you have heard the introduction of my
    background.
        I also wanted to add, and I wanted to thank everyone on
    this committee. I am former NYPD. We are celebrating an
    anniversary tomorrow. We have to take all threats seriously. I
    want to give a heartfelt thank you to everybody on this
    committee, everyone, irrespective of party.
        I am here on behalf of our university's two-decade-strong
    independent research and policy institution, the Center for the
    Study of Hate and Extremism. I want to thank you for another
    opportunity to come here to discuss our latest findings, most
    of which are coming from our latest Report to the Nation 2019.
    The conclusions are both fascinating and cautionary.
        I also would be remiss if I didn't thank all the scholars
    that helped with this report: Nakashima, Thompson, Nolan,
    Reitzel, Grisham, and Landon.
        But let me go right to the report. This is what came out
    before the latest spate of mass shootings. This is what we
    said: ``While white supremacists and ultra nationalists will
    remain--will maintain their position at the top of the threat
    matrix, the risk is also diversifying. Splintered free speech
    platforms, where hate speech is more prolific, have enabled
    organizationally unaffiliated extremist and loners with a tool
    to congregate, radicalize, and broadcast not only bigotry, but,
    disturbingly, lone acts of mass violence that reference prior
    attacks.'' Let me note this was before El Paso.
        The report also noted recently terrorists used 8chan,
    Telegram, Gab, and Facebook around the time of their attacks.
    8chan, now temporarily non-operational, is a free speech
    platform whose ``Embrace Infamy'' home page slogan is a gift
    wrap on a noxious bazaar of deeply bigoted, misogynistic, and
    violent bombasts in their political section. White supremacist,
    far-right extremists are now the most ascendant transnational
    terror threat facing the homeland in a fluid and somewhat
    diversifying risk matrix.
        Let me say this. I am very glad that we are hearing that we
    are seeing a confluence from across the ideological spectrum.
    We need to--my son--just a point of personal privilege, my son
    played soccer, and he plays defense. You have to look where the
    kicks are coming. You can't just look at one side of the field.
    I think we need that alacrity, and that is why I appreciate the
    committee noting that.
        But we also have to look at where these shots are coming
    from: White supremacist, far-right-extremist-motivated
    homicides. This is our curated data. We are a little different
    from the ADL. We look at those that are motivated by the
    ideology.
        White supremacist, far-right extremists--and I do not mean
    conservative people of goodwill--have killed at least 26 people
    so far this year. We had 16 service members killed in
    Afghanistan so far this year. More people were murdered
    domestically so far in 2019 by just a handful of white
    supremacists than all of those killed in the whole of calendar
    year 2018 in every extremist homicide event.
        This is coming at a time where, disturbingly, mass
    shootings overall, including those with mixed or no discernible
    ideological motives, were also rising. Through September 1 the
    Gun Violence Archive has enumerated 283 mass shootings,
    nationally. That is more than 1 a day, and the first time that
    we have seen this since 2016.
        One of the things that our research has shown is for the
    data, which I think is really interesting. There is a pattern
    of spikes in both violent internet chatter and actual terrorist
    incidents, as well as hate crime. I put a little chart by one
    of our colleagues from our center in there that shows when
    these spikes in hate crime go up. I can show you, whether it is
    here, whether it is in Europe, we see also terror attacks
    around that.
        Similarly, the month of the Charlottesville Unite the Right
    rally and the associated political controversy around it was
    tied for the second-worst month, according to FBI, for hate
    crime for this whole decade.
        If we want to look at another time, around the election of
    President Obama we saw this spike. What did we see around that
    time, as well? Terror plots and terror attacks. In England we
    saw a member of parliament assassinated at a time when these
    hate crimes went up, as well.
        So what we are seeing is a convergence of many things. What
    I would say to you is that we have to have a holistic approach.
        One of our--my guests here today lost her father--this is
    Tina Meins--lost her father in the San Bernardino terrorist
    attack. We have to have a coordinated approach, and that
    includes data. It also includes looking at the weapons of war,
    which are being used now increasingly by terrorists of all
    stripes, but in particular white supremacists and the far
    right. We have to have a coordinated National approach to this.
        I appreciate you having me here to discuss this, and I
    welcome any questions that the Members of the committee have.
        I want to once again, though, thank you for the work. The
    Homeland Security Committee does important work. I think it is
    important that other Governmental agencies come here and speak
    with you so that we are getting a holistic picture for what
    needs to be done. Thank you so much, Chairman.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Levin follows:]
                       Prepared Statement of Brian Levin
                               September 10, 2019
        Chairman Thompson, Ranking Member Rogers, and Members of the
    committee, my name is Prof. Brian Levin. Thank you so very much for
    your service to our country and for another opportunity to present some
    of the latest findings, on extremism, primarily derived from our Report
    To The Nation: 2019 Factbook On Hate & Extremism In The U.S. &
    Internationally, which are both fascinating and cautionary.
        I am a professor in the Department of Criminal Justice, who is also
    on faculty at our National Security Studies program at California State
    University, San Bernardino (CSUSB). I am here, however, on behalf of
    CSUSB's two-decade strong independent research and policy institution,
    the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism (``CSHE''). Our
    quantitative and qualitative trend analysis on violent manifestations
    of political conflict and prejudice across both borders and the
    ideological spectrum, has been used by scholars, journalists, and
    policy makers around the world.
        As the best analysis is often a coordinated team effort, I want to
    take this brief opportunity to thank all the scholars who enabled CSHE
    to conduct this important research: Our study co-author Legal Fellow
    Lisa Nakashima, as well as our Cal State-based crew of Drs. Kevin
    Grisham and John Reitzel and our Research Fellow William Lambdin; along
    with Dr. James Nolan of West Virginia University and data analyst
    Andrew Thompson.
     white supremacist-motivated fatalities rise along with mass shooting
                                     events
        White supremacist/far right extremists are now, the most ascendant
    transnational terror threat facing the homeland, in a fluid and
    somewhat diversifying risk matrix. According to CSHE's preliminary
    data, white supremacist/far right extremist-motivated homicides have
    killed at least 26 people so far this year. More people were murdered
    domestically so far in 2019 by just a handful of white supremacists,
    than all of those killed in the whole of calendar year 2018 in every
    extremist/hate homicide event. The fatalities per incident are also
    trending up as semi-automatic rifles continue to be their weapon of
    choice.
        This is coming at a time where, disturbingly, mass shootings
    overall, including those with mixed or no discernable ideological
    motives are also rising. The three main categories of violent mass
    offenders are listed below, and usually one element is primary, with at
    least one other often playing a more minor supporting role:
        1. The Ideologically Motivated (Religious, Political, or Hybrid)
        2. The Psychologically Dangerous (Sociopath or Unstable)
        3. Revenge, Validation, or Personal Benefit
        Through September 1, the Gun Violence Archive has enumerated 283
    mass shootings (where at least 4 are shot) nationally in 2019, the
    first time since 2016 that there were more than an average of 1 per
    day. Moreover, fatalities by rifle (of which semi-automatics are a
    subset), at 403, reached their highest level in a decade in 2017
    according to the FBI.
                 violence increases around political divisions
        Interestingly, our 2018 data showed the majority of white
    supremacist homicides clustered roughly before election time when polls
    indicated a possible party shift in a highly contested mid-term
    election. We also saw an increase in hate crime reports from major U.S.
    cities during that time as well. 2018 was the fifth consecutive annual
    increase in police enumerated hate crime in our multi-city study, and
    the steepest increase since 2015, with nearly half the cities hitting
    decade highs--despite a drop in the first half of the year.
        Similarly, the month of the fatal Charlottesville ``Unite the
    Right'' rally and the associated political controversy around it, was
    tied for the second-worst month this decade for FBI reported hate
    crime. Except for election month 2016, the last months with higher
    totals than August 2017, were around the election of Barack Obama, when
    escalating anti-Black hate crime hit levels not seen since.
        Election month, November 2016, was the worst month in 14 years with
    758 FBI reported hate crimes. Interestingly, other data showed a
    corresponding increase in the volume of both bigoted speech on 4chan,
    as well as an increase in manipulative racially divisive ad buys by the
    Russians on Facebook around that time. The Report On The Investigation
    Into Russian Interference In The 2016 Presidential Election (Mueller
    Report), March 2019 concluded:

    ``Collectively, the IRA's social media accounts reached tens of
    millions of U.S. persons. Individual IRA social media accounts
    attracted hundreds of thousands of followers . . . According to
    Facebook, in total the IRA-controlled accounts made over 80,000 posts
    before their deactivation in August 2017, and these posts reached at
    least 29 million U.S. persons and `may have reached an estimated 126
    million people.''

        The day after the elections--November 9, 2016--with 44 reported
    hate crimes, was the worst day in 13 years. It was also the day 3
    interdicted militia extremists planned to truck bomb a Garden City,
    Kansas apartment complex populated by Somali-American Muslims. This
    pattern of bursts in hate crime, vile internet chatter, and terror
    around conflictual political events has been repeated elsewhere, as in
    the United Kingdom. There hate crimes not only rose around the Brexit
    vote, a sitting member of parliament was assassinated around that time
    as well. More recently, we have seen an increase in threats against
    American public officials, as well an escalation in precursor extremist
    activity or violence by other ideological movements as we embark on yet
    another highly-conflicted election season.
        2019 will reverse an overall downward trend in American extremist/
    hate homicides that we've seen over the last couple of years, due to
    the rising number of mass white supremacist killings. Out of last
    year's total of 22 extremist motivated homicides, 17 were white
    supremacist/far right motivated, one was violent Salafist Jihadist, and
    there were none by the hard left or Antifa, though some of their
    localized splinters certainly have committed a steady string of crimes.
    Jews (for the first time) and African-Americans were the most common
    victims in fatal white supremacist attacks in 2018, while Latinos and
    Asians are this year.
                              a changing landscape
        When I testified before this committee just 4 years ago, only weeks
    before the Paris and San Bernardino terror attacks, the landscape was
    different. Then, I warned that the most urgent transnational terror
    threat facing the American homeland came from violent Salafist
    Jihadists who were often inspired or orchestrated by more organized
    groups.
        D'aesh in particular expanded not only its ``caliphate''
    territory--to nearly the size of Michigan, but also its terrestrial and
    on-line communal presence, recruitment, and revenues. The reach of its
    fatal extremism, left an escalating violent string of fatalities in its
    wake on America, and elsewhere.
        By the following summer of 2016, they inspired more horror, with
    another semi-automatic rifle rampage, this time at Orlando's Pulse
    night club, killing 49 mostly LGBT victims, and supplanting the San
    Bernardino massacre as the most fatal post-9/11 terror foreign
    influenced attack.
        That year our center enumerated just 3 white supremacist/far right
    homicides. White supremacists, had changed their tactics in an attempt
    to openly enter the mainstream in the prejudice tinged fissures over
    debates on issues of public concern like terrorism and immigration.
    Neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and alt-right adherents engaged in more
    large public demonstrations in the 2\1/2\ years leading just into and
    after Charlottesville, than in the whole of the previous decade. Nazis
    and Holocaust deniers even ran for Congressional and Senate seats in
    California and Illinois. Since Charlottesville, however, public
    organized groups have splintered amidst legal, financial issues and
    internecine squabbles, leaving a fragmented extremist landscape.
      white nationalism is an interconnected transnational threat to the
                                    homeland
        Earlier, in May I cautioned the committee that: ``For today's
    digital, often loner white nationalist terrorist, internet platforms
    are force multipliers that record and disseminate not only graphic
    violence, but narcissistic manifestos as well, in a scripted on-line
    folkloric chain of violence. These extreme views are disturbingly
    common in the general population.''
        Our aforementioned 137-page ``Report to the Nation: 2019'' released
    in July further elaborated on this threat in its summary:

    ``While white supremacists and ultra-nationalists will maintain their
    position at the top of the threat matrix, the risk is also diversifying
    well beyond the far right, to include those with antagonistic
    ideologies, those inspired by zealots and conflicts abroad, and those
    with more personal grievances in an increasingly coarse and fragmented
    socio-political landscape . . .
    ``[H]atemongers have increasingly migrated to splintered free speech,
    encrypted and affinity-based platforms, and messaging services, where
    hate speech is more prolific . . . The internet has enabled . . .
    organizationally unaffiliated extremists and loners with a tool to
    congregate, radicalize, and broadcast not only bigotry, but
    disturbingly, lone acts of mass violence that reference prior
    attacks.''

        The report further noted, ``recently, terrorists used 8chan,
    Telegram, GAB, and Facebook around the time of their attacks.'' 8chan,
    now temporarily non-operational, is a free speech platform whose
    ``embrace infamy'' homepage slogan was gift wrap on a noxious bazar of
    deeply bigoted, misogynistic, and violent bombast in their political
    speech section.
                             the great replacement
        Within days of our latest report release, another link in this
    transnational horrific ``chain of violence'' that I discussed in May
    was forged. On the morning of August 3, a 21-year-old white male from
    Allen, Texas posted a methodical 4-page diatribe on 8chan after driving
    across the State. It opened with praise for both the Christchurch
    terrorist who killed 49 at two mosques, and his lengthy manifesto
    entitled ``The Great Replacement,'' which was itself lifted off a 2012
    French book by Renaud Camus, with the same title, about European
    ``white genocide.'' The New Zealand terrorist, in turn was also
    inspired by, yet another manifesto writing white supremacist terrorist
    who murdered 77 in Norway in 2011.
        The young Texan further explained the influence that the French
    book had on him:

        ``This attack is a response to the Hispanic invasion of Texas . . .
    I am simply defending my country from cultural and ethnic replacement
    brought on by an invasion . . . Actually, the Hispanic community was
    not my target before I read the Great Replacement.'' Le grand
    remplacement is a 2012 dystopian book lamenting the coming extinction
    of white Europeans on the continent by Muslim immigrants and other
    people of color, that has become a recent staple in an international
    chain. The killer concluded by warning, ``This is just the beginning of
    the fight for America and Europe.''

        Less than 20 minutes after uploading his hateful exhortation, its
    author opened fire on mostly older shoppers in a crowded El Paso
    Walmart with a legally purchased semi-automatic military style rifle
    killing 22--the worst white supremacist/far right terrorist attack
    since 168 perished in the Oklahoma City Murrah Federal Building bombing
    of April 19, 1995.
                leaderless resistance and propaganda of the deed
        That same year, Stormfront, the first white Supremacist website was
    launched by Don Black, a neo-Nazi white supremacist felon, whose vision
    of an international racist network was succinctly stated in its moniker
    ``White Pride World Wide.'' In 1995, I testified before another
    Congressional committee about the central role that the ``Leaderless
    Resistance'' tactic plays regarding scripted violence by autonomous
    loners or small cells against those perceived as enemies of whites.
    News reports of random ``propaganda of the deed'' violent attacks
    against minorities alone was supposed to inspire other extremists. In
    today's fragmented social media landscape, the white supremacist
    embrace of leaderless resistance has produced a ``propaganda of the
    deed 2.0'' effect. The violence is not only inspired by racist
    folklore, but through an accompanying text or video, the terrorist
    seeks to write the next chapter of it. Most of these young terrorists
    have no direct operational connection to, or affiliation with terror
    groups. However, the internet has also apparently enabled newer small
    violent groups, with short half-lives, like the Kansas plotters,
    Atomwaffen Division, the Rise Above Movement and the Base to not only
    recruit individually, but to also assemble, across borders when
    necessary, for violent activities or training.
        The spread of white nationalist and, to a lesser extent, other
    extremist viewpoints into an increasingly fragmented and sometimes
    violent mainstream socio-political landscape provides an overflowing
    elastic reservoir for intergroup conflict around the globe, where
    offenders are also co-influenced by a variety of factor ranging from
    conspiracy theories to misogyny. At its most jagged and unstable
    digital edges, it has resulted in political violence, intimidation, and
    threats with transnational reach. As then DNI director Coates stated to
    the Senate in January, ``In the past 2 years, individuals with ties to
    violent ethno-supremacist groups in France, Sweden, and the United
    Kingdom have either carried out attacks on minorities and politicians
    or had their plots disrupted by authorities.'' Britain's intelligence
    agencies explained recently ``Increasingly, the vital piece of
    information that might stop an attack is unlikely to be held by MI5,
    but buried somewhere else in the mountain of data generated each day,
    often scattered across the world.'' And just last month the Swedish
    Security service observed ``a development in the violent right-wing
    extremist scene that could increase the risk of certain individuals
    being inspired to carry out attacks or violent crime . . . [as] violent
    right-wing extremist ideology might be going from something considered
    extreme to something considered normal, could prompt certain
    individuals to become radicalized.''
        As one can see, violent extremism is evolving and while currently
    dominated by white nationalists/far right ideologues, they do not exert
    a monopoly. Still, with 43 percent of American respondents to a 2018
    Reuters poll saying whites are under attack, there is a wide bench from
    which these extremists can try to draw recruits.
                  caution respecting major statutory overhauls
        With dozens of statutes available to combat domestic terrorists and
    the unknown impact on civil liberties from major changes, I hold the
    same basic position today that I did when I testified almost 25 years
    ago regarding a broad overhaul of domestic Federal statutes.
        CSHE does however, support the following:
        Enacting H.R. 3106, the Domestic Terrorism DATA Act to improve the
    availability and production of timely government data on terrorism and
    the Jabara-Heyer NO HATE Act;
        Enhancing both statutory and administrative provisions to counter
    the growing threat against public officials and elected office holders;
        Amending 18 USC Sec. 231 to punish not only trainers, but trainees
    in violent methods designed to foment civil disorder;
        Improving background checks and closing loopholes on firearms
    purchases, as well as the placement of restrictions on semi-automatic
    rifles, and extended magazines inter alia;
        Providing greater funding and resources to enhance interagency
    coordination to combat the threat that white supremacist/far right
    extremism poses to the homeland.
        As I noted in May, the domestic terror threat is a fluid one, with
    increasingly transnational and internet dimensions. The societal and
    international divisions that fuel extremism will likely be further
    exacerbated by a highly-charged political season and increasing
    international instability.
        Thank you.

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

           Chairman Thompson. Thank you for your testimony.
        I now recognize Mr. Joscelyn to summarize his statement for
    5 minutes.

    STATEMENT OF THOMAS JOSCELYN, SENIOR FELLOW, FOUNDATION FOR THE
                         DEFENSE OF DEMOCRACIES

        Mr. Joscelyn. Well, Chairman Thompson, Ranking Member
    Rogers, and other Members of the committee, thank you for
    inviting me to testify here today. This is actually the
    nineteenth time I have testified before Congress, many of those
    times before this committee. I find this committee in
    particular to have a pretty bipartisan air about it, and that
    is great for--especially when addressing issues that really are
    a threat to all of us across the ideological spectrum, as the
    other guests here have said.
        You know, I deal a lot with ISIS and al-Qaeda, and there is
    a lot of sentiment in the United States right now that people
    just want to move on. I get that. You know, if you were telling
    me 18 years after 9/11 I would still be talking about al-Qaeda
    I would probably be surprised at the time. Unfortunately,
    however, I am always reminded of a simple, pithy phrase, which
    is ``The enemy gets a vote.'' Both ISIS and al-Qaeda are
    continuing to fight. I think that was recognized in the opening
    statements both from you, Mr. Chairman, and you, Mr. Ranking
    Member.
        I would say I had some--a preamble dedicated to the called-
    off discussions at Camp David. But if we could just copy and
    paste Peter's opening remarks as my critique, as well, that--I
    agree with every one of his points there.
        I wanted to add one additional point of critique on that,
    in terms of negotiations with the Taliban, which is that in
    July the Taliban released a very disturbing video. My
    colleagues and I are nerds who troll through all the Taliban
    propaganda. We troll through all al-Qaeda and ISIS propaganda.
        In this video, about 10 minutes in, they were justifying
    the 9/11 attacks and the Madrid train bombings and the 7/7
    bombings in London. They said that it was a slap on--a very
    hard slap on our dark faces--``our,'' meaning Americans. They
    said that we deserved it, that it wasn't their fault or the
    jihadis fault, it was Americans' fault for their policies
    overseas. This has been a consistent Taliban message for the
    past 18 years. It is very disturbing to me that that sort of
    detail would be whitewashed while we are negotiating with them,
    and that people aren't taking that into account.
        I will add one other fact on that. In my testimony you will
    see I quote from 4 very recent U.N. Security Council reports
    dealing with al-Qaeda and ISIS. You can find the links are all
    given in my testimony for this. But one other fact that doesn't
    get enough attention is what the U.N. Security Council says
    about al-Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan. What the U.N.
    Security Council says is that al-Qaeda continues to see
    Afghanistan as a safe haven for its leadership, based on its
    long-standing strong ties with the Taliban.
        In addition, these reports from the U.N. Security Council
    say things like al-Qaeda members act as instructors and
    religious teachers for Taliban personnel and their family
    members.
        I won't bore you with the additional details, but there are
    ample facts like that recounted in these U.N. Security Council
    reports that show that al-Qaeda is very much interested in
    resurrecting the Taliban's Islamic Emirate in Afghanistan. The
    idea that the Taliban is going to somehow restrain or renounce
    al-Qaeda right now today I find fanciful. Yet that was the
    whole exchange in this deal that was sort-of proffered, was
    that we were going to withdraw our troops in exchange for this
    sort of promise. I--if you go back to the 9/11 Commission
    Report and many other details, you know there is no reason to
    believe that.
        I used more of my time on that than I thought I would. But
    I will just say this very quickly. You know, ISIS in
    particular, you know, as we have been warning--and there is, I
    think, uniform agreement across the expert community on this--
    ISIS is not close to dead. Despite losing its physical
    caliphate, obviously, ISIS is very much alive.
        There is--there are real challenges there, in terms of
    making sure that they are not able to reconstitute certain
    threats to the West. In particular, you know, I still find it
    fascinating that we know of guys who have been fighting for
    ISIS or its predecessor organizations for over a decade who are
    still in the game, and are still fighting that haven't been
    taken out.
        As I think Ali pointed out, they are in--they have a number
    of so-called provinces, everywhere from West Africa all the way
    to South Asia. They are fighting. By the way, those provinces
    were set up to compete with al-Qaeda's presence in each one of
    those regions, because al-Qaeda is the deep, entrenched
    insurgency in most of those areas, including Shabaab in
    Somalia, or in West Africa, or, as I mentioned, Afghanistan or
    elsewhere.
        I would just say this. I echo--if you look at my testimony,
    even though it is not the main thing I focus on, I echo the
    alarm over the rise of far-right terrorism and extremism. I
    think it is an obvious growing threat.
        One of the paragraphs in my testimony deals with how
    individuals responsible for attacks everywhere from New Zealand
    to El Paso were sort-of feeding off of each other and trying to
    one-up each other in trying to kill more people in the name of
    this sort-of twisted ideology. That, to me, makes it a global
    threat right off the get-go, just being able to see the ideas
    transit all the way from New Zealand all the way to El Paso and
    various other areas.
        I will say this, too. Well, there is--there are a lot of
    points to argue, or to sort-of go into about the comparisons
    between jihadism and far-right terrorism. One point of
    similarity that I think comes across is after the New Zealand
    terrorist attack I was very struck by the fact how many jihadis
    were sharing the video of the massacre in the mosques in New
    Zealand. In fact, I got the video by--from al-Qaeda channels.
    They were sharing it and commenting on it. You could see this
    twisted sort-of feedback loop, this cycle of violence between
    the two feeding off of each other as they are talking about
    this.
        In my written testimony--I won't read it here--I produced a
    quote from a Shabaab spokesman--this is al-Qaeda in Somalia and
    East Africa--and he used the New Zealand terrorist attack to
    argue, yes, basically that terrorist was right, Muslims don't
    belong in the West. You need to come fight for us against the
    West. Come back to your homelands.
        So that is exactly how--and one of the areas that I am
    doing research on right now--these twin threats are sort-of
    feeding off each other. I am very worried, in particular, about
    both growing in the near future. Thank you.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Joscelyn follows:]
                     Prepared Statement of Thomas Joscelyn
        Chairman Thompson, Ranking Member Rogers, and other Members of the
    committee, thank you for inviting me to testify today.
        It is hard to believe that 18 years have passed since the September
    11, 2001, hijackings. The world has changed dramatically during that
    time. Many in the United States want to move on from the fight against
    jihadism, including from the wars unleashed by 9/11 and America's
    response. I cannot say I entirely blame them. But the enemy gets a
    vote, and our enemies have not given up.
        Many in Washington argue that ``great power competition'' is
    America's main concern, and that the United States needs to pivot away
    from protracted conflicts against the jihadists. Some argue that we can
    no longer afford to have our limited resources tied up in the fight
    against the Islamic State or al-Qaeda, because we need to focus on
    near-peer competitors such as China, or on spoilers like Russia. Rising
    challengers, and especially China, do demand more of the U.S.
    Government's attention. But I think the resource allocation argument
    misses a key point: By and large, the U.S. military's pivot has already
    occurred. The last ``surge'' of American forces ended in 2011. Today,
    there are far fewer American troops deployed to wartime theaters than
    at the height of the U.S. commitment.
        The United States has also already shifted much of the burden to
    its allies, as they have carried out the bulk of the on-the-ground
    fighting against Sunni jihadists for years. For example, Kurdish,
    Iraqi, and other forces played a leading role in the ground campaign
    against the Islamic State, ending its territorial claims in Iraq and
    Syria. Those same allied forces sustained the overwhelming majority of
    casualties in the war against the so-called caliphate. The same is true
    in jihadist hotspots such as Afghanistan and Somalia. Unfortunately, 16
    Americans have perished as a result of the conflict in Afghanistan this
    year. Still, Afghan military and security forces, as well as civilians,
    have sustained far higher casualties.
        Going forward, as the United States presumably draws down further,
    a key question is: How will America's allies continue to keep the
    jihadists at bay with even less external assistance? We see in
    Afghanistan, for instance, that the government is barely holding the
    Taliban and other jihadists back throughout the country. This has been
    the case even though approximately 14,000 American troops, along with
    thousands of NATO partners, have been assisting the Afghans. America's
    airpower and Special Forces have been essential for preventing the
    Taliban from capturing more ground, especially several provincial
    capitals. This means it is extremely unlikely that the situation will
    improve with less Western assistance. This does not mean that we should
    paper over the problems with the war effort or ignore wasteful
    spending. The wide-spread frustration with these issues is well-placed.
    However, there are also legitimate concerns about the threat of
    terrorism emanating from Afghanistan in the future.
        Even though the U.S. military's footprint has been significantly
    reduced, America's armed forces continue to strike terrorist targets in
    several countries. Law enforcement and intelligence officials also
    continue to face a wide spectrum of threats. These include threats from
    the Islamic State and its global arms, al-Qaeda and its international
    network, as well as other foreign terrorist organizations. The Islamic
    State, al-Qaeda, and allied groups are fighting or operating across an
    enormous amount of ground, stretching from the remote regions of West
    Africa, through North and East Africa, into the heart of the Middle
    East, and all the way into Central and South Asia. The jihadists' war
    is far from over. Most of the jihadists are fighting for territory over
    there, but new threats to American security could emerge from within
    their ranks at any time.
        There are also ample reasons to be concerned about the rise of far-
    right extremism, including terrorist attacks by white supremacists or
    other anti-government actors. To date, most of the far-right attacks
    inside the United States have been carried out by individuals. It is
    far too easy for a lone terrorist to wreak havoc. And we have already
    witnessed how an attack in one part of the world can inspire or
    influence another, even half a world away.
        Consider that Brenton Tarrant, the accused terrorist who massacred
    51 innocent civilians at a mosque in Christchurch, New Zealand, in
    March, claimed to be inspired by Anders Behring Breivik, who killed 77
    people in Oslo in 2011, as well as by Dylan Roof, who murdered 9
    churchgoers in a 2015 mass shooting in Charleston.\1\ Even if the
    Christchurch terrorist exaggerated his ties to Breivik--he claimed to
    be in ``brief contact'' with the jailed mass murderer\2\--the evidence
    shows how one far-right terrorist's words and deeds can influence the
    actions of another living far away. In fact, Patrick Crusius, who has
    been charged with killing 22 people in August at a Walmart in El Paso,
    Texas, reportedly wrote: ``In general, I support the Christchurch
    shooter and his manifesto. This attack is a response to the Hispanic
    invasion of Texas.''\3\ In addition to their hatred for immigrants, the
    gunmen in New Zealand and El Paso have also been described as ``eco-
    fascists.''\4\ This demonstrates how different extremist ideas can be
    combined in the minds of would-be terrorists to produce an even more
    toxic hatred. Also in August, another terrorist opened fire on a mosque
    in Norway, injuring 1. The man named as the main suspect in that
    attack, Philip Manshaus, reportedly drew inspiration from the killings
    in New Zealand and El Paso as well as from a shooting at a synagogue in
    California in April.\5\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \1\ Adam Taylor, ``New Zealand suspect allegedly claimed `brief
    contact' with Norwegian mass murderer Anders Breivik,'' The Washington
    Post, March 15, 2019. (https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2019/03/15/
    new-zealand-suspect-allegedly-claimed-brief-contact-with-norwegian-
    mass-murderer-anders-breivik/).
        \2\ Ibid.
        \3\ Tim Arango, Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs, and Katie Benner,
    ``Minutes Before El Paso Killing, Hate-Filled Manifesto Appears
    Online,'' The New York Times, August 3, 2019. (https://www.nytimes.com/
    2019/08/03/us/patrick-crusius-el-paso-shooter-manifesto.html).
        \4\ Joel Achenbach, ``Two mass killings a world apart share a
    common theme: `ecofascism,' '' The Washington Post, August 18, 2019.
    (https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/two-mass-murders-a-world-apart-
    share-a-common-theme-ecofascism/2019/08/18/0079a676-bec4-11e9-b873-
    63ace636af08_story.html).
        \5\ Jason Burke, ``Norway mosque attack suspect `inspired by
    Christchurch and El Paso shootings,' '' The Guardian (UK), August 11,
    2019. (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/aug/11/norway-mosque-
    attack-suspect-may-have-been-inspired-by-christchurch-and-el-paso-
    shootings).
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        I have studied jihadists for years. There are differences between
    the current far-right threat and that posed by groups such as the
    Islamic State and al-Qaeda. But I am struck by one similarity. The
    jihadists portray themselves as the guardians of Islam and its glorious
    past. They rely on a heavily mythologized view of history, justifying
    their violence by arguing that it is necessary to restore lost glory.
    This was a large part of the Islamic State's caliphate claim. Abu Bakr
    al-Baghdadi and his henchmen wanted people to believe that an Islamic
    empire had been resurrected for Muslims, even though most of their
    victims are in fact Muslims.
        There is a similarity with far-right extremism in this regard. The
    terrorist in Christchurch covered his weapons with historical symbols
    and names, portraying his wanton violence as a defense of the West
    against Muslims. Of course, his shootings were no such thing. But not
    only far-right believers were emboldened by Tarrant's historically
    illiterate narrative; so were some jihadists. Al-Qaeda's senior
    leadership and their loyalists around the globe called for revenge in
    the wake of the massacre in New Zealand. We collected messages from
    Afghanistan and Pakistan, Syria, Somalia, West Africa, and elsewhere.
        One message, from Shabaab's spokesman, the appropriately-named Ali
    Mahmoud Rage, was especially noteworthy. Rage agreed with Tarrant that
    Muslims have no place in the West. ``We say to the Muslims in the West,
    wake up from your slumber, and know that you are in the den of wolves
    who surround you from every direction and lie around you,'' Rage
    claimed. ``You are not safe from their gaze, even when you are inside
    the mosques.'' Rage continued: ``O Muslims, you must realize that there
    is no future for you in the West, and that you must return to your
    countries, to participate in liberating them from the enemies and to
    live afterwards as Muslims, free under the shade of the Shariah and the
    governance of Islam.''
        In other words, both Tarrant and Rage portrayed themselves as the
    guardians of whole civilizations. Neither man is any such thing. But
    their hate is not all that different.
        My other key points today are as follows:
        1. While the Islamic State has lost its territorial caliphate and
            suffered other significant blows, the group lives on as a
            global terrorist and insurgent organization. The organization
            has highlighted the continued loyalty of more than a dozen of
            its so-called ``provinces'' outside of Iraq and Syria this
            year. Some of these are smaller operations. But its
            ``provinces'' in West Africa and the Khorasan (a region
            covering Afghanistan and Pakistan as well as parts of several
            other neighboring countries) are especially active. As was the
            case at the height of its power, the Islamic State's violence
            is focused primarily overseas.
        2. To date, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi's men have had far more success
            orchestrating professional plots in Europe than inside the
            United States. This has to do with ease of travel and other
            logistical issues. But officials will have to continue
            monitoring this threat stream for some time, as Baghdadi's
            surviving goons would like to orchestrate a large-scale attack
            inside the United States or against American interests
            elsewhere. Fortunately, a number of hurdles stand in their way.
            But continued pressure is necessary to ensure they do not
            exploit any holes in America's defenses.
        3. The Islamic State's threat inside the United States has come
            primarily from its remote planners or through inspiration. Many
            of the group's ``remote-controlled'' plots--that is, attacks
            guided by on-line handlers working overseas--have been
            thwarted, but some inspired attacks have succeeded. With the
            proliferation of encrypted messaging capabilities, it may
            become easier for the jihadists to remotely guide larger-scale
            plots in the future, providing bomb-making or other tactical
            advice to people living in the United States. There is evidence
            that the Islamic State has done this elsewhere and that others,
            including al-Qaeda or far-right terrorists, could employ the
            same methods.
        4. Eighteen years after 9/11, Americans have the right to wonder
            how much of a threat al-Qaeda is to them. The organization has
            failed to conduct another high-profile attack inside the United
            States. Some early plots were thwarted, while others failed on
            their own. However, al-Qaeda is far from dead. Despite
            triumphalist claims about the organization's supposed demise,
            al-Qaeda is a global terrorist and insurgent organization.
            Indeed, al-Qaeda's loyalists are probably fighting in more
            countries today than ever before. Although this is not widely
            understood, al-Qaeda has devoted most of its resources to
            various insurgencies, seeking to build Islamic emirates that
            could one day join together and resurrect an Islamic caliphate.
            Of course, this vision is far from becoming a reality. But it
            does motivate much of the al-Qaeda network's violence. This
            central idea also explains al-Qaeda's global structure. Al-
            Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, al-Qaeda in the Islamic
            Maghreb, al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent, Jama'at Nusrat
            al-Islam wal Muslimin (also known as the ``Group for the
            Support of Islam and Muslims''), and al-Shabaab in Somalia are
            all openly loyal to al-Qaeda's senior leadership and serve as
            regional branches of the group. In addition, there are several
            al-Qaeda-affiliated groups in Syria, though the organization's
            structure in the Levant is now a bit murky due to various bouts
            of infighting and disagreements over strategy. There are other
            al-Qaeda-linked groups elsewhere as well.
        5. Al-Qaeda has not attempted a large-scale attack in the West in
            years, but this does not mean the threat has been entirely
            eliminated. Al-Qaeda deliberately chose to prioritize fighting
            in various theaters over spectacular, 9/11-style terrorism.
            There is always a possibility that al-Qaeda will decide to take
            a big shot at the United States or Europe once again. The last
            al-Qaeda attack in the West came in January 2015, when two
            brothers carried out a precisely planned assault on Charlie
            Hebdo's offices in Paris. That attack, facilitated by al-Qaeda
            in the Arabian Peninsula, was part of al-Qaeda's targeted
            global campaign against supposed blasphemers. Al-Qaeda's men
            wanted to portray themselves as the avengers of Islam after
            Charlie Hebdo and other publications printed allegedly
            offensive images of the Prophet Mohammed. Al-Qaeda has also
            sought to inspire individuals to lash out on their own, and has
            had limited success in this regard.
        6. There are a variety of ways al-Qaeda could attempt a major, mass
            casualty attack in the West in the future. Part of the story
            that is often overlooked is the U.S. Government's role in
            suppressing various emerging threats. For example, the U.S.
            military struck alleged al-Qaeda leaders in Syria twice this
            year, claiming that these unnamed individuals are ``responsible
            for attacks threatening U.S. citizens, our partners, and
            innocent civilians.''\6\ Previous American airstrikes in Syria
            have targeted al-Qaeda figures suspected of plotting against
            the United States and the West as well. In recent years, the
            United States has also taken out al-Qaeda operatives in
            Afghanistan and Yemen after intelligence officials learned they
            had a hand in anti-American and transregional plans.\7\ This
            counterterrorism campaign demonstrates how al-Qaeda's external
            operations planning has become more geographically dispersed
            over time, a direct result of the group's role in various
            insurgencies.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \6\ U.S. Central Command, ``Statement from U.S. Central Command on
    strike against al-Qaida in Syria,'' June 30, 2019. (https://
    www.centcom.mil/MEDIA/STATEMENTS/statements-View/Article/1891697/
    statement-from-us-central-command-on-strike-against-al-qaida-in-syria/
    ); see also: U.S. Central Command, ``Statement from U.S. Central
    Command on U.S. Forces strike against al-Qaida in Syria leadership in
    Idlib, Syria,'' August 31, 2019. (https://www.centcom.mil/MEDIA/
    STATEMENTS/Statements-View/Article/1949406/statement-from-us-central-
    command-on-us-forces-strike-against-al-qaida-in-syria/). These
    airstrikes targeted Ansar al-Tawhid and Hurras al-Din (or possibly
    former members of the group). Both are al-Qaeda-affiliated groups
    operating in Idlib as well as elsewhere in Syria.
        \7\ Cheryl Pellerin, ``Transregional Strikes Hit al-Qaida Leaders
    in Syria, Yemen, Afghanistan,'' U.S. Department of Defense, November 2,
    2016. (https://www.defense.gov/Newsroom/News/Article/Article/994180/
    transregional-strikes-hit-al-qaida-leaders-in-syria-yemen-afghanistan/
    ).
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        7. The Trump administration has been pursuing a deal with the
            Taliban as part of its effort to extricate American forces from
            Afghanistan, but this will not lead to peace. As the Taliban's
            recent actions have demonstrated--including its large-scale
            assaults on the cities of Kunduz and Farah, suicide bombings
            throughout the country, kidnapping and murder of a human rights
            official, and release of a video justifying the 9/11 attacks--
            there is no good reason to think the organization is interested
            in peace. The Taliban currently contests or controls more
            ground than at any time since 9/11. Americans' frustration with
            the war effort is well-placed. In my view, however, a deal with
            the Taliban is not necessary to withdraw American forces from
            Afghanistan, nor will it advance American interests. A number
            of regional or international terrorist organizations fight
            under the Taliban's banner today, and there is no indication
            that the Taliban will truly break with them.
        8. The Taliban remains closely allied with al-Qaeda, and this is
            not likely to change as a result of any agreement between the
            United States and the Taliban. At FDD's Long War Journal, we've
            documented this relationship for years. In addition, 4 reports
            submitted to the United Nations Security Council since last
            year have warned that: Al-Qaeda is ``closely allied'' with the
            Taliban, and the group's ``alliance with the Taliban and other
            terrorist groups in Afghanistan remains firm'';\8\ al-Qaeda's
            relationship with the Taliban is ``long-standing'' and
            ``strong'';\9\ al-Qaeda ``has grown stronger operating under
            the Taliban umbrella across Afghanistan and is more active than
            in recent years'';\10\ the Taliban is the ``primary partner for
            all foreign terrorist groups operating in Afghanistan, with the
            exception of'' the Islamic State's Khorasan branch;\11\ al-
            Qaeda ``members continue to function routinely as military and
            religious instructors for the Taliban'';\12\ and al-Qaeda
            ``considers Afghanistan a continuing safe haven for its
            leadership, relying on its long-standing and strong
            relationship with the Taliban leadership.''\13\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \8\ United Nations Security Council, ``Twenty-second report of the
    Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team submitted pursuant to
    resolution 2368 (2017) concerning ISIL (Da'esh), Al-Qaida and
    associated individuals and entities,'' June 27, 2018, pages 3 and 15.
    (https://undocs.org/S/2018/705).
        \9\ United Nations Security Council, ``Twenty-third report of the
    Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team submitted pursuant to
    resolution 2368 (2017) concerning ISIL (Da'esh), Al-Qaida and
    associated individuals and entities,'' December 27, 2018, page 16.
    (https://www.un.org/sc/ctc/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/N1846950_EN.pdf).
        \10\ United Nations Security Council, ``Tenth report of the
    Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team submitted pursuant to
    resolution 2255 (2015) concerning the Taliban and other associated
    individuals and entities constituting a threat to the peace, stability
    and security of Afghanistan,'' April 30, 2019, page 9. (https://
    www.undocs.org/S/2019/481).
        \11\ Ibid.
        \12\ United Nations Security Council, ``Twenty-fourth report of the
    Analytical Support and Sanctions Monitoring Team submitted pursuant to
    resolution 2368 (2017) concerning ISIL (Da'esh), Al-Qaida and
    associated individuals and entities,'' June 27, 2019, page 16. (https:/
    /undocs.org/S/2019/570).
        \13\ Ibid., page 15.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        9. Far-right terrorism is a global phenomenon. To date, high-
            profile attacks have been carried out primarily by individuals
            or very small cells. As the brief summary above makes clear,
            however, violent provocations are traveling around the world at
            an alarming rate. Individual terrorists are not only inspired
            on-line, but can also engage in one-upmanship, with aspiring
            terrorists attempting to outdo one another. Racially-motivated
            extremist beliefs do not have to be focused exclusively on
            cultural or ethnic identity, but can also incorporate other
            radical ideas, sometimes making it difficult to distill the
            beliefs of a perpetrator down to a single issue. Several recent
            terrorist attacks have been conducted by individuals who
            combined far-right, anti-immigrant views with other beliefs.
            However, their targets--whether they are Hispanic, African-
            American, Muslim, Jewish, members of the LGBT community, or
            other civilians--indicate their primary motivations.
        10. Going forward, we must be vigilant regarding the possible
            development of more sophisticated far-right terrorist
            organizations and networks with capable leaders, both inside
            the United States and abroad. There are already indications
            that neo-Nazis and others are organizing their on-line presence
            to make it easier for aspiring terrorists to get their hands on
            evil knowhow such as bomb-making techniques. As we have seen, a
            single shooter can terrorize a community and kill dozens. A
            small team of dedicated individuals could hypothetically do
            even more damage, especially if they combine small arms with
            explosives. Paramilitary or other organized training could
            greatly increase the threat even further. Coordination across
            national boundaries is also a very real concern.

        Chairman Thompson. Thank you very much. The Chair now
    recognizes himself for 5 minutes. This is kind-of the broad
    brush question for the Members.
        As we look at this global threat, what is your suggestion
    to this committee for us to focus on for the next year, both
    internationally and domestically, in your learned opinion?
        Mr. Bergen. Can I remind the committee that Representative
    King introduced legislation a long time ago? No fly, no buy. If
    you are too dangerous to be on a no-fly list, why is it OK for
    you to buy semi-automatic weapons?
        There was a moment after the Florida attack where it seemed
    like Congress actually might vote for this. This is
    astonishing. The NRA have produced a huge smokescreen, saying
    there is some Americans on that list who shouldn't be on there.
    Well, we know that only 800 Americans are on that list. My
    guess is all but 2 of them should be on that list, and that the
    civil rights of the 2 people that are being infringed are less
    important than the civil rights of every American who might be
    killed in a mass shooting because somebody legally purchased
    semi-automatic weapons, as Omar Mateen did, the guy who killed
    49 people down in Florida, as did the terrorists who killed
    this lady's father in San Bernardino.
        This is the simplest thing we could actually do to reduce
    the threat.
        Chairman Thompson. Mr. Soufan.
        Mr. Soufan. I think, when it comes to terrorism--I agree
    with what Peter said about mass shootings. But also, when it
    comes to terrorism, I think we need to be sure that the Islamic
    State won't rise again. We need to figure out a strategy that
    goes beyond just the military and the intelligence. We need to
    start focusing on targeting the ideology and targeting the
    incubating factors that is making these groups recruit all over
    the place.
        When I talk about ISIS, I also talk about al-Qaeda. Shabaab
    has been recruiting based on local reasons in Somalia. Al-Qaeda
    and the Islamic Maghreb is recruiting based on tribal and
    ethnic and resources conditions in the Sahel region. The same
    thing in what is happening in Syria with al-Qaeda and ISIS, and
    what is happening in Afghanistan.
        After 18 years of this so-called war on terrorism, we spend
    more than--I don't know. It is reported $5-6 trillion, and now
    we have more terrorists than when we started on 9/11. What we
    are doing is--internationally, globally--is not working. What
    we are doing domestically is working very well. I think the
    intelligence community, the law enforcement community have been
    doing an amazing job in containing that threat and preventing
    that threat from coming to the United States.
        Joint terrorism task forces around the Nation, intelligence
    folks and military personnel on the front lines are doing an
    amazing job, and they are keeping us safe. But we are actually
    putting a Band-Aid on the wound. We need to cure it. By curing
    it, I think we need to go beyond the military and the
    intelligence.
        Chairman Thompson. Mr. Levin.
        Mr. Levin. Thank you. I think there are 3 major things that
    we need to look at.
        One are socio-political divisions, which are getting very
    hot throughout North America and Europe. If you want to look at
    where a threat comes from, look at where you have the bench
    with the most players. Forty-three percent of Americans,
    according to a Reuters Ipsos poll, said whites are under
    attack. That is up 4 percent from 2017.
        That being said, I think we also have to look at unstable
    states, displaced persons internationally, and--as well as
    civil war.
        Two other quick things. One, the internet. Thank you very
    much for calling in the head of that toxic waste dump, 8chan,
    which not only says--not only has bigoted things on there, it
    is really a place for rallying other extremists to commit acts
    of mass violence.
        Last, I have the daughter of someone whose father--who
    painted murals of Jesus at children's hospitals--shot dead in
    our community. We just had some--we just had a California
    highway patrolman shot dead. At the time, San Bernardino was
    the worst post-9/11 violent Salafist Jihadist attack by way of
    fatalities. That has been eclipsed since.
        We have to do something about the weapons of war. I am
    former NYPD. I am a gun owner. But you know what? I don't want
    unstable lunatics or ideological extremists having access to
    these weapons of war. We have seen, for instance, FBI--rifle
    deaths have hit a 10--a decade high. That is the subset of
    where semiautomatic comes from. So I think, with regard to
    magazines, all that kind of stuff, we have to look at magazine
    size. We have to look at types of these semiautomatic rifles,
    which are now the weapons of choice.
        Also, I would say for my friends who also look at these
    jihadist messages, they say, ``Go get a gun. It is easy in the
    United States.''
        So I think, you know, we can dance around the circle, but
    the bottom line is that these kinds of weapons are wreaking
    havoc in our country, and 89 percent of Americans, just in a
    poll that came out just over this past week, said that they
    favor things like background checks, restrictions on magazines,
    and also perhaps even hiking the age of purchasers who have not
    served in the military. So there are a variety of things. I
    want to thank the committee for the holistic approaches.
        Last, though--I think it is really important--the threat is
    really diversifying. While white nationalist, white
    supremacists are on the--on top, these other groups that we are
    talking about internationally, they have a remarkable ability,
    like hitting mercury with a hammer, to come back and coalesce.
    So I think we have to keep a broad spectrum approach. But right
    now, white nationalists, white supremacists represent the
    biggest threat. I think, if you look at what the U.K. services
    have said, what Sweden said just in the last month, this is
    something that is hitting all over the world.
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you. Thank you very much.
        Mr. Joscelyn.
        Mr. Joscelyn. Two quick points. One on al-Qaeda. I think it
    is fitting, since we are 18 years after 9/11, we can ask why we
    haven't been attacked again. There are many reasons, I would
    say, one of which is, of course, the U.S. Government suppressed
    a number of threats, one of which is that they were incompetent
    on several occasions, thank goodness, and the third of which is
    very misunderstood, and is not something that you hear often,
    but I think this committee should explore, which is that over
    last several years al-Qaeda has absolutely de-prioritized
    attacks in the West, in particular, and certainly in terms of
    mass casualty attacks, or attempting one.
        The last al-Qaeda attack in the West was actually January
    2015 against the Charlie Hebdo offices in Paris. That was a
    very precise, well-planned, military-style assault that they
    designed to try and send a message across the Islamic world to
    pretend that they are avenging Islam for the cartoons that were
    published or re-published by Charlie Hebdo. That is a very
    different sort-of style of attack than just sort-of blanket
    trying to bring down planes, or to bomb buildings, or go after
    random civilians.
        The fact of the matter is we have evidence, which I can
    share with you later, that al-Qaeda has had a stand-down order,
    and has not tried sort-of a 9/11-style attack in some time. It
    doesn't mean they will be successful if they push that button
    again. There are a lot of tripwires they could, you know, come
    across that would stop them. But I would ask the question of
    why. Why is it they really haven't tried that recently? They
    have been growing their insurgency footprint, and I think they
    have more assets to try that in the future.
        Very quickly, on the far-right threat--or I am terming the
    ``far-right threat,'' this committee, I think, should spend
    time, in my opinion, looking at the increasing indications of
    organizational capacity, which I think Ali Soufan had addressed
    in his testimony. I think that that is where I think this may
    be going.
        I am worried that, when you look at the recent big attacks
    we talked about in El Paso or New Zealand, or the attack on the
    mosque in Norway, or some of these other ones, these were
    carried out by individuals. If you have a team, a small team of
    individuals who are well armed, who have procured weapons, they
    could be even more deadly, and they could be training for
    something along those lines, and training along those lines
    they can get inspiration from a number of different sources.
        I wouldn't--I am not going to share all my thoughts on that
    in an open setting, because I don't want to accidentally
    inspire somebody, but I would be happy off the record to
    provide more thoughts along those lines.
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you. I think you will probably get
    a chance to do an off-the-record conversation about it, too.
        The Chair recognizes the Ranking Member of the full
    committee for questions.
        Mr. Rogers. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Mr. Joscelyn, what steps can the United States and its
    allies take to keep pressure on terrorist networks and their
    safe havens?
        Mr. Joscelyn. Well, I think the No. 1 thing is
    transparency, talking about what is going on. I am a little
    worried that our leaders are not articulating what is going on,
    or what we see overseas, and explaining to the American people
    the threats that are developing.
        I will give you an example. Just days before President
    Trump was elected, a very senior al-Qaeda leader was killed in
    Kunar Province in Afghanistan. He was planning attacks against
    us from Afghanistan. He was laying the groundwork for long-term
    planning. That made barely a ripple in the news cycle. Nobody
    even knew that that occurred. Yet we see stuff like that all
    the time. You can see in Syria, where the U.S. military has
    bombed al-Qaeda locations twice this year, there has been no
    real explanation of why, or what the threat was, or what they
    were doing.
        So I think there is a basic level of education that is not
    being met right now. But I think we have to keep pressure on
    these networks, the leadership structures, and, most
    importantly, work with allies and partners around the world to
    keep the jihadi insurgencies at bay, because, as those jihadi
    insurgencies spread and have spread, the threats can multiply
    to global security. And that is not something that we are going
    to at this point have the U.S. military taking the lead in
    large coin-style operations around the globe.
        But we have to be very careful about identifying partner
    forces on the ground to back. The big threat in Afghanistan, as
    Peter outlined, and I agree with, is that we have been
    negotiating with the Taliban, while throwing the legitimate
    government of Afghanistan under the bus. That is our best hope
    of keeping the Taliban and al-Qaeda at bay is propping them up.
    I know it is costly. I know people are frustrated with the war.
    Believe me, I get it. But that is the best hope in the long run
    for not allowing these threats to multiply out of Central and
    South Asia.
        Mr. Rogers. Can I point out, Mr. Levin, you said we should
    go beyond what we are doing to combat global terrorism. Mr.
    Soufan talked about how, after 18 years, we have many more of
    these global terrorists than we had when we were attacked in
    2001.
        So I would ask the whole panel, what do you think we should
    be doing differently from what we have been doing to combat
    this global terrorist threat? Start with Mr. Levin.
        Mr. Levin. First, don't take your eye off of the violent
    Salafist Jihadists. Also, don't take your eye off of a variety
    of different places that are becoming hot. FDD was just
    threatened by Iran. I mean we now have an American think tank
    basically being threatened by a foreign power, and they have
    proxies that do bad things----
        Mr. Rogers. What should we do about it, though? That is
    what I am asking all of you. What should we be doing
    differently from what we have been doing as a Nation? You said
    don't take our eye off of them, but then what other action?
        Mr. Soufan.
        Mr. Levin. Oh, could I just----
        Mr. Rogers. Sure, sure.
        Mr. Levin. I don't think we should just get out of
    Afghanistan as if we are--you know, we are heading to a
    football game that we are late for because we are impatient. So
    I just wanted to make sure I made that point.
        Mr. Rogers. Right.
        Mr. Levin. Ali.
        Mr. Soufan. So, sir, first you correctly said that al-Qaeda
    has more than 40,000 members today. We are not even including
    the so-called Islamic State and all the members that they have.
        I mean, at one point they had 45,000 foreign fighters from
    110 different countries that joined them in Iraq and Syria.
    Remember, after the war in Afghanistan, after the Soviets
    pulled out of Afghanistan in 1989, we had about 10,000 foreign
    fighters. ISIS alone had more than 45,000 foreign fighters from
    110 different countries, and you see what those 10,000 did on
    9/11, almost created a path that led us to 9/11.
        What made this ideology, the Salafist Jihadi movement? What
    made it stay after all the trillions of dollars that we spent?
        First, resiliency of the ideology. Frankly, wouldn't even
    attempt to counter the ideology. We are not comfortable in
    dealing about countering the ideology under many
    administrations.
        Two, sectarianism. That started with the Iraq war. The
    sectarianism created opportunities for regional countries to
    fight each other using the sectarian elements which fed into
    groups like ISIS and al-Qaeda, and gave a new blood for al-
    Qaeda, the Iraq war.
        Third, I think it is the Arab Spring. The Arab Spring
    changed the calculus of Osama bin Laden. This is when he
    ordered his organization not to focus on the far jihad, not to
    focus on the United States, but to focus regionally, create
    chaos, prevent anyone from filling the vacuum, and then they
    can create an alliance between all these groups and create
    their own caliphate.
        So now they are doing exactly what bin Laden told them with
    al-Qaeda and the Islamic Maghreb. Then it goes to the Horn of
    Africa with the Shabaab. Then it goes to AQAP in Yemen. Then it
    goes to the different names that al-Qaeda uses in Syria, from
    Ansar al-Deen to the Tahrir al-Sham. You can put a lipstick on
    a pig, it is still a pig. They are all al-Qaeda members.
        So if you look at that, the Arab Spring changed the
    calculus of the global jihad. The Syria war that gave them
    another opportunity that Afghanistan--you know, that we took
    away from them in Afghanistan. We need to engage in countering
    the sectarian elements by cohesive diplomatic initiative, and
    solving a lot of these problems there. We need to counter the
    ideology using people from the region, tribal leaders,
    governments, scholars--preventing our allies from using
    religion in order to fight Iran, for example, and this way it
    is feeding into al-Qaeda.
        We need to find solutions for a lot of these incubating
    factories that is feeding these groups and make them recruit.
    We need to diminish their ability to recruit. You know, al-
    Qaeda and ISIS should not be the answer for the grievances of
    Muslims in the Middle East. When we do that, we will be on the
    first path of success.
        Mr. Rogers. Great, thank you. I yield back.
        Mr. Bergen. I mean I think it is very simple. Just learn
    from our own history. We closed our embassy in Afghanistan in
    1989. Into the vacuum came the Taliban and then al-Qaeda. We
    withdrew completely from Iraq at the end of 2011. By the way,
    this is a bipartisan failure, because it was George W. Bush's
    plan, it was implemented by the Obama administration. Let's not
    make the same mistake in Afghanistan.
        Let's also learn from our successes. You know how many
    people have died in the operation against ISIS, how many
    American servicemen have died in the Iraq and Syrian war? It is
    16. Now, each one of those deaths is an individual tragedy. But
    tens of thousands of Iraqis and Syrians died on our behalf. We
    trained up one of the world's worst military, the Iraqi
    military, to become the Iraqi Counter Terrorism Service, one of
    the most effective counter-terrorism groups in the region, and
    they did a great job in defeating ISIS. We did the same thing
    with Syrian Democratic Forces. Its--those forces are still
    there, and they make it much less likely that either ISIS--that
    ISIS could come back in the same way that it did in the summer
    of 2014.
        So I think just learn from our history. We know how to do
    this. The Trump administration's approach to this and the Obama
    administration's approach to this have, broadly, been very
    similar. No big footprint. Use special forces, use drones, use
    cyber operations, keep the number of Americans that are
    actually fighting on the ground pretty--to a very small group.
    That is a tried-and-true kind of approach.
        Mr. Rogers. Great, thank you.
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you. The Chair recognizes the
    gentlelady from New York, Ms. Rice.
        Miss Rice. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Mr. Bergen, has the announcement of the death of Osama bin
    Laden's son had an effect on al-Qaeda's ability to recruit
    newer, younger members? Are you concerned that the leadership
    void, such as there is one, leaves opportunities for more
    extreme spin-off groups to rise?
        Mr. Bergen. Thank you, Miss Rice, Representative Rice. You
    know, bin Laden's son, the State Department put a million
    dollars on his head. I think that is actually kind-of--if you
    think $25 million for Ayman al-Zawahiri, the actual leader--
    Hamza was a, you know, 30-year-old. He wasn't--there is no
    evidence he was carrying out operations. It is not good for
    them that they lost him, because he could have become a next
    generation leader. Ali Soufan has written about this
    extensively. I don't think it is really that big a deal, either
    way. Al-Qaeda's leadership is mostly dead, and that is because
    of the drone program.
        We don't know how Hamza died. I wouldn't be surprised if it
    was on the wrong end of an American drone, but it has been very
    effective. The best witness for that is bin Laden. If you look
    at the Abbottabad documents, he was extremely concerned about
    the drone program because it was killing his entire
    organization, the leadership of it.
        Miss Rice. How close do you think Iran is to acquiring a
    nuclear weapon?
        Mr. Bergen. I have no idea.
        Miss Rice. Does anyone on the panel have any thoughts about
    that?
        Mr. Bergen. I mean, look, the International Association for
    Atomic Energy has said at least 9 times that the Iranians are
    not enriching uranium to the point where it is really an issue.
    Right now the agreement was 3.67 percent. It is now--they have
    been enriched to 4.5 percent. Well, they need to get to 90
    percent for a weapon. So, look, I am not a nuclear weapons
    expert, but, I mean, they are a very long way from it.
        But they are kind-of fiddling around the edges, and we are
    kind-of in this kind-of ironic situation, where the thing the
    Trump administration is supposedly trying to prevent is
    actually beginning to happen, which is they are trying to inch
    up to getting this capacity. But they are being very careful.
    They don't want a conflict with us in the same way that we
    apparently don't really want a conflict with them.
        Miss Rice. Peter, I think that you actually mentioned
    before, you know, that a lot of how we address the issues that
    we are talking about here today requires a level of cooperation
    with our international partners. A big concern that I have--and
    I am sure many people on this panel have--is our ability to
    actually build those kind of international--or continue those
    kind of international relationships that are so important, not
    just to intelligence gathering, but to a collective response to
    whatever threat it is that we are talking about.
        So, Peter, your thoughts on that, and anyone else on the
    panel?
        Mr. Bergen. No, I mean, our allies are still with us in
    Afghanistan. If we--but if we withdrew, they are not going to
    stay. I mean, they are advising and assisting the Afghan army.
    So, I mean, they are looking to us for leadership, obviously.
    Yes, I think that is about it.
        Mr. Joscelyn. I have one thing.
        Miss Rice. Yes.
        Mr. Joscelyn. You know, we--I hear a lot in this town about
    great power competition. I am sure you guys hear quite a bit
    about it. You know, especially with China, and homeland
    security, and different threats and issues. My own view, as you
    see in my written testimony, is that the resource allocation
    argument is a little bit misplaced.
        I am sure there is still fat on the bone to be cut in terms
    of what we are spending on counterterrorism, maybe, actually.
    But the pivot away from making that the centerpiece of what the
    U.S. military does, in particular, happened years ago. If you
    look at Defense Department budgets, you look at how our forces
    are deployed around the world, it is just simply not the case
    that they are sort-of tied up resources fighting al-Qaeda or
    ISIS that need to be freed up to worry about China or worry
    about Russia. I just don't buy that argument, as a whole.
        You can argue about different--what you think we should be
    doing in Afghanistan, or you can argue we should be doing
    things differently. Fine. But I don't think that there is sort-
    of this meme that has grown about how we just have to worry
    about China and great power competition now, and don't worry
    about this stuff.
        The bottom line is that the best cost management way to
    deal with this jihadism going forward is to make sure that our
    allies are properly supported in the fights, since they are the
    ones who are incurring the on-the-ground casualties, by and
    large, since they are the ones that are expending the
    resources, and since, by and large, it is their societies and
    their homes that are in jeopardy.
        You know, if we pull back from that and we take--pull the
    rug out from under them, then guess what? We are going to have
    to spend more resources to deal with it in the long run, and
    then it is going to become an even bigger resource allocation
    problem.
        Miss Rice. Yes. Mr. Soufan, what more should be done to
    combat the use of crowdfunding and crypto currencies to fund
    white supremacist extremists?
        Mr. Soufan. Well, first we need to recognize the threats. I
    bet our intelligence and law enforcement folks will do a great
    job in dismantling it.
        Our allies, for example, the Canadians and the British,
    already designated some white supremacist groups as terrorist
    organizations. Guess what? These groups have contacts with
    white supremacist groups in the United States. Now you have an
    ally like the Brits or the Canadians saying, ``Those are
    terrorists, America. What are you going to do about it?''
        So this is really interesting. We need to recognize the
    threat. We need to start looking into designation of foreign
    entities that is involved in promoting this hateful narrative.
    Then the next will come.
        Unfortunately, with 9/11 we were screaming and crying,
    ``Hey, pay attention to this al-Qaeda. Pay attention to Osama
    bin Laden.'' I remember when the USS Cole happened and we were
    in Yemen. Nobody cared. When we finally convicted Osama bin
    Laden and his operatives who were blowing up two embassies in
    East Africa, in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam in August 1998, the
    day after the conviction the cover pages in the New York papers
    were a fight that took place between Jennifer Lopez and P.
    Diddy in a club. Nobody cares about what we are doing.
        People cared and woke up after 9/11. We were in that battle
    for a long time. We have been asking people, ``Please pay
    attention.'' I think we need to recognize that. Other allies
    started recognizing that threat. We need to pay attention
    before it is too late. Thank you.
        Miss Rice. Thank you all very much. Thank you, Mr.----
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you. The Chair recognizes the
    gentleman from New York, Mr. King, for 5 minutes.
        Mr. King. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Let me thank all the
    witnesses for their testimony.
        Mr. Levin, thank you for your service with the NYPD. In
    your testimony you mentioned about the social and political
    divisions here in the country which edge the violence. Let me
    just say at the outset white nationalism is evil. Whatever has
    to be done to stamp it out, we have to do, whether it is
    cooperation internationally, nationwide among local police.
    Coordination that we put in against al-Qaeda and ISIS has to
    all be also used against white nationalism.
        I would say, though, that--so we don't take our eye off the
    ball all together, even domestically, there have been attacks
    from the left. For instance, the attack on Steve Scalise and
    the Republican baseball team. It was motivated by somebody from
    the left. We had El Paso. We also had Dayton, which appears the
    person was motivated from the left.
        Now, not to ascribe any of this to people on the left, but
    we do have people who can be driven off the edge. So I think,
    while white nationalism is most organized right now, also we
    should keep an eye on, again, groups like Antifa on the left,
    because there is a, I think, a violence in our society. It is
    more pronounced on the right right now, but it is also there on
    the left. We should keep that in mind.
        Also, the attacks on police officers have increased
    dramatically in the last several years. So all of that, I
    think, should be part of the holistic approach we are talking
    about.
        Also, I can't agree more with all of you who say that we
    can't take our eye off the ball, as far as overseas, as far as
    the Islamist threat, the terror threat. Just go back to 2009
    with Najibullah Zazi. If he had been successful, we would have
    had hundreds, if not thousands, of people killed with that one
    attack. There was going to be a attack on the--a liquid
    explosive attack on the New York City subway system, which
    almost succeeded. I was actually with Commissioner Kelly the
    night they were waiting for that to happen. They didn't know if
    they had gotten everybody or not. So with one mistake, or one
    taking our eye off the ball, we could have another 9/11, or we
    could have had someone like Zazi getting through.
        So I think it is a temptation on both sides to, you know,
    sort-of live in your own silo. I think that those of us on the
    right have to realize there is a definite threat coming from
    white nationalism. It is there. It is evil. But also, as a
    country, we can't let battle fatigue cause us to make decisions
    which may seem pleasant at the time--we are finally bringing
    our troops home, we are finally easing some of the
    restrictions--and then find out we get attacked the next day.
        As you said, otherwise it will be a Jennifer Lopez replay.
    We will be--I remember in 2001 also the big issue that summer
    had been the attacks by sharks and people at the beach. That
    was the headlines every day. We never heard from it again after
    9/11.
        So with that, if I could just, again, ask each of you if
    you can just comment. Do you think that significantly the reach
    between overseas Islamist terrorism, al-Qaeda, ISIS, and the
    offshoots, that reach they have into the United States as far
    as actual interconnection has been reduced, and where it stands
    right now since 9/11?
        Mr. Bergen. Well, let me make an observation. Every lethal
    terrorist attack carried out by jihadi terrorists since 9/11
    has been carried out by a U.S. citizen or a U.S. legal
    permanent resident. None of them are foreign terrorists. None
    of them came from overseas. So the reach is entirely
    electronic.
        I mean--so the travel ban was kind-of a solution in search
    of a problem that didn't really exist. You can't ban the
    internet, and the people involved aren't--they are here, they
    are Americans.
        So the question is one of domestic radicalization, whether
    it is right-wing terrorists, or whether it is jihadists, or
    whether it is black nationalist terrorists, or ideological
    misogynists, or other groups.
        So the real issue is what is happening on the internet, and
    what is radicalizing people here, notwithstanding the fact
    that, as everybody has said, we have to be cognizant of the
    overseas threat. But the kind of proximate threat is the local
    threat here in the United States.
        Mr. King. Mr. Bergen, if I could just add, though, to that,
    though, for instance, Zazi was an American citizen.
        Mr. Bergen. Yes.
        Mr. King. But he was--also had been over in--I guess it was
    Afghanistan, where the attack was coordinated from. So he was
    an American of Afghan ancestry, and he was over there. So that
    was, yes, an American carrying it out, but with direct
    coordination from Afghanistan.
        Mr. Bergen. That is correct, sir. So, you know, Faisul
    Shahzad, trained by the Pakistani Taliban in 2010, tried to
    blow up an SUV----
        Mr. King. Times Square.
        Mr. Bergen [continuing]. In Times Square, and the Underwear
    Bomber was a Nigerian who was trained in Yemen who tried to
    bring down a flight. So--but these are all a decade ago. I'm
    not saying it can't happen again, but the things that are
    happening all the time are these domestic terrorists.
        Mr. Levin. Could I just respond to something you said,
    Congressman?
        Mr. King. Yes, sure.
        Mr. Levin. Nobody knows the Antifa threat like I do, since
    the last death threat I got was either from the hard left or
    Antifa. We don't know who it was.
        But now, Dayton is in a little bit of a holding pattern.
    FBI apparently still is looking at it as domestic terrorism. It
    could be a hard left thing. However, over the last couple of
    years we have not seen any homicides committed by Antifa or the
    hard left. Not saying it couldn't happen--1970's, a different
    picture. When I testified before the committee just 4 years ago
    I said the biggest threat facing the United States homeland are
    violent Salafist Jihadists. Then, within weeks, we had Paris
    and our community was hit.
        But I think we also have to look at a little bit of
    operational effectiveness. What we have seen is this pattern
    around the world of these white nationalist, far right--we just
    had a Nazi elected in Germany. So yes, could the hard left do
    things different?
        One of the things that we see is when one goes up, another
    goes up. If you remember, after the Oklahoma City bombing, who
    came out of the shadows? The Unabomber.
        So what we are seeing is a lot of convergence. We even see,
    like, mixed messages and mixed motives. But bottom line is, at
    this point, we have not seen the kind of organized threat--
    Antifa, I think, is more concerned, frankly, with shouting loud
    at a lot of these places, and minor physical assaults. But we
    did see in Tacoma an Antifa partisan commit an attack with
    firearms and an IED, just in the last few months.
        But bottom line is we have counted--we--so the year after I
    testified, 3 homicides by white supremacists. Now, this year
    alone, 26.
        Mr. King. Yes, I am not disputing anything you said. I
    would say that, right now, the main threat is white
    nationalism. We should also keep an eye, since there is, as you
    said, violence going throughout our society, and some of the
    recent attacks have also been coming from the left.
        But again, I--let's make it clear. White nationalism right
    now is the main domestic threat. I am not getting away from
    that.
        Mr. Joscelyn. Can I make a very quick point? Just to answer
    your question about the issue of infiltrating a terrorist team,
    which is what this gets to the heart of, the--one of the big
    reasons why they haven't been able to do another 9/11-style
    attack is because there are a number of trip wires for
    infiltrating into the United States a team of trained
    terrorists from abroad. That doesn't mean it has been perfect;
    some of them have gotten through on an individual basis, that
    sort of thing.
        My main concern with the spread of a jihadist insurgency is
    it gives them more jumping-off points to try and get a team
    into the United States. That is my main concern. I don't
    think--although the United States is definitely tracking that
    threat in places like Syria and Yemen and elsewhere, I think
    there are probably holes developing in our vision of the enemy,
    which may be a concern, going forward.
        There are some indications of what they are trying to do,
    in terms of basically finding a side way in to try and do
    something along those lines. But again, that is sort-of the--
    that is, obviously, not the bulk of what we have seen since 9/
    11, but it is still a possibility that can't be ruled out.
        Mr. King. OK, thank you. I yield back.
        Chairman Thompson. The Chair recognizes the gentlelady from
    New Mexico, Ms. Torres Small for 5 minutes.
        Ms. Torres Small. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you all for
    being here today.
        I am concerned about the rise of white nationalism abroad,
    and their connection to domestic terrorism in the United
    States. As you know, authorities believe that the shooter of
    the El Paso massacre last month, just a few miles from the
    district I serve, wrote a anti-Hispanic manifesto, referencing
    white supremacist ideologies, and support for the Christchurch
    shooting in New Zealand.
        Mr. Soufan and Mr. Levin, can you please talk about the
    nexus between global white supremacist extremism and its impact
    on domestic terrorism in the United States?
        Mr. Levin. Sure. From time to time we see, like, different
    flavors of the year. So the Turner Diaries back in the 1980's
    was a book that inspired a group that committed the largest
    armored car heist and had a list of people to kill. Now there
    are others. I don't even want to mention these other books, by
    the way, so I am not going to.
        But if you look at the words of the actual terrorist in El
    Paso, he said exactly why he was doing this. It wasn't until he
    read a book, and that book was this ``The Great Replacement.''
    What ``The Great Replacement'' started out--is a book by a
    fellow named Camus, not the one that you all studied in high
    school, another Camus. What it talked about was Muslims in
    Europe, and how they were taking over, this whole concept of
    white genocide. What has happened is this has become a world-
    wide template.
        In the United States it is now, with this terrorist,
    Latinos. But we have also seen them talk about conspiracies and
    Soros. The killer that murdered congregants at the Tree of Life
    Synagogue spoke about immigration, because Jews were supporting
    immigrants.
        So the bottom line is, just like the violent Salafist
    Jihadists, there is a template of grievance and this fear, as
    America changes. We have ceased to be a white majority
    Christian nation, and there is going to be some tension, not
    only with that kind of thing, but also political changes.
        Interestingly enough, the young people who have been
    committing this--look at this. We have seen Poway. We have--we
    haven't put Gilroy as ideological white supremacist at this
    point. But bottom line is those counties, if you look at those
    counties, they are all counties that have had their demographic
    change. The young people who are committing these attacks--we
    are talking, like, teenagers and young 20's--they are in the
    most diversified group of any age cohort.
        So I think we have to do a lot with regard to education,
    weaponry, but also we need----
        Ms. Torres Small. Sir, I just--I have got 2 more minutes, I
    want to get to a few more----
        Mr. Levin. Sure.
        Ms. Torres Small. Just one more question. The other thing I
    appreciate is Mr. Bergen and Mr. Soufan both talked about the
    range of terrorism threats, and that terrorism is terrorism. So
    understanding ideology is one key piece of how we address that;
    the other is understanding platforms.
        So I wanted to just get a sense of--because the shooters of
    El Paso and Christchurch massacres both used on-line platforms
    to spread their xenophobic ideologies. So, Mr. Soufan, if you
    can, speak to how--what on-line platforms are doing to better
    detect and mitigate terrorist groups and individuals from
    promulgating violent extremist context and galvanizing support.
        Mr. Soufan. We always hear Facebook and Twitter putting
    down accounts and closing accounts. But you know what? You put
    out something, and they open 3 or 4 more.
        You heard about the ideology, but there is actually an
    organizational transnational network that goes beyond the
    ideology. We have groups--and I don't want to name any of them
    here, because I don't want to give them the PR of their names
    being mentioned in the U.S. Congress, but I will be very happy
    to share all the names and the organizations with you. These
    organizations operate in so many different places in the
    Western world, all the way from Australia through Ukraine to
    Western Europe to the United States.
        We have groups in the United States, they actually go on a
    trip all together to Europe every year to celebrate Hitler's
    birthday, where people from all over the white supremacist
    movement get together and they party and they coordinate and
    they work together. We have people training exactly like the
    jihadi----
        Ms. Torres Small. What can on-line platforms do to better
    mitigate those convenings?
        Mr. Soufan. Well, from that perspective, what the on-line--
    this is a problem that we have witnessed with them with the
    jihadis, and we still--we see it with the white supremacists.
    They have to monitor their websites, and they claim, when they
    are selling ads on their websites, that--or on their platforms,
    that they can monitor everything. That is why they can--you
    know, you can make money out of it. Well----
        Ms. Torres Small. What can Congress do, and the Department
    of Homeland Security, to improve coordination with the on-line
    platforms?
        Mr. Soufan. Well, I think you need to hold the on-line
    platforms accountable. We need to work--you hold them
    accountable for what is on their platforms. Unfortunately, this
    is something that hits with the First Amendment. I think
    Congress--and I think I believe people in this committee had
    dialogs with the platforms on this.
        Ms. Torres Small. Thank you.
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you. The Chair recognizes the
    gentleman from Texas for 5 minutes, Mr. McCaul.
        Mr. McCaul. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Let me first say at the outset--express, Mr. Chairman, my
    disappointment that the Secretary of Homeland Security, the FBI
    director, and the director of NCTC is not here today. It has
    been a long-standing tradition of this committee when I was
    Chairman, and Mr. King. They annually have testified before
    this committee. I regret that, and I hope that we can follow up
    in a bipartisan manner on that.
        Let me also say, Peter, your experience--been one of the
    only journalists who have interviewed Osama bin Laden; Ali,
    your tremendous work at the FBI, both pre-9/11 and post, is to
    be commended. I thank the other witnesses, as well.
        But I want to talk also about Afghanistan. I think we need
    a residual force, as we need one in Syria, if anything, for
    homeland security response. We can't nation-build, but I think,
    to have that residual force to protect the homeland, is
    extremely important.
        On the--I want to ask one question on the international
    terrorism and one on domestic terrorism.
        I would say that we--in 2015 and 2016 our threat briefings
    were terrifying. I think that there is one operational external
    operation per month to kill Americans in the United States.
    That has greatly diminished, and I attribute a lot of that to
    the crushing of the so-called caliphate.
        Having said that, I think they have retreated, and they are
    embedded. They are on the rise in the Sahel in Africa. So maybe
    Mr. Bergen and Mr.--Ali, if you could, comment on where is al-
    Qaeda today, and how big of a threat are they as they were,
    say, pre-
    9/11?
        Mr. Bergen. Yes, I mean I think al-Qaeda, you know, for
    some of the reasons Ali laid out, has, you know--they have
    kind-of moved to a local insurgency model in places like Syria
    and other places. Their capacity to attack the United States
    has really diminished. So, you know, that can change, but right
    now they are--you know, the last time al-Qaeda carried out an
    attack in the West was the 7/7 attacks in London on July 7,
    2005. You know, that was 15 years ago, almost.
        So--but, you know, why did ISIS--there were 80 ISIS cases
    in the United States in 2015. The number has gone down to 18 in
    2019. The fact that ISIS had this geographical caliphate was
    very inspirational. So the model is a little bit different. If
    a jihadi group has large amounts of territory, is able to
    recruit, as Ali's group has documented, you know, tens of
    thousands of people from around the Muslim world, you know, we
    have a strong interest in making sure these geographical safe
    havens disappear, because they are very inspirational to people
    that may not even travel there.
        Mr. Soufan. I think, sir, there was a reason al-Qaeda was
    focusing locally, because the Arab Spring gave them the
    opportunity to do so.
        Al-Qaeda's strategy is basically based on the management of
    savagery, 3 different stages: First, you do attacks in order to
    have the system that you are fighting collapse; and then you
    fill the vacuum and prevent anyone else from filling that
    vacuum but you; and then you establish a state. That is exactly
    what al-Qaeda is trying or attempting to do in each of these
    areas that experience the vacuum after the Arab Spring, all the
    way from Sahel to Yemen to Syria to Iraq. Remember, ISIS was
    al-Qaeda in Iraq before.
        So, basically, al-Qaeda, when it started--I spoke about the
    resiliency of the group. Al-Qaeda, when it started, they didn't
    focus against the United States, they were focusing in Sudan
    about trying to help the Somalis against the United States, and
    then went to Afghanistan after the Sudan government kicked out
    Osama bin Laden.
        But then, after that, they started their global jihad.
    There is a big possibility that, at one point, when they feel
    that they already established a network, they already have the
    operatives, they already have the expertise, they already have
    a network, globally, to go back to the global jihad--because
    global jihad is what al-Qaeda is all about, and----
        Mr. McCaul. Right. My last question--and from my position
    as the lead Republican on the Foreign Affairs Committee, I do
    think the Sahel is a new hotspot to look at with the jihadists.
        But on domestic terrorism, you know, my father was a
    bombardier, he bombed the Nazis. I have no tolerance for white
    supremacists, you know, for Nazi doctrine. It disturbs me
    greatly. When I talked to the FBI in 2015, 2016, it was all
    about--every shooting that took place was by--it was
    traditionally a jihadist. Now it seems to shift, and we are
    talking more about white supremacy, domestic terrorism groups.
        My question is this: We have a National counter-terrorism
    center. Does it make any sense to have a domestic counter-
    terrorism center under the FBI that would have this same
    discipline of fusion intelligence?
        But also, as Ms. Torres Small mentioned, the role that
    Twitter and Facebook played--and I worked with them greatly to
    bring down the sermons of Awlaki, all this stuff that was out
    there, jihadist material, off the internet, does it make any
    sense to have a similar discipline, domestically, to take down
    this--you know, when a manifesto is published on the public
    internet, to take that down?
        Mr. Bergen. I think, sir, on the first, I mean, yes. I
    think a domestic analog of the NCTC I think is an interesting
    idea.
        On the second, you know, the Germans criminalized--have
    made it a criminal matter for these companies not to
    immediately take things down.
        Now, it is not really a First Amendment issue, it is really
    a terms of use issue, right? We are not criminalizing free
    speech, we are just saying, hey, being on these platforms is
    not a right. They are private property. You are allowed onto
    them. But if you incite violence, we can get you off. So it is
    really just about making social media companies enforce their
    own terms of use.
        How do you do that? You don't necessarily do it through
    legislation. You do it through having hearings like this, and
    you do it through shaming and naming, and making it, like--you
    know, think about Facebook. Facebook was creating the Promised
    Land 10 years ago. Now it is a much more complicated picture.
        You know, these companies need to face--they tend to have,
    first of all, denial and then, eventually, acceptance is the
    usual. I think they know they have a huge public relations
    problem, and--but it is based on some real problematic things
    that people are doing on their platforms. We need to just
    constantly keep the pressure on them to do the right thing,
    because it is not a First Amendment issue, it is a terms of use
    issue.
        Mr. McCaul. Thank you.
        Chairman Thompson. Yes, and let me say that this committee,
    as you know, we have been looking into this, and our next
    speaker might talk about it. But shaming is part of it, but I
    think there is some responsibility that we, as Members of
    Congress, will have to exert as we do our review. But we are
    trying to get it right, you know, and not a knee-jerk response,
    but try to get it right.
        The gentleman from New York for 5 minutes.
        Mr. Rose. Mr. Chairman, thank you. I would like to just
    start out by saying, Mr. McCaul, I think this notion of a
    domestic NCTC is a brilliant concept, and would really love to
    work with you on that. I think there is a tremendous amount of
    potential for progress there.
        Mr. Levin, thank you, as well, for your support to the
    NYPD.
        Mr. Levin. Thank you for your service to our country. One
    of the contributors to this is a student of ours who is an
    Afghan veteran. God bless you.
        Mr. Rose. All right. Well, that is--thank you. I needed to
    hear that today.
        So here is the problem with social media right now, is that
    they are committed to getting foreign terrorist organization
    content off of their platforms. When they don't do it
    correctly, we call them out on that. We have to do a better job
    of establishing a system by which we can publicly hold them to
    a standard, a standard that we have helped establish, and an
    organization where they can solve that collective action
    problem.
        But the issue, as we face domestic terrorism, is--and white
    nationalist terrorism--is that many of these entities are not
    established as FTOs.
        So my question to you is simple. Which organizations should
    the State Department establish as FTOs, as it pertains to the
    white nationalist threat? We will start with Mr. Bergen.
        Mr. Bergen. I am going to defer to Mr. Levin and Mr.
    Soufan, but I think this is a very fruitful idea, because there
    are, obviously, huge First Amendment issues around this. But if
    you can designate a white nationalist organization overseas
    that somebody here domestically is communicating with, then you
    open yourself up to all sorts of material support charges. So I
    think it is a very fruitful potential idea.
        Mr. Soufan. Yes, that is exactly what I mentioned in both
    my oral statement and my written statement. I think we already
    have a few organizations that has been designated as foreign
    terrorist organizations.
        The Canadian--for example, when they designated one of
    their organizations, they designated it as a part of a foreign
    terrorist network. It was a white supremacist group, domestic
    white supremacist group. So we already have some groups that
    has been designated by our allies. I think we can work on our
    allies in trying to help them build material support cases
    inside the United States for these individuals that have been
    in contact with them.
        Mr. Levin. Here is the problem. It is very similar to--I
    know the rest of the panel will remember this--when bin Laden
    was killed, there was a treasure trove of emails and documents.
    He was upset that it was being farmed out to do-it-yourselfers.
    It was--he was a little--you know, he was upset about the
    change with regard to that.
        What we are seeing is a fragmentation, often times--not
    always--but with regard to groups which are splintered. They
    are splintered and very hard to identify, No. 1.
        No. 2, in Europe they outlaw hate speech, which is legal
    here.
        Mr. Rose. But that is not going to change here. So I want
    to keep us focused here. Foreign terrorist organizations, white
    nationalist organizations, who should we identify as such?
        Mr. Levin. We should look at some of these neo-Nazi groups
    that are in Britain, that are in Germany.
        Mr. Rose. OK.
        Mr. Levin. I don't want to give them free publicity.
        Mr. Rose. That is all right. They get enough of it on
    Facebook already.
        Mr. Levin. Right. But the security services in Sweden, in
    Germany, in Britain know who the ones that have the violent----
        Mr. Rose. OK.
        Mr. Levin. I think we have to have the same kind of
    coordination with that that we had with regard to violent
    Salafist Jihadists.
        One other quick point on this. There is a difference in
    threat. Europe, you have the return of foreign fighters that we
    don't have here, for instance, with regard to the violent
    Salafist Jihadist threat. Here we are looking at a lot of
    people who are disenfranchised folks who are almost self-
    radicalizing.
        Mr. Rose. Yes. But with all respect--and I want to get to
    the next witness--we see the same thing in the jihadist threat,
    too. So the--there are striking similarities between these two
    likely threats. Not the most dangerous threat, but the most
    likely threat we face is that of a self-radicalized gunman. But
    the ideologies are relevant.
        So just--because I have limited time----
        Mr. Levin. Sure, but we can't drone white supremacists in
    Germany.
        Mr. Rose. Right.
        Mr. Joscelyn. Just very quickly, believe me, I monitor a
    lot of hateful content. If you could see my computer in the
    room in the back you would probably be shocked at how much
    stuff is still on-line. Every day, hundreds and hundreds of
    terrorist channels that I monitor on Telegram, in particular,
    that have been active for probably 2 years, some of them.
        All I would say is this. In terms of removing content from
    on-line, I am generally sympathetic to that idea. The only
    thing I will tell you is if you talk to the real professionals,
    like at the FBI or elsewhere, they will tell you that there is
    a lot of material that goes on-line. It is very useful for
    figuring out who to be investigating----
        Mr. Rose. Sure.
        Mr. Joscelyn [continuing]. Because these guys interact. If
    you can designate certain terrorist organizations overseas,
    then that can be a trip wire to get more investigative work
    done, in terms of who is actually engaging with content from
    those organizations.
        Mr. Rose. Absolutely. Just to close things out, I believe
    that this is the epicenter of the problem, is that right now in
    the United States of America if someone says, ``I declare
    allegiance to ISIS, and I want to hurt people,'' we have an
    amazing amount of law enforcement resources available to us to
    address that. When they say the exact same thing about a white
    nationalist organization, we do not. Terrorism is terrorism,
    and we have to fix that.
        The first step, I believe, is to start establishing some of
    these organizations as true foreign terrorist organizations.
        Mr. Soufan. Not only that. There are 17,000 people from
    across the Western world that went to fight in Ukraine. The
    great majority went to fight was white supremacist
    organizations. Some of them are from the United States.
        We have another problem with foreign fighters, and it is
    white nationalist problem, not jihadi problem. These guys can
    travel to the Ukraine, can meet with other like-minded groups,
    come back to the United States, and no one is monitoring them.
    At least one of them got indicted by the L.A. office of the FBI
    as part of an organization that I won't name, and their job was
    to organize violence in Charlottesville.
        This is a reality. We know these groups----
        Mr. Rose. But you would agree we have the infrastructure in
    place----
        Mr. Soufan. Absolutely, absolutely.
        Mr. Rose. We have to identify them.
        Mr. Soufan. Absolutely. Declare those guys in Ukraine as
    terrorists, and then we will monitor each and every one when
    they come back to the United States.
        Mr. Rose. Great. Thank you.
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you. The Chair recognizes the
    other gentleman from New York, Mr. Katko.
        Mr. Katko. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. At the outset I want to
    echo the sentiments of my--some of my colleagues here about the
    FBI director, the Homeland Security Secretary, and the director
    of NCTC not being here. I don't think we should tolerate that
    conduct much longer, and I think that--our job is to provide
    oversight. I don't think the tail should wag the dog. I think
    that we should let them know in no uncertain terms that when we
    call them to testify, it is not an option, and that we should
    put our foot down and get them here.
        Now, I want to turn to what we have discussed here today.
    It is pretty clear to me that we have had a very healthy
    discussion, and we got some direction, especially from Mr.
    Rose's questioning, about maybe labeling some of these
    foreign--some of these white supremacist groups as foreign
    terrorist organizations, and then using the model that we have
    used with the jihadist organizations to help go after them,
    which is a great idea.
        I do want to understand the scope of it, the problem in the
    United States, a little bit better, and I am not sure I got it
    absolutely clear that white supremacists is the biggest
    problem, and we got to go after that, and we have to address
    it. I will talk more about that in a moment.
        But Mr. Levin, you stated that the risk is diversified, and
    we need to look at the entire field in your testimony. Could
    you briefly tell us what you meant by that?
        Mr. Levin. Sure. I mean the risk is diversifying in a
    variety of ways. One, organizational structure. We talk a lot
    about loners, but there have been recent cases--and again, I
    don't want to mention these groups--but they have included
    transnational. We now have a missing Canadian service member
    who was just booted out of the service, who is a member of a
    paramilitary group that trained here in the United States. So
    we are also seeing this stuff bubble up, where we are not just
    talking loners, we are seeing that--the internet, and other
    ways of people to congregate, to train with military weapons.
        I believe that 18 United States Code 231, which prohibits
    paramilitary training to foment civil disorders, should be
    amended to also punish trainees, not just trainers. That is
    something that is not ideological, it is not a First Amendment
    kind of issue.
        I would also say that I am a bit concerned--and, gosh, I
    don't want to come up as being the white supremacist defense
    person here--but we must make sure that it relies on criminal
    predicates. What we have seen recently in Southern California,
    a group on the left that was actually peaceful that was
    investigated, and what I worry about is we--whatever we are
    going to do, we want to make sure that we have restrictions
    which make sure that people who--we might just disagree with
    are not being tracked because they are a terrorist----
        Mr. Katko. I understand that. There has got to be
    safeguards of that.
        Mr. Bergen, you say--you testified words to the effect that
    prioritizing one domestic ideology is a mistake. What did you
    mean by that?
        Mr. Bergen. Well, I just mean that, you know, for--look, if
    we get--political violence has been a way of life in the United
    States--I mean, in the 1970's it was the underground black
    national--Black Panthers. Black--people motivated by black
    nationalist ideology have killed 8 people in the last 2 or 3
    years in the United States. People motivated by ideological
    misogyny have killed 8 people in the United States in the last
    several years.
        So all I am saying is that there are many different
    ideologies that young men who want to carry out violent acts
    might attach themselves to. Jihadism and white supremacy are
    the two most important ones, but there are others.
    Representative--you know, I mean, everybody knows the Steve
    Scalise case, and how lucky he was to survive that attack. So
    we are seeing a little bit of an uptick on leftists.
        Despite what Representative King said, Antifa is not
    carrying out lethal attacks. They may not----
        Mr. Katko. Right, right. I understand what you are saying,
    and I guess that is my point, too, is we are so laser-focused
    on the jihadist movement that maybe we took our eye off the
    fact that this--we now have a burgeoning white supremacist
    movement. If we start focusing on the white supremacist
    movement, we should not take our eye off some of the other
    possible burgeoning things like you mentioned. Whatever we do,
    as a committee, and whatever we do, as a Congress, has to keep
    an eye on that fact.
        So, with that in mind, is there any suggestions that any of
    you have as to things we should do to make sure that not only
    do we go after the white supremacists, and do what we have to
    do with that, but how we not take our eye off some of the other
    groups that are starting to develop and burgeon and become
    concerns?
        Mr. Soufan. I think we have joint terrorism task forces,
    each one has a domestic terrorism squad or squads, and they are
    focusing on that. I think they work very closely with people--
    --
        Mr. Katko. They do focus on--I don't mean to interrupt you,
    but I get the sense when talking--I have worked with them for
    20--ever since 9/11. I get the sense sometimes that domestic
    terrorism is not as much of a priority, No. 1. No. 2 is they
    don't really have the guidelines for domestic terrorism that
    they do for international terrorism. You know what I mean?
        Mr. Soufan. You are correct on both, sir. This is one of
    the problems that now they are facing because they see an
    increase with white supremacist activities, and they don't have
    the legal tools to counter it the same way they counter it when
    it is from a jihadi group.
        Mr. Katko. So what tools should we implement for them?
        Mr. Soufan. Just to give you--you mentioned, you know, one
    of the tools is designation, absolutely. Another is to
    recognize a threat. A third to start looking into these groups
    and see how they are connecting with each other.
        We have--look, the reason I am concerned about this, and
    the reason I am here today is because I saw that in the 1980's
    and 1990's evolving with the jihadis, and nobody was listening.
        Mr. Katko. Exactly, exactly.
        Mr. Soufan. Now we see the same thing. I can sit with you,
    I can give you names, organizations, individuals here in the
    United States and Western countries. In other places they have
    their own Afghanistan, and they are doing the same thing. They
    are today where the jihadis were in the 1990's.
        Mr. Katko. We can't wait----
        Mr. Soufan. We need to pay attention.
        Mr. Katko. We can't wait for the wake-up call that we had
    on 9/11.
        Mr. Soufan. Exactly.
        Mr. Katko. Right? So whatever you--all of you--have as far
    as information--my time has passed--but suggestions, please
    submit them to us. Please talk to us and let us know. Because I
    think we all want to get this right. This isn't a Republican or
    Democratic thing, this is an American thing, and we want to get
    it right. So thank you very much.
        Mr. Soufan. Thank you, sir.
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you. The Chair recognizes the
    gentlelady from Illinois, Ms. Underwood.
        Ms. Underwood. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. With the number of
    domestic terrorism arrests now approaching 100 this year, it is
    clear that domestic terrorism is a pervasive threat to our
    National security.
        Recently, Acting Secretary McAleenan expressed the need for
    further investments at the Department of Homeland Security to
    bolster the agency's efforts to prevent, prepare, and respond
    to domestic terrorism. This issue was underscored when I was
    briefed by the Department's protective security advisors, or
    PSAs, who provided valuable assistance to critical
    infrastructure and community organizations in the region.
        Unfortunately, in communities like mine that are more
    suburban and rural, the PSAs are significantly under-utilized.
    This year region 5 PSAs have conducted 151 assessments in the
    Chicago urban area, yet have only conducted 13 assessments
    located in communities outside of the UASI-designated area.
        As we allocate resources to the Department, I want to make
    sure that communities like mine are receiving their fair share,
    and are not left vulnerable to extremist threats. My team and I
    have been digging into this issue over the past months.
        Beginning in fiscal year 2018, DHS began providing security
    grants to houses of worship and other community organizations
    located outside the urban areas for expenses like cameras and
    security personnel. However, in rural areas, where budgets are
    tight, and revenue sources are limited, we have learned that
    many organizations are not aware of these grants.
        So, for the panel, as we work on legislative options to
    increase DHS's engagement with organizations in rural and
    suburban communities on domestic terrorism, I would be
    interested to hear specific recommendations that you all have
    to ensure that communities in northern Illinois, like Grayslake
    and Aurora, are connected to DHS's resources. Do you have any
    thoughts?
        We can start with you, Mr. Joscelyn.
        Mr. Joscelyn. I would have to look into a whole mess of
    things you said there. I haven't investigated that in any
    detail, but I will. I will look into what you just said.
        Ms. Underwood. OK.
        Mr. Joscelyn. I haven't--I would like to get a copy of what
    you read off, because I didn't get all of it, but I--there is
    an issue there.
        Ms. Underwood. OK, thanks.
        Mr. Levin.
        Mr. Levin. Here is the thing. It is similar, but it rhymes
    with regard to white supremacist versus violent Salafist
    Jihadists. What I think----
        Ms. Underwood. I am sorry, we are asking about grants and
    the ability for these protective service officers to go into
    rural areas.
        Mr. Levin. Right. And my point was going to be as follows--
    --
        Ms. Underwood. OK, great.
        Mr. Levin. Because it is more dissipated, you have to have
    the local law enforcement involved. They know who the local
    neo-Nazi skinheads are, much more so--and God bless FBI, I work
    with them. But you have to include local law enforcement, and
    you have to put it--just one thing. You have to make it a
    priority. Law enforcement responds----
        Ms. Underwood. My question is about community grants. Law
    enforcement grants are being provided by DoJ and DHS, and they
    are well-resourced, or at least going to communities rural,
    suburban, and urban. But there is a huge gap.
        So I am going to go next to Mr.----
        Mr. Levin. Yes. Well, off ramps----
        Ms. Underwood. Thank you.
        Mr. Levin. Off ramps for groups----
        Ms. Underwood. Thank you.
        Mr. Levin [continuing]. That help people that are leaving
    the movement.
        Ms. Underwood. Thank you.
        Mr. Soufan. I don't know much about that specific area,
    ma'am.
        Ms. Underwood. OK.
        Mr. Soufan. I am not--but the grant program was always
    great. It helped us tremendously in countering violent
    extremism. We had people in different communities, like, for
    example, in the Somali community, you know, doing a lot of good
    works to counter the propaganda of Shabaab. So the grant
    program was always a great program, and that is something
    definitely worth looking into.
        Ms. Underwood. OK.
        Mr. Soufan. Thank you.
        Ms. Underwood. Mr. Bergen, do you have any comments?
        Mr. Bergen. I don't.
        Ms. Underwood. OK, thank you. Houses of worship have been
    increasingly under threat of white supremacist extremism, as
    seen by the horrific shootings in Pittsburgh, at the Tree of
    Life synagogue, and in Charleston, South Carolina, at the
    Emmanuel AME Church. Houses of worship are no stranger to these
    kinds of threats. But as extremists are emboldened to use more
    sophisticated tactics, we must strengthen protection for places
    of worship.
        So, Mr. Levin and Mr. Soufan, I understand that you are
    former law enforcement professionals. Do you have specific
    recommendations for houses of worship seeking to protect their
    facilities and congregations from domestic terrorism threats?
        Mr. Levin. Yes, they have to step it up. I think every
    department should have a blueprint of houses of worship in
    their area. They are now a target.
        Ms. Underwood. Yes.
        Mr. Levin. We have to have all kinds of security that we
    don't have the time right now to talk about. But I could talk--
    I could send things----
        Ms. Underwood. Send it in writing?
        Mr. Levin. Absolutely.
        Ms. Underwood. Thank you.
        Yes, sir.
        Mr. Soufan. I think we have some great organizations doing
    amazing work with that--SCAN, for example--doing phenomenal
    work protecting houses of worship, especially Jewish synagogues
    and Jewish organizations. I think I believe they set up a
    subcommittee in DHS to focus on this threat, too.
        So that is something we need to figure out, how to engage
    with community leaders and how to engage with local law
    enforcement and Federal law enforcement in order to ensure that
    these kind of places are better protected.
        Ms. Underwood. OK.
        Mr. Soufan. Because we have seen attacks against mosques,
    against churches----
        Ms. Underwood. Right.
        Mr. Soufan [continuing]. Against synagogues, and that needs
    to stop.
        Ms. Underwood. So if you have specific recommendations that
    you would like to followup with in writing, we would welcome
    that.
        I look forward to working with the Chairman and Members of
    this committee to advance meaningful legislation, ensuring that
    the Federal Government has the resources needed to combat and
    prevent the spread of all forms of violent extremism and
    domestic terrorism.
        I yield back, thank you.
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you very much. The Chair
    recognizes the gentleman from North Carolina, Mr. Walker.
        Mr. Walker. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Mr. Soufan, can you describe the similarities between those
    that have pledged allegiance to ISIS or al-Qaeda, and violent
    white supremacists, in terms of how they recruit, coordinate,
    or even plan their attacks?
        Mr. Soufan. Sure. If you look in the United States, for
    example, most of the terrorism that took place, or that
    occurred by ISIS or al-Qaeda in the recent years were
    individuals that had self-radicalized on-line, people that
    never met al-Qaeda individual and an ISIS individual. They
    self-radicalized themselves, and they went from the
    radicalization process to the operational, you know, overnight.
    That is exactly what we see with the white supremacist.
    Usually, with the jihadis, they put a video about why they did
    what they did. With the white supremacist, they put a
    manifesto.
        They advocate violence as the only way to reach their
    goals. One wanted a goal of pure racial society, one wanted a
    goal of pure religious society. The similarity goes on and on
    and on. But the kind of threats that we are experiencing today,
    attacks that--experiencing today, the United States from the
    jihadis--or from the white supremacist, very similar to the
    attacks that we experienced in the last 3 or 4 years by the
    jihadis.
        Mr. Walker. OK, and how do you recommend Federal agencies
    such as the FBI or the DoD address the broad range of these
    emerging threats?
        Mr. Soufan. I think, first of all, we need to recognize
    this. Second, the FBI and DHS and other local law enforcement
    and Federal law enforcement need to be given the appropriate
    tools.
        But we can start, as we mentioned earlier, by designations.
    A lot of these groups and individuals here are connected to
    other groups in Europe that is already considered terrorist
    organizations by our European allies, and this is a good----
        Mr. Walker. Let me go to Mr. Joscelyn just for a minute
    there.
        Do you have anything to add to that?
        Mr. Joscelyn. Very quickly, I offered one similarity
    between the two in my written testimony, which I won't recount
    here. But in terms of portraying themselves as defenders of a
    civilization or an ethos, that is a very common sort of
    psychological phenomenon----
        Mr. Walker. Right.
        Mr. Joscelyn [continuing]. Across both sides. There are
    differences, as I mentioned--alluded to in my testimony, as
    well. We got to be careful.
        I mean ISIS built a paramilitary army that conquered
    territory and declared itself to be a physical caliphate. We
    don't, fortunately, have anything like that on the white
    supremacy side yet right now. They are not, you know,
    developing so-called provinces around the world.
        Al-Qaeda was primarily an insurgency organization since its
    founding, and I think its organization is much more robust than
    people give it credit for. I would just say, on that note, if
    you ask somebody who is really in the game for a list of all
    the veteran al-Qaeda operatives who are still alive, who go
    back to bin Laden's day or beforehand, you would probably be
    surprised.
        Mr. Walker. Yes, and you have just hit a few--answered a
    few of the questions I had, so well done there.
        We have been long aware of the law enforcement challenge of
    international terrorists using encrypted communication to
    recruit, coordinate, plan, et cetera. Is there evidence that
    domestic terrorists are using the same techniques and systems
    at this point, Mr. Soufan or Mr. Joscelyn?
        Mr. Soufan. Yes, absolutely. They--you know, as time can
    tell you, they use, you know, the same--not the same platforms.
    Like, 8chan, for example, is used by the white supremacists.
    The jihadis use the Telegram, and so forth. But yes.
        Mr. Walker. Mr. Levin--and I was--I arrived here a little
    bit late--I was invited to attend an event of the CBC in the
    Emancipation Hall. But I--as I was walking in, I believe you
    were saying something about the changing demographics of both
    political--but I think I heard you say the fact that we are no
    longer a majority Christian nation, that you were weighing that
    into some of the charges--in the increasing white supremacy. Is
    there data to back that up, or is that just a personal
    perspective that you have?
        Mr. Levin. No, there is data, and it is in our report. It
    is white Christians are now a minority in the United States. I
    will----
        Mr. Walker. But to make that--but, yes, I understand that.
    But to say that, as far as--that could be weighing in on
    driving the white supremacy, do you have any data on that?
        Mr. Levin. How it is driving white supremacy?
        Mr. Walker. Yes.
        Mr. Levin. Well, what I can tell you is that a combination
    of changes appears to correspond to certain spikes that we are
    seeing around certain catalytic events like elections, and
    things like that, where this kind of change is being promoted
    by white supremacists.
        I want to be careful here. White Christians are our friends
    and our neighbors. My neighbor runs a Christian school.
    However, the way it is being turned around is that society is
    not only becoming racially changed, but we are also losing our
    religious traditions, as well. That is amplified and perversed
    into another message.
        Mr. Walker. Fair enough. You have made your point there. I
    think--and I agree with my friend, Max Rose, who did an
    eloquent job, and with Representative John Katko--both are an
    issue, and certainly resources are a factor. I think we are big
    enough in Congress to look at the ability to be able to
    override both of these elements in our country.
        With that I yield back, Mr. Chair.
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you. The Chair recognizes the
    gentlelady from Michigan, Ms. Slotkin, for 5 minutes.
        Ms. Slotkin. Hi, gentlemen. Thanks for being here. I want
    to echo and actually amplify some of the comments of my
    colleagues on the other side.
        To both the Chairman and the Ranking Member, it is
    outrageous that the day before September 11 we cannot have an
    annual counter-terrorism brief from DHS, from the FBI, and from
    NCTC. I know you both tried. But I look forward to your plan of
    how this committee can engage, because I am offended for the
    public, because, again, right up against an anniversary, to not
    be able to hear from the leadership of the Cabinet on where we
    are on counter-terrorism threats is just nuts.
        Then, second, I am offended for all the people who work in
    those agencies who have been the ones who have helped prevent
    an additional attack like that. They don't get any credit,
    because it is hard to say what could have happened. But the
    fact that we have gone this many years without a similar style
    attack, I certainly wouldn't have bet on it when I was on New
    York on September 11, 2001.
        So I just wanted to amplify that I think that is just
    beyond the pale.
        We have talked a lot about the similarities between the way
    that people have become radicalized in foreign terrorist
    organizations and in domestic terrorism. I don't want to repeat
    it, but just the radicalization process seems very similar,
    particularly the use of the internet. That sort of quest for
    purity of religion or society or whatever, and feeling like you
    are a defender of that purity seems very similar. The tools of
    violence are very similar, right, the way that you--these
    groups perpetrate violence.
        I think, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member, we have a lot of
    agreement on our committee that this is just an area of
    interest that we haven't done as much work on as foreign
    terrorism. You know, this committee was stood up because of
    what happened on 9/11, and I think, while we have to remain
    vigilant, we have figured out how to at least minimize the
    threat from foreign terrorist organizations. But I don't think
    we are there on domestic terrorist organizations of all kinds.
        So I think that we have enough interest in us setting up
    either some sort of task force, or some sort of concerted
    effort for this committee to take the lead on the things that
    our local law enforcement and FBI, National Counterterrorism
    Center would need in order to stem this threat. Because if we
    are getting this message that the noise in the system smells
    and feels like what happened before 9/11, where there wasn't a
    lot of attention, but things were happening, then I would argue
    this is the time for us to act, learn the lessons of history,
    and move out with some sort of task force, bipartisan task
    force. I think we need it.
        Just in my remaining time--because folks have asked really
    great questions--can I get from one of you--maybe Mr. Bergen or
    Mr. Soufan--an example of how a specific case of someone
    radicalized to become a domestic terrorist, an example of
    someone over the past year, year-and-a-half, their story, to
    bring it home a little bit for people who may be watching and
    listening to this?
        Of course, as short amount of time as you can manage.
        Mr. Bergen. Well, first of all, thank you for your service
    to the country. You know, Omar Mateen was born in Queens, New
    York, same place our President was born. He kind-of flirted
    with Hezbollah, al-Qaeda. Eventually, you know, many of these
    people are zeroes trying to be heroes, right? He was working as
    a kind-of security guard at a golf community retirement center.
    He had dreams of joining the NYPD, it failed.
        For him, and I think for a lot of these guys--and they are
    almost universally guys--the ideology is something they attach
    themselves to because they have grievances that are unresolved.
    This is the way they are going to be a hero in their own story.
    Then they legally acquire 4 semi-automatic weapons. Omar Mateen
    killed 49 people in a nightclub at 2 a.m. in the morning on a
    Saturday night, an excellent place to kill as many people as
    possible with 4 semi-automatic weapons.
        So that is the story. That is an extreme version of it, but
    that is the story you see.
        Ms. Slotkin. So I would just say we have listed a number of
    things that, you know, we feel like we don't have the same
    authorities to work externally outside the United States as we
    do internally. There is a lot of legal reasons.
        Besides designation, what are the other tools, maybe Mr.
    Soufan or Mr. Joscelyn, that we think our law enforcement need
    in order to squelch the threat of domestic terrorism?
        Mr. Soufan. Well, we need to give them the tools that we
    are giving them for international terrorism. Most of the
    successful terrorism cases are basically based on material
    support charges. We cannot charge domestic terrorists with
    material support. It is impossible to do it. You need to
    designate in order to do so.
        So basically, we are going to look at every case as one
    individual. With the law that exists today, even when we stop--
    the FBI or law enforcement stops someone from going to conduct
    a terrorist attack, they have to let him go. Even when they
    charge them, they charge them on some stated charge or
    violation of the Telecommunication Act, because he is
    harassing, let's say, Jews or Muslims on-line. Then, toward the
    end, they have to let them go because there is nothing they can
    do to prosecute these people unless they kill.
        So all our efforts, or the law enforcement effort, is not
    preventative as much as, you know, reactive in nature, after
    the fact. We need to be sure that these things won't happen. In
    order to do so, at least we need to start with making that
    international connection, because a lot of these guys are
    connected to entities overseas, and some of these entities are
    already declared as terrorist organizations by our allies.
        Ms. Slotkin. I know my time is way past up, so thank you,
    Mr. Chairman.
        Mr. Joscelyn. Mr. Chairman, can I give you one quick note,
    please, just 1 second? I have an idea for you, because you are
    interested in transparency and oversight, and I am a big
    advocate of both.
        The Intelligence Committee has a yearly world-wide threat
    assessment hearing, where they have to prepare a written
    assessment, prepare it and testify in public about it. I think
    it would be a great idea to have a similar assessment for the
    Department of Homeland Security to talk about the threats and
    assessments inside the United States, and to testify about what
    those look like, and it basically gives you a mechanism for
    accountability and for inquiring about what is actually going
    on. That is it.
        Chairman Thompson. Well, good suggestion. Just for the
    record, some of the Members have talked about their
    disappointment in not having certain members here. The Ranking
    Member and I made the request in July for their attendance here
    today, and we have received notice that they will be available
    October 30. So it is not as high a priority as it should be,
    and I think we will share the sentiments of what we have heard
    here today as to their not being here is not in the--what we
    think--the best interest of this country.
        The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Texas, Mr.
    Ratcliffe.
        Mr. Ratcliffe. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the
    witnesses being here.
        It will be 18 years tomorrow since the terrorist attacks of
    9/11, and, obviously, international terrorism, specifically
    radical Islamic terrorism, still poses a persistent threat to
    our Nation and to U.S. interests abroad. We have seen various
    spikes in intensity with respect to that.
        To that point, recent Department of Defense and other
    reporting is showing that ISIS has reorganized and recovered to
    some significant degree in Iraq and Syria, specifically. While
    that same reporting does indicate that ISIS is facing some
    financial constraints, I think they still have the ability to
    fund significant operations. Other reporting also shows that
    al-Qaeda is re-introducing its movement and targeting a new
    generation of fighters.
        So to that point, I guess, since its territorial defeat at
    the end of 2017, we know that ISIS still commands somewhere
    around 14,000 fighters in Iraq and Syria. I serve on the--also
    serve on the House Intelligence Committee, and many in the
    intelligence community are raising concerns that ISIS is
    adapting and consolidating and creating conditions for
    resurgence in the Syrian and Iraqi heartlands, where Abu Bakr
    al-Baghdadi and most of the ISIS leadership is now based.
        So I want to start, I think, with you, Mr. Joscelyn. With
    America's intelligence strategy focused so much and shifting to
    a lot of our adversaries, like China and Russia and Iran and
    North Korea, are we and can we ensure that we are devoting the
    appropriate resources to also address these emerging or re-
    emerging threats with radical Islamic terrorist groups?
        Mr. Joscelyn. Well, my big concern there is that the
    territorial caliphate was taken away largely by a proxy force
    that required, basically, a minimal amount of boots on the
    ground from the United States and our resources. There seems to
    be an impatience, even with that. That I find to be somewhat
    deplorable.
        You know, if you look at the whole thing that is going on,
    you know, basically, very few--as Peter said, very few
    Americans have died taking away the physical caliphate. This is
    something that is clearly in our National interests, to
    basically make sure this organization does not re-constitute
    itself and grow once again.
        You know, just recently, the State Department release
    rewards for information on 3 different ISIS leaders. All of
    them have pedigrees that go back a decade or more. You know, I
    mean, this is an organization that clearly still has talent
    that has been in the game for a long time, and hasn't been
    taken out of the game.
        I think, going forward, that is why I have emphasized in my
    testimony I don't believe the resource allocation argument that
    we need--we have these vast resources being spent against the
    jihadis that need to be repositioned against China. I just
    don't buy that, when you look at how we are fighting ISIS, and
    we are looking--how we are fighting other organizations. There
    is certainly fat that can be cut from the bone. But overall, it
    is something that is basically a outsourced fight, for the most
    part.
        Mr. Ratcliffe. Thank you.
        Mr. Soufan, I see you nodding and wanting to weigh in, so I
    want you to do that. But I also--I am curious. One of the
    themes that we have seen in statements from Ayman al-Zawahiri
    is the need to reunite the jihadist factions.
        So as you comment on my first question, my second one is do
    you see that happening, al-Qaeda and ISIS uniting under one
    banner? What is the prospect of that?
        Mr. Soufan. First, I agree with everything Tom said. ISIS
    is not dead. Al-Qaeda was--never went away. Al-Qaeda just
    changed focus. Today they have 100 times more members than they
    had on 9/11.
        ISIS today, you know, still have at least $400 million.
    That makes them the richest terror organization in the world.
    Baghdadi is still alive. They are recruiting other already-
    existing terrorist groups in different places, provinces, as we
    see in the Sinai, and with Boko Haram in Nigeria. So the threat
    is there.
        Also, ISIS have thousands of members in jail, usually in
    Kurdish authority--under--with the Kurds in Syria. What is
    going to happen to those guys if their countries are not taking
    them back? Are they going to be released? When they are
    released, what kind of threat they will pose on their
    countries? Actually, the United States and the West. A lot of
    them are from Western countries. So the threat is very there
    still. The threat is very dangerous.
        Now, as for your second question, sir, I am sorry, what is
    the second one? I am----
        Mr. Ratcliffe. Reuniting--Zawahiri is saying----
        Mr. Soufan. Yes.
        Mr. Ratcliffe [continuing]. Reuniting al-Qaeda and----
        Mr. Soufan. I think now it is becoming increasingly
    difficult, especially after the death of Hamza bin Laden. The
    folks in ISIS really don't like Zawahiri. That is why they
    broke off from him. We have seen some ISIS members, at least in
    Syria and some in Yemen, rejoin al-Qaeda. But this is very
    limited. It hasn't been a wave.
        I think Hamza bin Laden was to be the person who used his
    father's name. The plan, at least, of the senior members of al-
    Qaeda. Some of them are still alive, as Tom said, who
    established the organization with Osama bin Laden in 1988.
    Those guys are still alive, and they are still operational.
        So, basically, their plan was to probably use bin Laden to
    unify the Salafist Jihadi movement again. That is why Hamza, in
    all of his statements, never attacked ISIS. It was a job left
    to Zawahiri. I think at this point, if they don't have a Hamza,
    if they don't have a bin Laden, I think it is going to be very
    difficult for them to reunify.
        Mr. Ratcliffe. Terrific.
        Mr. Joscelyn. If I may, just real quick, what we track
    every day is just a lot of infighting still between ISIS and
    al-Qaeda across the board in different theaters. What I would
    ask, especially because our policy in Afghanistan has become
    very confused, there is this idea that we are going to count on
    the Taliban, basically, to take out ISIS. I would ask people in
    the U.S. intelligence community and Homeland Security who is
    leading the charge in eastern Afghanistan against ISIS for the
    Taliban. It is a guy named Bilal Faat, also known as Bilal
    Zadran. He is in the al-Qaeda fold.
        So basically, you are counting on al-Qaeda to wipe out ISIS
    as part of our strategy, which makes zero sense. Thanks.
        Mr. Ratcliffe. I thank you all for your perspective, all
    the witnesses today, thank you.
        I yield back.
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you. The Chair recognizes the
    gentleman from California----
        Mr. Correa. Thank you, Mr. Chairman----
        Chairman Thompson [continuing]. Mr. Correa, for 5 minutes.
        Mr. Correa [continuing]. For holding this hearing, and I
    want to echo some of the comments made by Republican colleagues
    in this committee that not having the FBI or DHS show up is not
    only disrespectful, but we are talking about the safety of all
    Americans in this country.
        During the break I had a meeting with some religious
    leaders in my community--synagogues, mosques, churches--to talk
    about safety in the community, lack thereof, to see what they
    needed to feel that they were securing more of their houses of
    worship.
        I also had my local sheriff, Sheriff Barnes, attend. He
    made some interesting comments that I thought were disturbing,
    and that is that he still felt that we are still operating in
    silos. When it comes to terrorism, fighting terrorism, we are
    still operating in silos.
        Let me be specific. He said to me in response to some of my
    questions that the FBI still gives him information on the need-
    to-know basis. He has what is called a fusion center in Orange
    County, where, essentially, he takes as many of the local
    organizations and Federal organizations to put information
    together to try to approximate when the next attack is being
    planned, or when it is going to take place. Many times he would
    essentially say--my words--we can't get that information from
    the FBI.
        I am hearing the discussion here today, and we are still
    talking about a bigger silo, which is--we are talking domestic
    terrorism versus international terrorism. We are almost having
    a competition to see which terror, which threat is bigger,
    international or domestic. I think it is just one. We are
    talking about the safety of Americans, and when the next attach
    is going to happen, heaven forbid.
        Eighteen years ago this country was attacked, brutally
    attacked. For the most part, we shifted our resources to
    international terrorism. We really took our eye off the ball of
    domestic terrorism. Whatever it is that inspires that domestic
    terrorism, we are not focusing on that right now. Is that what
    I am hearing from all of you here today?
        [Pause.]
        Mr. Correa. Don't all of you answer at the same time, but--
    --
        Mr. Joscelyn. Well, I will say this. I mean, certainly, if
    you look at the FBI's testimony to this committee and
    elsewhere, they have certainly, I think, testified to the fact
    that they had a lot of on-going active cases involving domestic
    terrorism, including white supremacists.
        I think the issue has to do with better coordination, and
    probably making sure they have all the capabilities they need
    to go after who I think you are hearing from this panel are
    potentially developing organizational capacity, which is, I
    think, going to be in the next level.
        Mr. Levin. Could I just interject one quick thing on that?
        Mr. Correa. Go.
        Mr. Levin. There are just 4 issues here. There are legal
    issues in dealing with international terror. We have FISA
    courts, we have ways of getting evidence overseas that are
    different than if we are dealing with domestic groups.
        Also, domestic groups are smaller, and they can be violent,
    but they have a much shorter half-life. Therefore, it is really
    important to have local law enforcement up and in equal number.
    Some of the testimony here was that the local folks have a
    better handle on some of these hate groups. Totally.
        Mr. Correa. Yes?
        Mr. Levin. Yes.
        Mr. Correa. So, shouldn't they be coordinating a whole lot
    better with DHS and the FBI?
        Mr. Levin. Absolutely. And also----
        Mr. Correa. That, Mr. Chairman, is the reason I feel we are
    at a loss here today.
        Chairman Thompson. Yes.
        Mr. Correa. OK, so maybe some of the information should not
    be shared in public. We can go private, sir, and address these
    issues. Whatever tools the FBI or maybe my local sheriff need
    to address these issues, we need to give them those tools.
        Please continue in the last minute that I have.
        Mr. Levin. The last thing, how we get the evidence. We have
    intelligence, for instance, with regard to international.
    Certainly--when I say international, I am talking about violent
    Salafist Jihadists, for example.
        With regard to the more localized folks that we have here
    who you call domestic terrorists, these groups are much
    smaller, and the people that are going to find the information
    first are going to be people in the local community. Friends,
    family members, local law enforcement. With that we want to
    make sure that there is reporting.
        So how do we do that? Make sure there is an off-ramp, so
    that those who are neo-Nazis and white supremacists know that
    there is--that, if they want to give it up, there is a place
    that they can go, other than jail or death.
        Mr. Correa. Further comments?
        Mr. Bergen. The FBI did a very interesting study about who
    knows when something is going to happen. The people who know
    the most are peers, and the people who know the least are
    strangers. So strangers produce a lot of false positives.
        Going--just picking up on Professor Levin's point, it is
    getting people, the peers, to come forward. In the case of the
    San Bernardino case, a peer knew exactly what was going to
    happen, provided the weapon.
        How do you get that person to come forward? Off ramps are
    part of this. You can't offer the kind of binary choice of say
    nothing or go to prison for 20 years. You have to sort-of--and
    this is where local law enforcement can help. I mean this is
    what cops do, right? They go out and they kind of talk to
    people, and they get information. So it is appealing to peers.
        Family members know the second most. They are slightly more
    likely to come forward.
        Then, of course, authority figures often know something.
    But--and are very likely to come forward, but they don't know
    the full dimension.
        So when you are looking about, whether it is jihadism or
    right-wing, it is--getting peers to come forward is really--
    they are the people with the information.
        Mr. Correa. Mr. Chair, I yield.
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you very much. You bring a number
    of issues. Part of our challenge, as a committee, historically,
    has been this shared jurisdiction. That creates some structural
    impediments that we are just faced with. Some of us are going
    to make another swing at minimizing some of those impediments,
    as we go forward.
        The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Louisiana for 5
    minutes, Mr. Higgins.
        Mr. Higgins. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this
    hearing, and I thank the panelists for appearing before us
    today.
        Mr. Levin, thank you for your service to the Thin Blue
    Line, sir. I was a SWAT operator for 12 years. You appear to be
    a very well-read man. You are obviously of high intelligence.
    You are familiar with our Constitution, I am quite sure.
        Mr. Levin. Absolutely.
        Mr. Higgins. And our Federalist Papers?
        Mr. Levin. I won the Civil Liberties Award at Stanford Law
    School.
        Mr. Higgins. Our Federalist Papers?
        [No response.]
        Mr. Higgins. Federalist Papers, the Federalist letters?
        Mr. Levin. Sure.
        Mr. Higgins. Not to put you on the spot. In Federalist 10,
    Madison stated that liberty is to faction as air is to fire, an
    element without which it will instantly expire.
        Now, I have heard you use--now that I have reminded you,
    you recall one of the most famous Federalist letters, I am
    sure.
        Mr. Levin. Mm-hmm.
        Mr. Higgins. What Madison was saying there is that, as we
    were constructing our representative republic, as the
    Constitution was being formed and debated, it was a great
    question of whether or not we could even do this thing, whether
    or not we could have a strong central government and still
    maintain the sovereignty of the States and the freedoms of the
    citizens therein. He clarified that there was an inherent
    danger within a society that allowed great liberties. Yet none
    would argue for the elimination of liberties in order to reduce
    the threat that could be borne of such liberties.
        You have stated a couple of times--if I am quoting you
    correct--``weapons of war.'' But you are not talking about
    tanks and grenades and shoulder-launched munitions, are you,
    sir?
        Mr. Levin. No, I am talking about semi-automatic rifle
    access to people who shouldn't have them in a civilized
    society. If you look at the Constitution, the Preamble is
    ``secure domestic tranquility.''
        Mr. Higgins. OK. With great pardon, reclaiming my time, so
    you--when you say ``weapons of war,'' do you support the
    seizure of semi-automatic weapons that are legally owned?
        Mr. Levin. No.
        Mr. Higgins. Your colleagues mentioned the term ``full
    semi-automatic weapon.'' I have heard this term used
    increasingly.
        Mr. Levin. I am sorry, which colleague?
        Mr. Higgins. A full semi--your colleague to your right. It
    is referring more to the term than the colleague.
        A semi-automatic weapon, has--one pull of the trigger,
    there is a release of one round. And there are millions of
    Americans that follow the law and own these weapons. It has
    been suggested by some, as part of the National narrative--and
    we should have this conversation. But I find it reflective of
    Madison's warnings, that to restrict the liberties, or to
    infringe upon the Constitutional protections of law-abiding
    Americans in order to create some illusion of greater safety or
    security would be, in itself, a more significant threat to the
    future of our republic.
        So it has been alarming to me to listen to gentlemen of
    distinguished accomplishment today seemingly leaning toward
    suggesting the serious infringement of Second Amendment rights,
    perhaps First Amendment rights. What about freedom of speech
    and assembly, peaceful assembly, red flag laws? These things
    are quite alarming to many Americans, myself included.
        In my final minute I would like to ask you each to answer
    yes or no. Last Congress, under the leadership of Chairman
    McCaul and this committee, the House of Representatives passed
    the Department of Homeland Security Authorities Act. This was,
    essentially, the first full authorization of the Department of
    Homeland Security. It failed in the Senate. It was never
    brought to a vote.
        My question to each of you--yes or no, given the
    restrictions of time--do you agree that it is in the Department
    of Homeland Security's best interest for Congress to provide it
    with full reauthorization.
        Yes, sir?
        Mr. Bergen. I think so, yes. Just one minor point. My in-
    laws are from the great State of Louisiana. They don't go
    hunting with AR-15s. So I think what I am advocating is a very
    minimalist position, which is no fly, no buy. This is something
    Congress can do. This seems like a very basic thing. Anybody
    who is too dangerous to get on an American-bound or an American
    passenger jet is not the sort of person who should be
    acquiring, legally, semi-automatic weapons.
        Mr. Higgins. That gets to be determined by whom, sir?
        Mr. Bergen. Well, by the people around this table sitting
    here, the legislature----
        Mr. Higgins. The people around this table. So bureaucrats
    and career politicians in Washington, DC. shall determine what
    Constitutional protections shall just be----
        Mr. Bergen. You pass the laws, sir. You pass the laws.
        Mr. Higgins. Yes, I would say that our anointed documents
    shall protect our citizens' freedoms and rights.
        Good sir, yes or no regarding full authorization of DHS?
        Mr. Soufan. Yes.
        Mr. Levin. Yes.
        Mr. Joscelyn. I think so, yes.
        Mr. Higgins. Gentlemen, I respectfully thank you for your
    time.
        Mr. Chairman, I thank you for holding this important
    hearing today.
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you very much. Since we have
    conducted this hearing I have just been informed that the
    President has asked for the resignation of our National
    security advisor, John Bolton. In light of the conversation
    that we have been having at this hearing, I would like to get
    some comments from our witnesses on that.
        Mr. Bergen. We are about to get our fourth National
    security advisor of the United States. Interesting question who
    that will be. I think it is surprising, this level of turnover.
        Chairman Thompson. Mr. Soufan.
        Mr. Soufan. I am concerned that it is the fourth National
    security advisor in a period of less than 3 years, but I am not
    surprised, frankly, because I think the President has differing
    views regarding Iran that Mr. Bolton--and I think we have--we
    don't know what is going to happen between Iran and the United
    States over there.
        So it seems that there is probably disagreement about that.
    I don't know. We just heard it from you, sir. But yes, I am not
    really surprised. Recently they haven't been seeing eye-to-eye.
        Chairman Thompson. Mr. Levin.
        Mr. Levin. When I spoke in Europe, one of the things that
    came up was the disorganization that is occurring with regard
    to issues of international security. This kind of rotation is
    troubling.
        Chairman Thompson. Mr. Joscelyn.
        Mr. Joscelyn. I think it acts as a very strong impediment
    to any American who is loyal to their country and just wants to
    serve their country to have a constant turnover of personnel,
    and not have any stability there, in terms of what you are
    going to do. Whether you agree with the people's positions or
    not, you know, you need to have some sort of stability and
    stable hands on the steering wheel. It is a strong
    disincentive, I can tell you personally, for anybody who would
    think about trying to work for their country to have this type
    of turnover, constantly.
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you. The Chair recognizes the
    gentlelady from Nevada for 5 minutes.
        Ms. Titus. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. First I just would like
    to disagree with that rather weird interpretation of Federalist
    10 offered by Mr. Higgins as justification for not passing gun
    control.
        Actually, Madison was looking at reconciling interests of
    factions of people who disagreed with each other, and he was
    opposed to direct democracy--in other words, rule by mob--and
    thought we needed a representative government to reconcile
    those factions. Certainly, that is what Congress is, and that
    is what our role should be. So it is absolutely appropriate
    that we should consider and pass those kinds of bills that deal
    with gun violence.
        Second, we--you were talking about peers were the ones who
    know first. I think that brings up the role of women. Women in
    some societies are on the front lines, and maybe the best able
    to recognize radicalization, or see something happening in the
    home, and I don't think we are doing enough to talk to women,
    especially in other countries.
        Then, third, as I look at the policies of this
    administration in addition to the turnover of our National
    security, they want to cut ICE funding, which is to help local
    governments deal with terrorism. You got a Muslim ban, which
    you said was a solution looking for a problem, it just keeps
    out the most vulnerable. It has deterred national tourism, it
    has hurt my business in Las Vegas. We have got a limit, and
    they are wanting to reduce that limit again this year on the
    number of refugees we will take.
        Now we hear him using terrorism as an excuse for not
    allowing immigration, like terrorists are going to sneak across
    the border with the people who are coming from El Salvador. Or
    just recently, we can't let the people in from the Bahamas who
    have been devastated, because bad, bad people might come in
    with them.
        Could you all address this? How is--is any of this
    effective, or even accurate?
        Mr. Bergen. OK, the short answer is it isn't helpful. Just
    a quick anecdote.
        Ninety years ago a woman called Mary MacLeod left the Outer
    Hebrides, which was one of the poorest places in Europe, and
    she came to New York, and she married a guy called Fred Trump,
    and had 5 sons. One of them is named Donald Trump.
        The United States has not been this cramped, you know,
    terrified place in the past. This banning refugees as a blanket
    matter is un-American. The travel ban wouldn't have reduced
    terrorism.
        The whole burden of this discussion today has been we have
    a domestic problem. Sometimes it is jihadist, sometimes it is
    right-wing. Sometimes it has been black nationalists. Sometimes
    it is other forms of ideology. This is a problem that we have
    here, not coming from outside.
        Mr. Levin. If I could just address one thing, I think that
    what we have to do is have a reasonable discussion. If you look
    at Antonin Scalia's opinion in the Heller case involving the
    District of Columbia in 2008, he specifically said not everyone
    is entitled to any gun anywhere at any time. What I think that
    we have to do is look at reasonable restrictions. Eighty-nine
    percent of Americans favor certain types of restrictions.
    Eighty percent on another issue, with regard to red flags.
        The bottom line is--and I wish the Congressperson would
    have stayed, because our assistant director is from Louisiana,
    a former member of the military. We are not hostile with regard
    to conservative people of good will who are gun owners.
        But the bottom line is my community keeps getting hit. We
    just had a CHPs officer murdered. We had the San Bernardino
    terrorist attack occur just weeks after I spoke. I promised the
    people in my community that I would bring this up, not as a
    cudgel or a political thing, but something that the
    Constitution, the Second Amendment--even if it is a fundamental
    right, which the Supreme Court has not yet interpreted it as--
    we put restrictions on fundamental rights all the time, such as
    freedom of speech, freedom of interstate travel, and all those
    kinds of things.
        Bottom line is we have to have some kind of reasonable
    agreement. In a representative democracy that we live in, yes,
    we have people from all different places. Frankly, we have
    heroes here, sitting on this committee. I think one of the
    things that we should look toward doing--and we heard this
    yesterday in New York at the Senate hearings--is perhaps giving
    this committee a bit more jurisdiction to cover these issues--
    of terrorism, that is.
        Mr. Joscelyn. If I could just--we don't have enough time
    for this, but I just wanted to applaud one point you were
    talking about with the role of women, in terms of addressing
    earlier signs of radicalization, and violence, and that sort of
    thing.
        One of the issues that we see across the board when you are
    saying different types of extremism is misogyny is very
    prevalent across different types of extremist beliefs. You
    know, the jihadis that I spent most of my life studying are
    extremely misogynist, you know. You know, you study that in
    different forms of other extremism, as well. So that is--we are
    out of time, but that is a huge issue there.
        Ms. Titus. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you very much. The Chair
    recognizes the gentleman from Texas for 5 minutes.
        Mr. Crenshaw. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for
    holding this hearing so close to September 11. We are going to
    bring it back on topic a little bit.
        You know, September 11 changed the role of the United
    States, it changed the Middle East, it changed all of our
    lives, my life included. September 11 was possible because al-
    Qaeda had the time and the space to operate and plan. One thing
    I fear--and this is coming from rhetoric from the left and the
    right--what I fear is that we are no longer at war with them,
    but they are definitely at war with us.
        This pertains to the resignation of our--of John Bolton, as
    well. He is in favor, generally speaking, of maintaining a
    presence in Syria and Afghanistan and Iraq. I also am in favor
    of that. I worry about what would happen if we had a premature
    withdrawal.
        Maybe starting with Mr. Bergen, you could speak to the
    consequences of premature withdrawals from these places, and if
    any other panelists have something to add to what Mr. Bergen
    says, please do so.
        Mr. Bergen. First of all, thank you for your service, sir.
        Secondarily, I am in violent agreement. I mean we have run
    this experiment before. I testified earlier that in 1989,
    because our embassy in Afghanistan--into the vacuum came
    Taliban and al-Qaeda. We got out of Iraq prematurely at the end
    of 2011. We have--it is, like, why repeat these mistakes? I
    mean these are recent mistakes.
        We know what a withdrawal looks like, and what a vacuum
    looks like, and what these groups will do. It doesn't require a
    vast amount of American resources to stay in these places and
    maintain some kind of advise-and-assist mission.
        Mr. Joscelyn. May I say something real quick? Again, thank
    you for your service.
        I would say this. I am actually deeply ambivalent about all
    war. Because, having covered it every day of my life, I see how
    horrible it is. I am very concerned, in particular, in
    Afghanistan, that we don't have a good grasp on what our
    mission is, and have sort-of lost focus of that along the way.
    I think this happens quite often, actually.
        But that said, the counter-terrorism side of me sees the
    writing on the wall. When you see what groups are operating in
    Afghanistan and Pakistan right now and throughout the region,
    and they have regional and global aspirations, and you see
    these organizations elsewhere, I have no doubt in my mind that
    the main thing that is keeping our thumb on them is the
    American presence, and our ability to----
        Mr. Crenshaw. That is the key. They have global
    aspirations. So if we just left them alone, you don't think
    they would just leave us alone?
        Mr. Joscelyn. So your--earlier, before you got here,
    Congressman, just days before President Trump was elected
    President, a guy named Faruk al Katani, who we profiled based
    on bin Laden's files and other evidence, was killed in Kunar
    Province in eastern Afghanistan. He had a very strong hand in
    al-Qaeda's global operations to come after us, to come after
    the United States. This is just days before the Presidential
    election in 2016. It got almost no notice. Nobody even--very
    few people probably off of this panel even know about it.
        Mr. Soufan. I think--again, thank you for your service,
    sir. I think al-Qaeda had the space and place to plan attacks.
    They also had the intention at the time. Now I think they are
    focusing locally, but the intention is still there. They are
    rebuilding their network. Any premature withdrawal from any
    place, to include Afghanistan, is a Saigon.
        Mr. Crenshaw. Thank you. And----
        Mr. Levin. I concur with that, by the way.
        Mr. Crenshaw. Thank you. I want to move on in my limited
    time here to Hezbollah. Regardless of what anyone thinks about
    the Iran deal, whether it was good or bad, or whether it should
    have been withdrawn from, the reality is that when the JCPO was
    put into place it enriched the Iranian regime. They didn't use
    that money for--on social welfare programs and infrastructure,
    right? They used it to enrich the Quds Force, the IRGC, as well
    as Hezbollah, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic jihad, Shia militias
    in Iraq, Houthis, et cetera.
        Can--and maybe I will start with you, Mr. Soufan. Can you
    speak to the current capabilities of Hezbollah? Are they
    weakened? Are they strengthened? How has their global outlook
    changed?
        Mr. Soufan. Hezbollah is today probably the most powerful
    group, terrorist group, in the world. I think their
    capabilities were shown in Syria, where, if it wasn't for their
    involvement, the Syrian regime will--could have been defeated
    early on.
        Hezbollah today is not only an organization, it is not only
    a political party in Lebanon. Hezbollah is a regional force, a
    regional legion, Quds Force. We put the report on Iran and
    Iran's playbook, and Iran--they learned from what happened to
    Sadam. They know, if they want to challenge the United States,
    they won't last a month.
        However, I think they moved from conventional warfare to
    unconventional warfare, and they started to establish groups
    that can fight for Iran in case there is war. They copied the
    model of Hezbollah, Hashd Sha'abi in Iraq, with the Houthis in
    Yemen, and with so many different groups around. You mentioned
    some. That is something we haven't--we are not paying attention
    to. We are not paying attention to the rise of--some of these
    groups are considered terrorist organizations, but they have
    missiles that can go across continents.
        Mr. Crenshaw. Thank you. I am out of time. I have got a lot
    more questions, but thank you for this, Chair.
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you very much. The Chair
    recognizes the gentlelady from Texas, Ms. Jackson Lee, for 5
    minutes.
        Ms. Jackson Lee. Mr. Chairman, thank you. To the Ranking
    Member, thank you for this very important hearing. Let me, just
    for the record, indicate--because we are in Homeland Security--
    my prayers for the people in the Bahamas, and certainly on the
    southeast.
        But we know the enormity of the devastation, which really
    ties into the question from my colleague from Las Vegas about
    precipitous policies that don't do us any good, and certainly
    don't reflect on the status of the most powerful nation in the
    world, and as well, developing allies: Rejection of devastating
    Bahamian citizens is just simply an outrage.
        Let me also indicate, as some of my colleagues have said
    the day before 9/11, that I am one of those Members who was
    here 9/11--in fact, in the United States Capitol--when the
    naivete of the United States was obviously not breached, but
    imploded, if you will. But leadership in that midst decided not
    to stereotype, stigmatize, even though, as we were fleeing with
    no knowledge, I could see the building smoke from the Pentagon.
    It is seared in my heart and mind, as is Ground Zero. Weeks
    later I was able to go by train to New York, and actually be in
    the presence of first responders, who were still recovering, if
    you will--not rescuing, obviously. They were still there,
    seeking the remains of those who had been lost.
        To put this in context, I have been in a lot of meetings.
    Since this is global terrorism, I will say that, as it relates
    domestically--which is part of the global world--that racism is
    now a National security threat, and all of its extensions of
    white supremacy, white nationalism. I know that there is
    thoughts about those who are in the Black Power movement, but
    we can document a recent vintage that we have not seen any
    incidences that could be characterized as terrorist from that
    community, from our community.
        I am wearing a kente cloth, because this is the 400th year
    of return.
        So let me just quickly, in the time left to Peter Bergen,
    who I know--and your work, and I appreciate it very much--tell
    me how terrorism globally, or the attitudes of the United
    States play into not being a breaker, or a blocker of this, but
    it fuels it if we don't take our rightful place of
    acknowledging alliances, fighting where we do fight with
    alliances, but condemning the dastardly actions of racism.
        Mr. Levin, if you would do that, as well.
        Then anyone who wants to speak to the toxicity of guns, as
    relates to those who wish to do evil and harm, and that we
    cannot separate the two. We have just had meetings at the Tree
    of Life. Obviously, a gun was used at the synagogue. A gun was
    used in Pulse Nightclub.
        So, Mr. Bergen.
        Mr. Bergen. Well, let me just make an observation, because
    we--which isn't repetitive of things we have already said. You
    are 3,000 times more likely to be killed by a fellow American
    with a gun than you are to be killed by any terrorist of any
    description in this country. We have a--you know, you are 50
    times more likely to be killed in the United States than, say,
    in the United Kingdom by somebody with a gun.
        We have an endemic problem with gun violence. Whatever
    people's view of the Second Amendment, this is just a fact. We
    are trying to--so I will leave it at that.
        Ms. Jackson Lee. Mr. Levin.
        Can someone answer any value to meeting with the Taliban on
    the soil of the United States without a more detailed plan and
    a strategic plan for that meeting?
        Mr. Levin. The answer to your last question is I am
    astounded by that, and incredibly disappointed.
        With respect to white supremacy and white nationalism,
    again, what is so important, and what I think has been done, is
    before we had more of a curation. The Klan wouldn't associate
    with Nazis. Then, in the 1980's, they did. Then, in the 1990's,
    the Justice Department had a whole task force relating to
    skinhead violence.
        What I think, some of the things we are missing today with
    respect to today's hearings, you cannot entirely approach this
    kind of surgery like you would another type of surgery, because
    the groups that will show up with respect to white supremacists
    are going to be smaller, they are going to have less of a half-
    life, and the folks that are going to be most likely to get
    them is not a CIA agent listening in on signals intelligence
    coming from overseas, but a teacher, a peer person, or someone
    who is on the internet with them.
        We are seeing people getting self-radicalized very quickly.
    Years ago Congress looked at an assailant who was arrested on
    an airplane, leaving. He got self-radicalized quickly. Now he
    would be one of the ones who took the longest.
        Ms. Jackson Lee. Just one question. Is racism and--racism
    and this posture of hatred--be considered a National security
    threat?
        Mr. Levin. Absolutely, definitively.
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you very much.
        Mr. Levin. International, as well.
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you very much.
        Ms. Jackson Lee. I yield back, thank you.
        Chairman Thompson. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from
    Texas, Mr. Taylor.
        Mr. Taylor. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate your
    testimony and your time being here, and I think this is an
    important hearing.
        During the recess I had some very unfortunate news from my
    district. The white nationalist shooter in El Paso, Texas went
    to high school in my district, grew up in my district, lived in
    my district.
        Last year Plano, Texas was the safest city in America. I
    have an African-American mayor, I have two Asian-American women
    on city council. I have a very diverse community. I have the
    largest mosque in North Texas. I have the largest synagogue in
    North Texas. I have a very large Hindu community in my
    district.
        A year ago a young man who went to Plano West High School,
    right, a few miles to the west of Plano Senior High, decided to
    radicalize to become an ISIS-inspired terrorist. He was
    arrested by the FBI before he could--he wanted to conduct
    attacks against Hindu temples in my district and against the
    Stonebriar Mall, which is where I have taken my daughter ice
    skating.
        So what I am trying to understand is how people are
    radicalizing on-line. I don't think it is my community. I think
    I have a very--again, a very diverse, harmonious community. But
    I think that it is--on some level I think it--I am looking to
    the internet to understand that.
        My question is to what extent is radicalization self-
    induced by content, and to what extent is there an active
    recruiter helping to radicalize? I have heard ISIS recruiters
    talk about recruiting, and that seemed like an active effort.
    It was difficult to radicalize someone, it wasn't something
    that just happened overnight. Is that the case, or is it--can
    it just happen with content? If the content is there, people
    could radicalize? Or does it require an active effort?
        Mr. Bergen. It is both. You know, what usually--you want to
    broadcast your message, your hateful message, with as many
    people as possible, because only 1 percent is going to respond.
    Then you communicate with them in an encrypted fashion.
        We talk about--you are from Texas, so think about the
    attack on the Prophet Mohammed Cartoon Contest. Those guys, who
    were born in the United States, American citizens, radicalized
    on-line, started communicating via encrypted communications
    with an ISIS recruiter who directed them to do this attack.
    They had 100 communications. We still don't know the content.
        So it is both.
        Mr. Taylor. Right, and I think you are talking about the
    attack in Garland, Texas. Is that right?
        Mr. Bergen. Yes.
        Mr. Taylor. Yes, I actually met that police officer who
    defended that attack. So--I mean, and that was, again, in
    Garland, Texas, which--you know, and it wasn't--it doesn't seem
    to be home-grown. I mean it is not happening at the local
    mosque in Collin County, it is happening on-line.
        But you are saying it is both, it is both the recruiter and
    the content. Is that your experience, as well, Mr.----
        Mr. Soufan. Yes.
        Mr. Taylor. Mr. Soufan.
        Mr. Soufan. Yes, absolutely, it is both. We have seen it
    both. We have individuals who self-radicalize themselves, never
    met with an ISIS guy, never communicated with an ISIS guy, and
    then they take their machine guns, go to a club in Orlando, and
    kill people.
        You have folks that, no, they did exactly what Peter said.
    They watched a lot of these videos, they chatted with them on-
    line, and then they moved into encrypted software to talk, and
    they were ordered or instructed to do specific acts. We have
    seen them both, and we have seen the same thing happening with
    the white supremacist movement, frankly, too.
        Mr. Taylor. So is that sort-of a--is it a 50/50 or an 80/
    20? I know I am asking you to kind-of start----
        Mr. Soufan. I----
        Mr. Taylor [continuing]. Making a generalization. You are
    saying both, but is it definitively one or the other?
        Mr. Bergen.
        Mr. Bergen. It is mostly the former.
        Mr. Taylor. Meaning?
        Mr. Bergen. Meaning it is mostly the people will just--as
    Ali said, it is like the people reading content, they get a
    semi-automatic weapon, they go and do something. But in some
    cases it is directed by ISIS.
        Mr. Taylor. OK. Mr. Joscelyn, did you want to add
    something?
        Mr. Joscelyn. Actually, in my previous testimony before
    this committee I had a whole bunch of examples of guys in the
    United States who were contacted by ISIS recruiters in Iraq,
    and Syria, and elsewhere, and how the FBI intervened in those
    cases. That gives you a good guide for the sort of the pull
    aspect of it, people who are reaching out to sort-of get people
    in the fold.
        But you were talking about shooting the--draw the Prophet
    Muhammad Contest. That was actually part of an organized idea
    campaign called the Cartoon Jihad started by al-Qaeda, all the
    way back in Inspire Magazine, where they were encouraging
    people to go out and shoot any kind of venue or publication
    that was drawing images of the prophet Muhammad. I think, in
    that case, there was clear evidence that that influenced their
    thinking on that.
        So the--and I--and this--in that case you can see that
    these ideas are being pushed out by organized terrorist
    organizations to seep into the minds of people like that, and
    then they can act on them.
        Mr. Levin. If I could just interject real quickly?
        Mr. Taylor. Sure.
        Mr. Levin. Over 20 years ago I testified before this
    committee about leaderless resistance. It was another
    committee, excuse me. This movement glorifies lone action or
    small autonomous cells, but they have--it is an ecosystem. They
    are not really loners. They are egged on by peers who not only
    help them operationalize, but amplify and direct where this
    aggression goes. They look at themselves in a chain.
        So what we are seeing now is a perverse thing, where these
    people don't need immediate peers in their town, they can have
    a peer in New Zealand who is imprisoned, and they say, oh, I am
    going to inscribe the next chapter in this book of violence. By
    the way, I am going to put something on the internet, either
    text or video, and that is what is becoming more problematic.
        What we are seeing is a dissipation, but also not only from
    loners, but also what we are worried about is duos and small
    cells, which are harder to detect.
        Mr. Taylor. All right. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield
    back.
        Chairman Thompson. Thank you very much.
        Mr. Soufan referenced Orlando. Our next witness--actually,
    the questioner--is a former chief of police from Orlando, who
    is now a Member of Congress, Congresswoman Val Demings.
        Mrs. Demings. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman and Ranking
    Member, and thank you to our witnesses.
        Mr. Soufan, the Chairman is absolutely right. I am from
    Orlando. The Pulse Nightclub is in my district.
        I walked in on what I thought was a very interesting
    conversation. I was going to say it was strange, but it was a
    conversation, Mr. Bergen, where you were reminding Congress of
    what our job is, and that our job is to write laws, to write
    legislation that will help to keep people in this country safe.
        It is kind-of amazing to me how we have zero tolerance when
    mass numbers of Americans are killed by international
    terrorists, but we sit back and do little or nothing when mass
    numbers of Americans are killed by domestic terrorists.
        You are absolutely right, we can do better. As we talk
    today about the disorganization of National security, surely
    this is one of those areas--in spite of all of the opposition
    that we hear, and the unfounded justifications to not do
    anything, surely this is one of the areas where we can come
    together and work hard to keep Americans safe. If we are not
    doing that, that is the foundation on which we do the rest of
    our work.
        Very, very quickly, would you agree that programs aimed at
    countering home-grown extremism are most effective when they
    have the involvement of local community members and leaders? Do
    you feel that some of the current policies implemented by this
    administration have undermined those partnerships? Could either
    of you elaborate on that?
        Mr. Bergen. To your first, yes.
        To your second, you know, I am not really sure. But the
    point is, you know, it is hard to measure success with these
    programs, because success is something not happening. On the
    other hand, these programs cost almost nothing. I mean your
    committee was instrumental in getting money to--for these
    programs. They are, like, $50 million. I mean it is a drop in
    the bucket.
        Try--you know, throw a few things at the wall, see what
    works, what doesn't work, and understand that this is not
    expensive.
        Mrs. Demings. Anyone else?
        Mr. Joscelyn. Just to echo that point about see what works
    and doesn't work, it is very easy to fund studies to figure out
    which types of programs, with a minimal amount of funding, are
    more effective than others. I mean, yes, it is difficult maybe
    to get the precise metrics you need to figure out which ones--
    because you are--as Peter said, you are stopping something from
    happening.
        But you can also sort-of look at other metrics. I don't
    have the time to get into all that, but there are ways to
    design studies of efficacy for little money, overall.
        Mrs. Demings. Thank you.
        Mr. Soufan. I don't think we can secure our communities
    without the community members and leaders being involved. So
    absolutely, that is, I believe, extremely important.
        Then, hey, if something doesn't work, we will figure out a
    way to make it work. But yes, absolutely, it is a must.
        Mrs. Demings. Thank you. I heard a couple of reports about
    a rise in the attempted radicalization of women.
        No. 1, have you seen that? Can you verify those reports?
        And No. 2, are there any programs or strategies targeting
    that specific concern?
        Mr. Soufan. We have seen that. We have seen that with both
    kinds of, you know, the threats that we are talking about
    today, the white supremacist threats, and also the jihadi
    threats. When it comes to ISIS, for example, women are not
    necessarily the victims. They are as involved, and they did as
    evil activities as the men.
        You just look at what is happening now in camp, and how the
    women of ISIS are trying to bring back ISIS inside the
    detention facility in Syria. So we have seen examples where
    women were involved in recruiting members, women were involved
    in enslaving Yazidis, for example, in Syria and Iraq, and where
    women were involved in, you know, establishing the network.
        The same thing in al-Qaeda. Not to the same level with
    ISIS. Osama bin Laden's wife, for example, was instrumental in
    directing him in so many different ways in his global jihad,
    the mother of Hamza.
        So, yes, women can be victims, but we have seen more and
    more women taking a role of, you know, of a villain.
        Mrs. Demings. Are there any particular programs or
    strategies to address that rise or concern at this point?
        Mr. Soufan. I am not familiar, I don't know if somebody----
        Mr. Bergen. I am not, either, but I will say domestic
    violence is often an indicator that you are going to carry out
    other forms of violence. Jihadist terrorists, we mentioned
    misogyny. Obviously, they are misogynists. But also, they are
    going to carry out acts of domestic violence.
        A thing for the committee to look into is to look at the
    cases in the United States that have been preceded by acts of
    domestic violence.
        Mr. Levin. Also, we recently had a violent Salafist
    Jihadist plotter in Arizona who went to a misogynistic videos
    done by far right. So misogyny not only stands alone, but it is
    also an undercurrent.
        In the white supremacist world, generally women play a much
    different role. They are supposed to make white babies to
    prevent the overthrow of white society.
        Mrs. Demings. OK.
        [Laughter.]
        Mrs. Demings. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
        Chairman Thompson. Well, let me thank the witnesses for
    their very valuable testimony. I have been on the committee
    since it was a select committee, and I--let me say that you
    have far exceeded in your testimony today giving us, as a
    committee, I think, what we really need. Your passion, your
    intellect, with the subject matter, speaks volumes.
        So I don't want to speak for the Ranking Member, but you
    know, we--you all have shared with us a lot of things we needed
    to hear, and your talent is beyond reproach.
        Mr. Rogers. I too have been on this committee since it was
    a select committee, and this is an outstanding panel. You have
    been very valuable, and this has been a great hearing. Thank
    you very much.
        Chairman Thompson. Rest assured we will follow up on a lot
    of things that came out of your testimony today. I don't know
    whether you are going to get credit for it, but it might come
    in a different form.
        All of us supported Mr. King's bill, by the way. It just,
    you know--we just got to keep trying in that.
        So Members may have additional questions for the witnesses,
    and we ask that you respond expeditiously in writing.
        Without objection, the committee record will be kept open
    for 10 days.
        Hearing no further business, the committee stands
    adjourned.
        [Whereupon, at 12:46 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]