President Trump has signed the first new National Counterterrorism Strategy of his second term, identifying three priority threat categories: narcoterrorists and transnational gangs, legacy Islamist terrorists, and — in a significant departure from prior administrations — violent left-wing extremists, including those motivated by radically pro-transgender ideology.
The strategy states America’s counterterrorism efforts will “prioritize the rapid identification and neutralization of violent secular political groups whose ideology is anti-American, radically pro-transgender, and anarchist.”
Senior Director for Counterterrorism Sebastian Gorka cited specific recent violence in framing the new priority, stating: “Whether it is the cartels, the jihadists or violent left-wing extremists like antifa and like the transgender killers, the nonbinary, the left-wing radicals who killed my friend Charlie Kirk, we will take them on, head-on.”
The strategy marks a sharp reversal from the Biden administration, which designated white supremacy as the most dangerous domestic terrorism threat in 2023. The document covers cartels first — justified by the fact that fentanyl trafficking has killed more Americans than foreign terrorist attacks since World War II — followed by Islamist groups and then violent left-wing extremists.
The strategy also pledges that “counterterrorism powers will not be used to target our fellow Americans who simply disagree with us” — a direct contrast with the Biden DOJ’s documented targeting of pro-life Christians under the FACE Act. Gorka confirmed the administration would “map” Antifa, “identify their membership,” and use law enforcement tools to “cripple them operationally before they can maim or kill the innocent.” The pattern of left-wing and transgender ideology-motivated attacks on Christians, conservatives, and Catholic institutions — documented across multiple incidents including the Minneapolis church shooting — forms the factual foundation for the new classification.
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