FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
ODNI News Release No. 42-25
December 11, 2025
President Trump’s Leadership Stops Terrorists: NCTC Director Kent
Delivers Opening Statement at Worldwide Threats Hearing
WASHINGTON D.C. – Today, National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) Director Joe Kent testified before the House Committee on Homeland Security on "Worldwide Threats to the Homeland,” joining Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and the Federal Bureau of Investigation's National Security Branch Operations Director Michael Glasheen, to brief lawmakers on the terrorism threat landscape and the state of U.S. counterterrorism operations.
Director Kent testified that President Trump’s decisive leadership is keeping Americans safe, highlighting the Administration’s actions against Jihadist threats and intelligence efforts to combat violent gangs and cartels as Foreign Terrorist Organizations.
Director Kent's full opening statement, as delivered, can be found here and below:
"Thank you very much Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member, and all the Members of the House, I appreciate the opportunity to appear before you and discuss the threats posed to our nation. Despite the progress that we've made so far in the Trump Administration, the threat posed by terrorists of all brands remains very high. Right now, we've made significant progress under President Trump's leadership. We have the Jihadis of ISIS and Al-Qaeda on the run in Iraq and Syria, thanks to the decisive action and the strikes that we've taken there recently since President Trump took office in January.
"However, we have a persistent threat from the individuals that were allowed into this country by the previous administration. The number one threat that we have right now, in my view, is the fact that we don't know who came into our country in the last four years of Biden's open borders. What we have identified is alarming, and I want to share that with you today.
"We just recently put out a warning of the heightened risk of terrorist attacks posed to the homeland by terrorists pretty much of all stripes, but in particular, from ISIS and from Al-Qaeda. NCTC has been crunching the numbers and going through the sheer volume of known and suspected terrorists that are in the country that came in under the Biden Administration.
"So far, NCTC has identified around 18,000 known and suspected terrorists that the Biden Administration let come into our country. These are individuals, who, under normal circumstances, would never be allowed to enter our country because of their ties to Jihadist groups like ISIS and Al-Qaeda. Yet, the Biden Administration not only let them into the country, in many cases, facilitated their entry into the country. Just like the entry of the Afghan terrorists who committed the terrorist attack here just before Thanksgiving, killing one of our National Guard members and wounding another, that Afghan was brought into the country as a group of over 100,000 Afghans who were brought here during the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan.
"These individuals, despite what has been reported, were not vetted properly to come into the United States. The individual terrorist who committed the attack in DC, he was vetted to serve as a soldier in Afghanistan. The Biden Administration essentially used his tactical level vetting as a ruse to bring him here and to bring him into our communities, and we've seen the tragic results of that.
"Now that Afghan, that attacker, that terrorist, is just one of 88,000. We've identified 2,000 of that group of 88,000 who have ties to terrorist organizations. We're working right now hand in hand with DHS and with the FBI, to run down this 2,000 — the Afghans who came here under Allies Welcome who have ties to terrorist organizations — and additionally, the other 16,000 individuals of ties to terrorist organizations that Biden let into our country. That is probably the top terrorist threat that we face right now, and that doesn't include the individuals who came here illegally through the open border. That number alarmingly remains unknown at this time. We're trying to figure out who those individuals are as well.
"Also adding to this elevated threat, we have ISIS and Al-Qaeda that have found sanctuary in places like Afghanistan and Syria due to the transitional nature of those governments. And also, again, in Iraq and some of the hinterlands of Iraq. And these terrorists are able to communicate and spread their propaganda and a lot of their know-how, thanks to the proliferation of encrypted apps and also due to just the internet writ large. The new terrorist tactic that we're seeing more and more is moving away from very deliberate cellular attacks that we can infiltrate easily while they communicate into an inspirational methodology where you have key members putting out media and putting out how-to guides to reach out and to touch individuals inside the United States. We recently disrupted one of those attacks just before Halloween, thanks to the work of the FBI, with support from really the entire US intelligence community and the joint terrorism task force model in Michigan. That plot touched multiple states and had ties to ISIS inside Iraq and Syria.
"Another issue that we are addressing right now, thanks to the decisive leadership of President Trump is the scourge of fentanyl, gang and cartel violence under President Trump's leadership. We've designated these cartels and gangs as terrorist organizations, and we've done that rightfully so. These individuals, these terrorists, have killed hundreds of thousands of Americans. As these Angel Families will tell you firsthand, what President Trump has done by designating them as terrorists has allowed us to turn the tools of the Intelligence Community against them and predominantly watchlist them as terrorists, to prevent them from ever coming into America in the first place. To date, we've added about 35,000 of these narco-terrorists to our terrorist watch list, and we've stopped just around 6,000 of these terrorists from ever entering our country, from setting foot inside of America so they can no longer kill Americans with impunity.
"These are just some of the issues that we're covering 24/7/365 at the National Counterterrorism Center, and I look forward to discussing more with you all today. Thank you."
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