Since late 2020, the Border Patrol along the US-Mexico border has encountered further 6.9 million illegal crossers. A recent one Pew Research survey reveals that 57% of respondents consider “managing immigration” a top policy priority this election year, just below “defense against terrorism” (63%).
In this context, politicians and experts have been quick to confuse these issues, holding numerous congressional hearings on the alleged threat of terrorists entering the United States to commit terrorist acts. This has given rise to a wave of rhetoric about the aforementioned terrorists exploiting border chaos to harm Americans.
Despite this alarmism, the actual threat from foreign-born terrorism is relatively minor and manageable. New research of the Cato Institute indicates that since 1975 the annual probability that an American will be killed in a terrorist attack committed by a foreigner is about one in 4.5 million.
The public remains nervous, however. A serious machine accident AND explosion from a port of entry in New York state on November 22, 2023, was initially mistaken by many journalists and experts as a terrorist attack. At the same time, blatantly fake videos The claim that a terrorist had crossed the border circulated widely on X (formerly Twitter).
Reports that illegal border crossers who are on terrorist watchlists have been arrested appear to validate these fears. A person detained and released by the Border Patrol in March 2023 was later found to be on the watch list. Similarly, Isnardo Garcia-Amado was detained in Arizona in early 2022, released, and then promptly arrested after the government determined he was on the terrorist watchlist.
Since late 2020, the Border Patrol has encountered 357 foreigners on the list of terrorists attempting to illegally cross the southwest border. But being on the watch list does not necessarily indicate an intent to commit terrorist acts on American soil, which is what the public really cares about.
Despite these apprehensions, there have been no convictions, nor have any of the watchlisted individuals been accused of actually planning a terrorist attack – an implausible outcome if they were all actually terrorists. The checklist seems largely to lead to fears of Colombians previously involved with groups such as the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), which do not pose a direct threat to the United States.
The government should be vigilant, but the public should temper their fears about terrorists crossing the U.S. border. According to the Cato study, no Americans have been killed in a terrorist attack on American soil carried out by an immigrant who entered illegally across a land or sea border. That’s not to say that such an event could never happen: it absolutely could. But so far away, there is little evidence to suggest that terrorists are using this route or intend to do so.
The actual risk posed by foreigners entering via routes other than the southern border varies considerably. For example, since 1975 the annual chance of being killed in a terrorist attack committed by an illegal immigrant has been zero. Nearly 98% of all foreign-born terrorist victims were killed in the September 11 terrorist attacks, the bloodiest in world history. The 9/11 hijackers entered as tourists and students, all with visas.
This is not to trivialize the threat posed by foreign-born terrorists to the life, liberty and private property of Americans. Since 1975, there have been 3,046 people killed by foreign-born terrorists on American soil. Each of those deaths is a tragedyjustifying a certain level of continued vigilance and resources from the government.
However, perspective is crucial. During the same period, nearly 990,000 people were killed in the United States through regular criminal homicides, about 323 times more than those killed by foreign-born terrorists.
If the media and political discussions were proportional, they would spend approximately one minute addressing foreign-origin terrorist threats for every 5.5 hours they spend on the regular murder threat. However, Republicans on the House Subcommittee on Integrity, Security, and Immigration Enforcement argued just as many hearings on illegal immigrant terrorists along the border as well as on normal crime, although there have been no noteworthy attacks.
It is critical that Americans understand the true scope of the terrorist threat to avoid exaggerated fears that lead to poor policy decisions. Those wrong policies, informed by inaccurate risk assessments, led U.S. policymakers to allocate disproportionate resources to a relatively minor and manageable threat. A rational evaluation of the facts should allow us to breathe a cautious sigh of relief, recalibrating our attention towards more urgent internal issues.