Considered opinion: Border securityTerrorists and the southern border: Myth and reality

By Nicholas Rasmussen

Published 11 January 2019

Taken at face value, rhetoric from the White House and DHS would lead Americans to believe that the United States is facing a terrorism crisis at our southern border. The situation being described is one in which thousands of terrorists have been stopped crossing our southern border to infiltrate the Homeland. If that were true, that would indeed be a crisis. Nicholas Rasmussen, who served as director of the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) under Presidents Obama and Trump, writes that “In reality, no such crisis exists. U.S. federal courthouses and prisons are not filled with terrorists captured at the border. There is no wave of terrorist operatives waiting to cross overland into the United States. It simply isn’t true. Anyone in authority using this argument to bolster support for building the wall or any other physical barrier along the southern border is most likely guilty of fear mongering and willfully misleading the American people.”

Taken at face value, rhetoric from the White House and DHS would lead Americans to believe that the United States is facing a terrorism crisis at our southern border. The situation being described is one in which thousands of terrorists have been stopped crossing our southern border to infiltrate the Homeland. If that were true, that would indeed be a crisis.

Nicholas Rasmussen, who served in a series of senior policy and intelligence positions with responsibility for terrorism and counterterrorism matters, most recently serving as director of the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) under Presidents Obama and Trump, says that, in reality, no such crisis exists.

Rasmussen writes in Just Security that U.S. federal courthouses and prisons are not filled with terrorists captured at the border. “There is no wave of terrorist operatives waiting to cross overland into the United States. It simply isn’t true. Anyone in authority using this argument to bolster support for building the wall or any other physical barrier along the southern border is most likely guilty of fear mongering and willfully misleading the American people.”

Rasmussen continues:

Why do I know this? As Director of the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) from December 2014 until December 2017, it was my job to lead the government’s efforts to collect and analyze all available information about terrorist threats to the Homeland. It was my responsibility on behalf of the Intelligence Community to synthesize and present that terrorism picture to our most senior decision makers – up to and including the President of the United States — so that sound decisions could be made about how to protect the Homeland from terrorist attack.