Threat Assessment: DHS Raises Concerns on Terrorism and Fentanyl Fatalities

The Department of Homeland Security on Thursday warned of the ongoing high risk of foreign and domestic terrorism but said fentanyl will “continue to kill more Americans than any other threat.”

The guidance came in the agency’s annual Homeland Threat Assessment (HTA) for 2024, released Thursday.

Terrorism “remains a top threat” to the country, according to the HTA.

“We assess that the threat of violence from individuals radicalized in the United States will remain high, but largely unchanged, marked by lone offenders or small group attacks that occur with little warning,” the DHS wrote.

Since January 2022, domestic violent extremists have conducted three fatal attacks resulting in 21 deaths, according to the report.

Writing that foreign terrorist groups — al-Qaida, ISIS — are rebuilding and “could seek to target” the U.S., the HTA notes that the “record encounters of migrants from a growing number of countries have complicated border and immigration security.”

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, warned Monday, the 22nd anniversary of 9/11, that the next mastermind of a 9/11-type attack will enter through the southern border and get transported by the Biden administration to wherever they want to go.

However, “other threats are increasingly crowding the threat space,” DHS said — namely fentanyl.

“We expect illegal drugs produced in Mexico and sold in the United States will continue to kill more Americans than any other threat,” DHS wrote in its HTA. “US-based traffickers have become more involved in the mixing and pressing of fentanyl, contributing to more lethal mixes of this already deadly drug.”

DHS added that “fentanyl has appeared more frequently in counterfeit prescription pills, such as Adderall and Xanax, combinations that raise the risk of overdose, particularly for unwitting users.”

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said more than 100,000 people died from drug overdoes the past year, with synthetic opioids accounting for about 75% of overdoses.

DHS says its various initiatives prevented nearly 10,000 pounds of fentanyl in two months. However, Republicans have frequently taken aim at the Biden administration’s lack of meaningful border security as a top reason for the fentanyl and opioid epidemic in the U.S. That, in addition to the epidemic of crime.

“Joe Biden’s open borders are many things,” Cruz said Monday, listing how they’re a boon for Mexican cartels to flood the U.S. with narcotics. “But it’s also an invitation to terrorists.

“If you’re the next planner of 9/11, it’s obvious where you go. You go to Mexico, and you come right across and Joe Biden and the idiots in his administration will fly you to wherever you want to go in this country, and you can carry out your terror attack,” Cruz said.