FBI Director Christopher Wray highlighted what the FBI sees as some of the leading foreign and domestic threats to the United States in an hour long program at Washington, D.C.’s International Spy Museum last Thursday, September 8.
Wray described the domestic terrorism threat as “persistent,”” and focused on China’s harassment of Chinese-Americans who are critical of Beijing, as well as plots by Iran he described as “showing a level of brazenness and aggression that is palpable and different.”
As far as domestic terrorism, Wray said, the FBI elevated racially-motivated violent extremism to a national threat priority in 2019 “on the same level as ISIS,” and more recently has elevated anti-government, anti-authority, violent extremism. That type of extremism “encompasses everything from militia, violent extremists to anarchist violent extremists,” he said.
Wray briefly mentioned the Iranian plot to assassinate former National Security Adviser John Bolton in 2021 in retaliation for the U.S. drone strike that killed Iranian commander Qasem Soleimani. He also brought up a cyber attack by Tehran on Boston’s Children’s Hospital in 2022, and its covert influence campaign on the 2020 U.S. presidential election.
“That’s all on top of constantly trying to evade international sanctions and being the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism,” Wray said, “So if that’s not enough to convince people that this is a serious threat, I don’t know what is.”
The FBI director said there’s little doubt the threats will become more “complex and sophisticated” in the years ahead
“If we’re going to be effective in protecting America, we have to work more and more closely with the private sector,” he said. “And so I envision a world in which over the period that we’re in, the cohesion and the partnership between the FBI and the business community and academic community is going to just continue to become more and more robust.”
Read more at https://nypost.com/2023/09/11/fbi-director-warns-the-number-of-russian-spies-inside-the-us-is-still-way-too-big/
#christopherwray #fbi #russia
The New York Post is your source for breaking news, news about New York, sports, business, entertainment, opinion, real estate, culture, fashion, and more.
Subscribe to New York Post Sports: https://www.youtube.com/c/nypostsports
Catch the latest news here: https://nypost.com/
Follow The New York Post on:
Twitter – https://twitter.com/nypost
Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/NYPost