Terrorism in the United States
In the United States, a common definition of terrorism is the systematic or threatened use of violence in order to create a general climate of fear to intimidate a population or government and thereby effect political, religious, or ideological change. This article serves as a list and a compilation of acts of terrorism, attempts to commit acts of terrorism, and other such items which pertain to terrorist activities which are engaged in by non-state actors or spies who are acting in the interests of state actors or persons who are acting without the approval of foreign governments within the domestic borders of the United States.
During the American Civil War, pro-Confederate Bushwhackers and pro-Union Jayhawkers in Missouri and Kansas respectively engaged in cross border raids, committed acts of violence against civilians and soldiers, stole goods and burned down farms. The most infamous event occurred in Lawrence, Kansas on August 21, 1863, when Quantrill's Raiders led by William Quantrill [Lawrence Massacre|ransacked the town and Murder of David Gunn|murdered about 190 civilians] because of the town's anti-slavery sentiment. Other acts of terrorism occurred during the war included the 1863 Chesapeake Affair and the 1864 St. Albans Raid, the former being committed by British subjects.
Since the end of the Civil War, organized groups or lone wolf white supremacists have committed many acts of domestic terrorism against African Americans. This form of terrorism has consisted of lynchings, hate crimes, [Mass Mass shootings in the United States|shootings in the United States|shootings], bombings and other acts of violence. Such acts of violence overwhelmingly occurred in the Southern United States, and they included acts of violence which were committed by the Ku Klux Klan. White supremacist terrorist incidents include the Tulsa race massacre of 1921, the Rosewood massacre of 1923, and the Wilmington insurrection of 1898.
In 2019, Matthew Alcoke, Deputy Assistant Director of the FBI Counterterrorism Division, defined domestic terrorists as "individuals who commit violent criminal acts in furtherance of ideological goals stemming from domestic issues." Although acts of violence by domestic extremists meet the definition, no US criminal charge for domestic terror exists. Rather, the phrase is an FBI investigative category used to classify four types of extremism: "racially motivated violent extremism, anti-government/anti-authority extremism, animal rights/environmental extremism, and abortion extremism." A 2017 report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office found that out of the 85 deadly extremist incidents which had occurred since September 11, 2001, white supremacist extremist groups were responsible for 73%, while radical Islamist extremists were responsible for 27%. The total number of deaths caused by each group was about the same. However, 41% of the deaths that were attributable to radical Islamists all occurred in a single event — the 2016 Orlando nightclub shooting in which 49 people were killed by a lone gunman. No deaths were attributed to left-wing groups. A 2017 report by Type Media Center and The Center for Investigative Reporting analyzed a list of the terrorist incidents which occurred in the US between 2008 and 2016 and included the 2014 killings of NYPD officers and the 2016 shooting of Dallas police officers.
In 2018, most ideologically motivated murders in the United States of America were linked to right-wing extremism. As of 2020, right-wing extremist terrorism accounted for the majority of terrorist attacks and plots in the US and has killed more people in the continental United States since the September 11 attacks than Islamic terrorism. The United States Department of Homeland Security reported in October 2020 that white supremacists posed the top domestic terrorism threat, which FBI director Christopher Wray confirmed in March 2021, noting that the bureau had elevated the threat to the same level as ISIS.
Totals in the U.S.
| Year | Number of incidents | Deaths | Injuries |
| 2017 | 65 | 95 | 932 |
| 2016 | 64 | 68 | 139 |
| 2015 | 38 | 54 | 58 |
| 2014 | 29 | 26 | 19 |
| 2013 | 20 | 23 | 436 |
| 2012 | 20 | 7 | 7 |
| 2011 | 10 | 0 | 2 |
| 2010 | 17 | 4 | 17 |
| 2009 | 11 | 18 | 41 |
| 2008 | 18 | 2 | 13 |
| 2007 | 8 | 0 | 0 |
| 2006 | 6 | 1 | 14 |
| 2005 | 21 | 0 | 0 |
| 2004 | 9 | 0 | 0 |
| 2003 | 33 | 0 | 0 |
| 2002 | 33 | 4 | 11 |
| 2001 | 41 | 3,008 | 16,515 |
| 2000 | 32 | 0 | 7 |
| 1999 | 53 | 20 | 40 |
| 1998 | 31 | 4 | 3 |
| 1997 | 40 | 2 | 18 |
| 1996 | 35 | 2 | 119 |
| 1995 | 60 | 178 | 738 |
| 1994 | 55 | 10 | 16 |
| 1993 | 36 | 10 | 1,005 |
| 1992 | 32 | 2 | 3 |
| 1991 | 30 | 2 | 4 |
| 1990 | 32 | 5 | 7 |
| 1989 | 42 | 3 | 14 |
| 1988 | 27 | 1 | 1 |
| 1987 | 34 | 1 | 1 |
| 1986 | 49 | 1 | 36 |
| 1985 | 40 | 3 | 13 |
| 1984 | 63 | 3 | 780 |
| 1983 | 44 | 8 | 5 |
| 1982 | 78 | 11 | 37 |
| 1981 | 74 | 8 | 15 |
| 1980 | 67 | 15 | 22 |
| 1979 | 69 | 18 | 58 |
| 1978 | 87 | 8 | 8 |
| 1977 | 130 | 4 | 17 |
| 1976 | 105 | 4 | 41 |
| 1975 | 149 | 24 | 158 |
| 1974 | 94 | 16 | 54 |
| 1973 | 58 | 45 | 33 |
| 1972 | 68 | 10 | 35 |
| 1971 | 247 | 20 | 55 |
| 1970 | 468 | 33 | 160 |
| Total | 2,872 | 3,781 | 21,707 |
A 2017 report by The Nation Institute and the Center for Investigative Reporting analyzed a list of the terrorist incidents which occurred in the US between 2008 and 2016. It found:115 far-right inspired terrorist incidents. 35% of these incidents were foiled and 29% of them resulted in fatalities. These incidents caused 79 deaths.63 Islamist inspired terrorist incidents. 76% of these terrorist incidents were foiled and 13% of them resulted in fatalities. These incidents caused 90 deaths.19 far-left inspired terrorist incidents. 20% of these terrorist incidents were foiled and 10% of them resulted in fatalities. Two of these incidents were described as "plausibly" attributed to a perpetrator with left-wing sympathies and caused 7 deaths. These are not included in the official government database.
According to a report which is based on Justice Department figures which were released by the U.S. government in January 2018, about three out of four people who were convicted on charges of international terrorism between September 11, 2001, to December 31, 2016, were foreign-born. According to the Justice Department, 549 people were convicted on charges of international terrorism, including 254 people who were citizens of other countries, 148 people were naturalized citizens and 148 people were natural-born-citizens. In a speech made before a joint session of Congress on February 28, 2017, President Donald Trump incorrectly attributed these findings to domestic terrorism; in actuality, the findings were based on cases in which international terrorists may have been brought to the United States for prosecution.
In 2015, the Triangle Center on Terrorism and Homeland Security and the Police Executive Research Forum conducted a nationwide survey of 382 police and sheriff departments. Nearly 74% of respondents stated that anti-government violence was their top concern with regard to threats from violent extremists, while about 39% of respondents stated that "Al Qaeda-inspired" violence was their top concern.
For the past decade, the national conversation on terrorism has largely focused on Islamic extremist acts, however, law enforcement groups have made it clear that Muslim extremists perpetrate a minute percentage of the ideologically based terrorist attacks which are perpetrated in the United States. Since November 9, 2001, only about 9 American Muslims per year have taken part in terrorist plots in the United States, in total, 20 incidents resulted in about 50 deaths. A 2012 study showed that in about the same time period right-wing extremists were responsible for about 337 attacks per year, in total, they killed more than 5 times the number of people killed by Muslims in the United States.
The National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism maintains Profiles of Individual Radicalization in the United States, a database which contains over 1,800 profiles of individuals who have been radicalized by ideologies since 1948. The database shows that from 1948 through 2016, 40.0% of identified extremists were far-right, 24.5% of identified extremists were Islamist and 17.4% of identified extremists were far-left, while 18.2% of identified extremists were "single issue" individuals.
In May 2019 and for the first time in its history, the FBI identified fringe conspiracy theories as a potential source of domestic terrorism, it specifically cited QAnon.
A June 2020 study of domestic terrorist incidents by the Center for Strategic and International Studies reported that during the previous 25 years, the majority of attacks and plots were perpetrated and hatched by far-right attackers. This trend has accelerated in recent years, with this sector being responsible for about 66% of all of the attacks and plots which were perpetrated in 2019, and it was also responsible for 90% of all of those attacks which were perpetrated in 2020. The next most potentially dangerous group has been "religious extremists", the majority "Salafi jihadists inspired by the Islamic State and al-Qaeda", while the number planned by the far left has reduced to a minute fraction since the mid-2000s.
In October 2020, the Department of Homeland Security released the Homeland Threat Assessment, a report detailing various domestic threats to US national security. It states that, out of all domestic terror attacks resulting in lethal threats to life between 2018 and 2019, "WSEs conducted half of all lethal attacks, resulting in the majority of deaths ".
Soon after the assassination of Charlie Kirk, U.S. President Trump claimed that "the radicals on the left are the problem" with political violence. Opinion editors, as well as both far-right commentators and Trump critics, have compared Charlie Kirk's killing to the Reichstag fire—the 1933 arson of the German parliament building that Hitler used as a pretext to suspend civil liberties and prosecute political opposition—some calling Kirk's killing Trump's "Reichstag fire moment". How Democracies Die author, professor Steven Levitsky, said that exploiting Charlie Kirk's killing to justify unleashing attacks on critics is "page one of the authoritarian playbook".
Attacks by type
Anti-abortion violence
Since 1997, there have been 8 murders, 17 attempted murders, 42 bombings, and 186 arson attacks aimed at abortion clinics and multiple providers across the US. In some cases small groups of clinics have been attacked multiple times.- 1991: The Central Ohio Women's Clinic that was housed in a building owned by the Planned Parenthood of Central Ohio in Columbus, Ohio was burned by members of the Christian Liberation Army, with damages estimates $75,000 in damages. Nine days later threw a firebomb into the Capital Care Women's Center in Columbus, Ohio, leaving damages sustained $250,000 in damages.
- 1993: Dr. David Gunn was murdered by anti-abortion extremist and Christian fundamentalist, Michael F. Griffin.
- 1994: Abortion provider Dr. John Britton and James Barrett and his wife June became victims of Reverend Paul Jennings Hill.
- 1996–1998: anti-abortion extremist Eric Rudolph cited biblical passages as his motivation for a series of bombings, including Atlanta's Olympic Centennial Park, a lesbian bar, and several abortion clinics. Rudolph acknowledges his attacks were religiously motivated, but denies that his brief association with the racist Christian Identity movement was a motivation for his attacks.
- 1996: Dr. Calvin Jackson of New Orleans, Louisiana was stabbed 15 times, losing 4 pints of blood. Donald Cooper was charged with second degree attempted murder and was sentenced to 20 years. "Donald Cooper's Day of Violence", by Kara Lowentheil, Choice! Magazine, December 21, 2004
- 1998: Anti-abortion extremist James Kopp murdered Dr. Barnett Slepian and went on a series of anti-abortion shooting sprees, both in the U.S. and Canada.
- 2006: David McMenemy of Rochester Hills, Michigan, crashed his car into the Edgerton Women's Care Center in Davenport, Iowa. He then doused the lobby in gasoline and started a fire. McMenemy committed these acts in the belief that the center was performing abortions; however, Edgerton is not an abortion clinic. Time magazine listed the incident in a "Top 10 Inept Terrorist Plots" list.
- 2009: Anti-abortion extremist Scott Roeder murdered Dr. George Tiller in Kansas.
- 2015: Robert Lewis Dear killed three people in a shooting at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs, Colorado. At his court hearings Dear declared himself a "warrior for the babies".
Antisemitism
- October 12, 1958: Bombing of the Hebrew Benevolent Congregation Temple of Atlanta, Georgia. The acts were carried out by white supremacists.
- June 18, 1984: Alan Berg, a Jewish lawyer-talk show host was shot and killed in the driveway of his home on Capitol Hill, Denver, Colorado, by members of a neo-Nazi group called The Order. Earlier and on the show, Berg had stridently argued with a member of the group who was later convicted of his murder.
- 1977 Washington, D.C. attack and hostage taking of Jewish hostages at the B'nai B'rith by members of a black Muslim group that had split away from the Nation of Islam.
- August 10, 1999: Los Angeles Jewish Community Center shooting in Granada Hills, California of Los Angeles. 5 people were wounded in the Jewish community center and its daycare facility. The gunman, Buford O. Furrow had antisemitic and anti-government views. Shortly thereafter, Furrow murdered a mail carrier, fled the state, and finally surrendered to authorities.
- June 10, 2009: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum shooting: 88-year-old James Wenneker von Brunn, a white supremacist and neo-Nazi, walked into the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., shooting and mortally wounding Stephen Tyrone Johns, a security guard. Von Brunn was wounded when other museum guards immediately returned fire and on January 6, 2010, while he was awaiting trial, von Brunn died of natural causes in a hospital which was located near the prison where he was being held. During the investigation it was discovered that von Brunn had planned to target White House senior adviser David Axelrod leading to increased protection for Axelrod and other steps.
- April 13, 2014: Overland Park Jewish Community Center shooting: 3 killed and 1 critically injured in shootings at Jewish Community Center of Greater Kansas City and Village Shalom in Overland Park, Kansas. Suspect is 74-year-old Frazier Glenn Miller, Jr. On April 27, 2015, Miller told the Associated Press that he planned to plead guilty and he also stated that his motivation was to "put the Jews on trial where they belong".
- January 10, 2018: Murder of Blaze Bernstein: A 19 year old gay Jewish student from the University of Pennsylvania was killed by a former classmate and member of the neo-Nazi terrorist organization Atomwaffen Division in Orange County, California.
- October 27, 2018: Pittsburgh synagogue shooting: A mass shooting occurred at Tree of Life – Or L'Simcha Congregation in the Squirrel Hill neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, on October 27, 2018, while a service was being held. Eleven people were killed, and six were injured. The sole suspect, 46-year-old Robert Gregory Bowers, was arrested and charged with 29 federal crimes and 36 state crimes.
- April 27, 2019: Poway synagogue shooting: A 19 year old nursing student, inspired by the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and the Christchurch mosque shootings in Christchurch, New Zealand, announced his plans to shoot up the synagogue on 8chan by posting an open letter. One woman was killed, and three were injured.
- December 10, 2019: Jersey City Kosher Grocery Shooting: Three people were shot and killed in a kosher grocery store in Jersey City by two heavily armed assailants, David N. Anderson and Francine Graham. The assailants wounded another customer and two police officers before being killed by police. It was determined in the subsequent investigation that the Anderson and Francine had planned a much larger attack on the Jewish community.
Environmental terrorism
Islamic extremism
- September 11, 2001, perpetrated by foreign national al-Qaeda members:
- * : Hijackers take control of two commercial jets containing passengers and fuel, flying them into the World Trade Center, killing hundreds on impact and an additional 2,606 when the towers subsequently collapsed. More than 6,000 people were injured.
- * : 5 Hijackers fly a Boeing 757-223 containing 53 passengers and 6 crew into the Pentagon, killing all 64 aboard and an additional 125 people on the ground.
- * : 33 passengers and 7 crew are killed after attempting to regain control from four hijackers that planned to fly the Boeing 757 into either the U.S. Capitol building or the White House. All 44 occupants died on impact after hijackers forced the plane into a nose dive.
- June 1, 2009: Little Rock recruiting office shooting, : A US-born convert to Islam shoots a local soldier to death inside a recruiting center explicitly in the name of Allah.
- November 5, 2009: Fort Hood shooting, Ft. Hood, Texas: A Muslim Palestinian-American psychiatrist guns down thirteen unarmed soldiers while yelling praises to Allah.
- April 15, 2013: Boston Marathon bombing : Foreign-born Muslims detonate two bombs packed with ball bearings at the Boston Marathon, killing three people and causing several more to lose limbs.
- September 25, 2014: Vaughan Foods beheading incident, : A US-born convert and Sharia advocate beheads a woman after calling for Islamic terror and posting an Islamist beheading photo.
- July 16, 2015: Chattanooga shootings, Chattanooga, Tennessee: A Kuwaiti-born Muslim commits a shooting spree at a recruiting center at a strip mall and a naval center, leaving five soldiers dead at the latter location.
- November 4, 2015: University of California, Merced stabbing attack by Islamist extremist
- December 2, 2015: San Bernardino attack, San Bernardino, California: A couple opens fire at a Christmas party, leaving fourteen dead.
- January 7, 2016: Shooting of Jesse Hartnett, Philadelphia police officer Jesse Hartnett is ambushed by a gunman who later pledged allegiance to ISIS.
- February 11, 2016: Ohio restaurant machete attack by Islamist extremist
- June 12, 2016: Orlando nightclub shooting, Orlando, Florida: Omar Mateen shoots and kills 49 people and injures 58 more at a gay bar, the largest mass shooting in U.S. history at the time.
- November 28, 2016: Ohio State University attack, Columbus, Ohio: A Somali student, Abdul Artan, who came to the U.S. as a refugee, intentionally rammed a car into pedestrians on a busy campus sidewalk on Monday morning and then began slashing passers-by with a butcher knife, the authorities said, injuring 11 students and faculty and staff members.
- October 31, 2017: New York City truck attack, New York City: 29-year-old Sayfullo Habibullaevich Saipov rented a Home Depot pickup truck and intentionally drove it through a bicycle path. He crashed into a school bus and then exited the vehicle wielding look-a-like weapons. He was shot by NYPD. 8 people were killed and 12 were injured.
- December 6, 2019: Naval Air Station Pensacola shooting, Pensacola, Florida: A second lieutenant of the Saudi Royal Air Force training at the Naval Air Station in Pensacola opened fire in one of the classroom buildings killing 3 and wounding 8 others before being shot dead by responding police officers.
- May 21, 2020: Corpus Christi, Texas: At the Naval Air Station Corpus Christi, Adam Alsahi crashed through a northern perimeter gate at NAS Corpus Christi, activating vehicle barriers. The driver then got out and opened fire before being shot and killed. A Navy police officer was shot but was protected by a ballistic vest. Alsahi had expressed support for terrorist networks including ISIS. The FBI announced the incident as terrorism-related.
- January 1, 2025: New Orleans truck attack, New Orleans, Louisiana: Shamsud-Din Jabbar drove a truck into a crowd of people on Bourbon Street and Canal Street, killing 14 people and injuring another 57. He then got out of the truck and shot at the police before being shot and killed. The police found more guns, a bomb, and an ISIS flag in the truck.
Left-wing and anti-government extremism
- September 6, 1901: President William McKinley was assassinated by Michigan born Russian-Polish anarchist, Leon Czolgosz, in Buffalo, New York.
- November 24, 1917: A bomb explodes in a Milwaukee police station, killing nine officers and a civilian. Anarchists were suspected.
- April through June 1919: A series of bombings and attempted bombings by Galleanist anarchists from. Targets included anti-immigration politicians, anti-anarchist officials, prominent businessmen, a journalist and a church.
- September 16, 1920: Wall Street bombing: The explosion killed 30 people, and another 10 later died of wounds from the blast. 143 were seriously injured.
- 1969–1977: The Weather Underground, a radical socialist movement, committed dozens of bombings and other terrorist activities over this time period. List of Weatherman actions
- August 7, 1969: Twenty were injured by radical leftist Sam Melville in a bombing of the Marine Midland Building in New York City.
- September 18, 1969: The Federal Building in New York City was bombed by radical leftist Jane Alpert.
- October 7, 1969: Fifth floor of the Armed Forces Induction Center in New York City was devastated by explosion attributed to radical leftist Jane Alpert.
- November 12, 1969: A bomb was detonated in the Manhattan Criminal Court building in New York City. Jane Alpert, Sam Melville, and 3 other militant radical leftists were arrested hours later.
- 1971–1975: The New World Liberation Front was a radical left-wing group in the San Francisco area in the 1970s that conducted multiple bombings in the Bay area over a 3-year period. They claim nearly 50 successful bombings.
- March 1, 1971: The radical leftist group Weather Underground exploded a bomb in the United States Capitol to protest the U.S. invasion of Laos.
- January 2–4, 1973: A bomb exploded at a United States Navy recruiting center in Portland, Oregon and two days later an Army recruiting center in the same city was dynamited by a group of anti-war activists in a conspiracy which included academic and bookseller Frank Stearns Giese.
- June 13, 1974: The 29th floor of the Gulf Tower in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, was bombed with dynamite at 9:41 pm resulting in no injuries. The radical leftist group Weather Underground took credit, but no suspects have ever been identified.
- May 31, 1975 – 1978: George Jackson Brigade bombings
- January 26, 1980: The home and car of Nguyen Thanh Hoang, a Vietnamese anti-communist journalist, were firebombed in Arlington County, Virginia. No one was injured. Hoang had received letters urging him to stop his anti-communist propaganda. After the event, two letters which claimed responsibility for the bombings were signed by a group calling itself the 'Action Squad'.
- November 7, 1983: U.S. Senate bombing. The Armed Resistance Unit, a militant leftist group, bombed the United States Capitol in response to the U.S. invasion of Grenada.
- May and June 1984: Earl Steven Karr planted over 20 pipe-bombs all around Minnesota, Illinois and Wisconsin. He was arrested in Mason City, Iowa after a pipe-bomb he was transporting detonated in the trunk of his car. Karr suffered second degree burns in the explosion. Only one person is known to have been injured by his explosives. Karr, a man with mental problems who stated he was a "former homosexual", left notes near the bombs which named the "North Central Gay Strike Force Against Public and Police Oppression" as the responsible party. A motive could not be determined other than a dislike of the towns the bombs were placed in.
- May 19, 2012: Three men were arrested after a raid an apartment, seized pipe bomb instructions, an improvised mortar made of PVC piping, a crossbow, knives, shurikens, a map of Chicago and four fire bombs, authorities confirmed. On April 25, 2014, the three men were sentenced to eight to five years in prison, considerably reducing initial penalties of up to thirty years.
- June 14, 2017: Congressional baseball shooting. James T. Hodgkinson was distraught over the 2016 election of President Donald J. Trump, and opened fire on an Alexandria, Virginia, baseball field where the Republican congressional team was practicing for the following day's Congressional Baseball Game. Majority whip Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana was one of four who were wounded. Hodgkinson was fatally shot by police who arrived at the scene within a few minutes of the shooting.
- July 4, 2025: Eleven people in Northern Texas coordinated an ambush on an ICE immigration facility in Alvarado. The attackers vandalized police vehicles in order to lure officers outside. After shooting one police officer in the neck, who also survived, the militants retreated. Multiple assault rifles, radios, and tactical vests were located near the facility. A manhunt immediately began for suspects. As of November 11, 2025, 18 people have been arrested in connection to the attack. Three days later a lone-wolf attack occurred at another immigration facility in Southern Texas, targeting CBP, where the attacker was killed and three more were injured.
Palestinian and anti-Israel militancy
- June 5, 1968: Sirhan Sirhan, a Palestinian with Jordanian citizenship, assassinated Democratic presidential nominee, Robert F. Kennedy, in the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, California, because of Kennedy's strong support of Israel. Some scholars believe the assassination was one of the first major incidents of political violence in the United States stemming from the Arab–Israeli conflict in the Middle East.
- March 4, 1973: A failed terrorist attack by Palestinian group Black September, with car bombings in New York City while Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir was visiting the city
- June 1, 1973: Yosef Alon, the Israeli Air Force attache in Washington, D.C., was shot and killed outside his home in Chevy Chase, Maryland. Palestinian militant group Black September is suspected, though the case remains unsolved.
- July 1, 1973: In Montgomery County, Maryland, an Israeli diplomat is gunned down in his driveway by Palestinian activist.
- February 26, 1993 World Trade Center bombing, : Ramzi Yousef detonates a massive truck bomb under the World Trade Center, killing six people and injuring over 1,000 in an effort to collapse the towers.
- 1994 Brooklyn Bridge shooting: a van filled with Jewish schoolboys to avenge of Cave of the Patriarchs massacre.
- February 23, 1997: A Palestinian teacher, Ali Hassan Abu Kamal traveled to the top of the Empire State building where he shot seven people before killing himself.
- January 5, 2002: Charlie J. Bishop stole a Cessna 172, and crashed into the Bank of America Tower in downtown Tampa, Florida. Bishop was the sole fatality and no one else was injured. Bishop wrote a letter, saying that he was inspired by Osama bin Laden and 9/11 and praised the attacks as a "justified response to actions against Palestinians and Iraqis", and was acting on behalf of Al-Qaeda
- July 4, 2002: Los Angeles International Airport shooting: Two people were killed and four others injured by a terrorist who opened fire at the El Al ticket counter.
- July 28, 2006: Seattle Jewish Federation shooting, : An "angry" Pakistani-American who converted to Christianity uses a young girl as a hostage in an attempt to enter a local Jewish center, where he shoots six women, one of whom dies.
Puerto Rican nationalism
- March 1, 1954: United States Capitol shooting incident. Four Puerto Rican nationalists shoot and wound five members of the United States Congress during an immigration debate.
- October 14, 1969: The Fuerzas Armadas de Liberación Nacional, a Puerto Rican nationalist group, claims responsibility for a small bomb explosion at Macy's Herald Square
- January 24, 1975: FALN bombs Fraunces Tavern in New York City, killing four and injuring more than 50.
- December 29, 1975: A bomb set off by FALN in East Harlem, New York, permanently disables a police officer while causing him to lose an eye.
- August 3, 1977: FALN bombs exploded on the twenty-first floor of 342 Madison Avenue in New York City, which housed United States Department of Defense security personnel, as well as the Mobil Building at 150 East Forty-Second Street, killing one. In addition the group warned that bombs were located in thirteen other buildings, including the Empire State Building and the World Trade Center resulting in the evacuation of one hundred thousand people. Five days later a bomb attributed to the group was found in the AMEX building.
- May 3, 1979: FALN exploded a bomb outside of the Shubert Theatre in Chicago, injuring five people.
- March 15, 1980: Armed members of FALN raided the campaign headquarters of President Jimmy Carter in Chicago and the campaign headquarters of George H. W. Bush in New York City. Seven people in Chicago and ten people in New York were tied up as the offices were vandalized before the FALN members fled. A few days later, Carter delegates in Chicago received threatening letters from FALN.
- May 16, 1981: One was killed in an explosion in the toilets at the Pan Am terminal at New York's JFK airport. The bombing is claimed by the Puerto Rican Resistance Army.
- December 31, 1982: FALN explodes bombs outside of the 26 Federal Plaza in Manhattan, Federal Bureau of Investigation Headquarters and a United States courthouse in Brooklyn. Three New York Police Department police officers are blinded with one officer losing both eyes. All three officers sustained other serious injuries trying to defuse a second Federal Plaza bomb.
Right-wing and anti-government extremism
- August 21, 1863: Lawrence Massacre: The Confederate guerrilla group Quantrill's Raiders led by William Quantrill raided and committed a massacre on the Unionist town of Lawrence, Kansas due to the town's long support of abolition, killing about 190 civilians.
- December 7, 1863: Chesapeake affair: Pro-Confederate British subjects from the Maritime Provinces hijacked the American steamer Chesapeake off the coast of Cape Cod, Massachusetts, killing a crew member and wounding three others in the ensuing gunfight. The intent of this hijacking was to use the ship as a blockade runner for the Confederacy under the belief that they had an official Confederate letter of marque.
- October 19, 1864: St. Albans Raid: Confederate soldiers without proper uniform raided the border town of St. Albans, Vermont from the Province of Canada, robbing $208,000 from three banks, holding hostages, killing a civilian and wounding two others, and attempting to burn the entire town with Greek fire.
- April 19, 1995: Oklahoma City bombing: A truck bomb destroyed the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in downtown Oklahoma City, killing 168 people. Far-right terrorists Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols were convicted in the bombing; McVeigh was executed by lethal injection in 2001.
- July 27, 1996: Centennial Olympic Park bombing by Eric Robert Rudolph occurred in Atlanta, Georgia, during the Atlanta Olympics. One person was killed and 111 injured. In a statement released in 2005 Rudolph said the motive was to protest abortion and the "global socialist" Olympic Movement.
- July 27, 2008: Knoxville Unitarian Universalist church shooting: Jim David Adkisson enters the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church in Knoxville, Tennessee with a shotgun, killing two and injuring several congregants before being tackled to the ground. Adkisson stated to the police and in a manifesto that he desired to kill Democrats, liberals, African Americans and homosexuals. Adkisson pleaded guilty to the crime in February 2009 and was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
- November 1, 2013: 2013 Los Angeles International Airport shooting: 23-year-old Paul Ciancia kills a Transportation Security Administration agent and wounds 7 others, 3 of them TSA agents. Ciancia was shot and taken into custody. A note found in Ciancia's pocket said he believed he was a "patriot" upset at former Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, and that he wanted to kill "TSA and pigs".
- March 14, 2014: Robert James Talbot Jr, from Katy, Texas was arrested, after a nearly eight-month operation by the FBI, Secret Service, Houston Police and Harris Sheriff's Office, investigated after creating a Facebook page called "American Insurgent Movement", with the aim of recruiting five of six persons for tried to theft of a stock car and banks, and start a ring of attacks against government buildings and law enforcements in the Greater Houston zone.
- June 8, 2014: 2014 Las Vegas shootings: Two Las Vegas police officers while eating pizza in a restaurant and one civilian were shot to death by Jerad and Amanda Miller, a married couple, in a suicide attack. A Gadsden flag, swastika and a note promising "revolution," was placed on the deceased officers bodies. The couple were thrown out of a patriot group defending rancher Cliven Bundy. The Millers were both killed in a shootout with police on the same day.
- October 22 – November 1, 2018: October 2018 United States mail bombing attempts: At least twelve confirmed packages containing pipe bombs were mailed within the U.S. Postal Service system to several prominent critics of U.S. President Donald Trump, including various Democratic Party politicians, actor Robert De Niro, billionaire investor George Soros, former CIA Director John O. Brennan, and former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper. On October 26, a 56-year-old man named Cesar Altieri Sayoc Jr. was arrested by authorities in Plantation, Florida in connection with the explosive devices. The suspect has a criminal history. A white van covered in stickers was also seized by authorities.
- January 6, 2021: January 6 United States Capitol attack. A mob of right-wing extremists stormed and subsequently attempted a coup d'état to prevent the counting of electoral college votes following Donald Trump's loss in the 2020 United States presidential election. The belligerents, which include a myriad of far-right organizations such as QAnon, Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, among many others, were following a seven-part plan proposed by Trump so that he could remain in office, and overturn the election's results. The insurrection resulted in the death of 2 people and 174 injured, with the injured mainly police officers on peacekeeping duties. Four officers committed suicide in the weeks following the incident. Over 1,200 people have been charged in connection to the attack, making it one of the largest criminal trials in United States history.
White nationalism and white supremacy
- June 1, 1921: The Tulsa race massacre, the destruction of the city's prosperous African-American community by white supremacists. The European-American authorities tolerated and frequently participated in the destruction of the Greenwood District, the wealthy area of Black-owned businesses which was known as "Black Wall Street". Airplanes were reported to have dropped incendiary devices on the city, contributing to a firestorm.
- 1951: Wave of hate related terrorist attacks in Florida. Black people were dragged and beaten to death, and there were 11 racist bombings. Synagogues and a Jewish School were dynamited in Miami. Explosives were found outside Catholic churches in Miami.
- 1963: The 16th Street Baptist Church bombing was a terrorist bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama on September 15, 1963. The bombing was committed by members of the Ku Klux Klan, a white supremacist terrorist group.
- 1988: Frazier Glenn Miller Jr. a Vietnam War veteran and the founder of the Carolina Knights of the Ku Klux Klan/White Patriot Party in the early 1980s served three years in Federal penitentiary for trying to assassinate Morris Dees, founder of the Southern Poverty Law Center. The FBI found a cache of weapons in his home after they used tear gas to drive him out and arrest him. He testified against 14 White Supremacists as part of a plea bargain deal.
- January 17, 2011: 2011 Spokane bombing attempt: Kevin William Harpham attempted to bomb a Martin Luther King Day parade in Spokane, Washington but failed.
- August 5, 2012: Wisconsin Sikh temple shooting: Wade Michael Page killed six people at a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin before being killed by police officers. During the investigation of the crime, police found out that Page was a member of white supremacist and neo-Nazi organizations such as the Hammerskin Nation/Hammerskins. The police concluded that racism and ethnic hatred was the main cause of the murders.
- April 13, 2014: Overland Park Jewish Community Center shooting: Klansman and Neo-Nazi Frazier Glenn Miller killed three people at Jewish community centers in Overland Park, Kansas.
- June 17, 2015: Charleston church shooting: Dylann Roof carried out a mass shooting at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in downtown Charleston, South Carolina. The church is one of the United States' oldest black churches and has long been a site for community organization around civil rights. Nine people were killed, including the senior pastor, Clementa C. Pinckney, a state senator. A tenth victim was also shot, but survived. The FBI has not officially classified the act as terrorism, which was met with controversy.
- March 20, 2017: Murder of Timothy Caughman: James Harris Jackson, a 28-year-old War in Afghanistan veteran, traveled to New York City from his hometown of Baltimore with the intention of killing black men there. Three days after arriving at New York City, Jackson stabbed Caughman, a black man, to death with an 18-inch sword. He then turned himself in to authorities. Jackson was charged with one count each of murder in the first and second degrees as an act of terrorism, second-degree murder as a hate crime, and three counts of criminal possession of a weapon.
- August 12, 2017: 2017 Charlottesville attack: James Alex Fields of the neo-Nazi group Vanguard America drove into the front of a crowd of marchers on the street, who witnesses say were counter-protesting the "Unite the Right" rally which began the night before. One person died and 19 were injured.
- August 3, 2019: 2019 El Paso shooting: Patrick Crusius committed a violent domestic terrorist attack/mass shooting targeting Latinos at a Walmart store in El Paso, Texas, killing 23 people and injuring 22 others.
- May 14, 2022: 2022 Buffalo shooting: Payton S. Gendron committed a mass shooting targeting African Americans at a Tops Friendly Markets supermarket in Buffalo, New York, killing 10 people and injuring 3 others. Eleven of the 13 victims shot were Black while two others were White.
Organized KKK violence
| Date | Type | Dead | Injured | Location | Details |
| 1865–1877 | Campaign of violence | 3,000+ | |1867Deadliest attacksThe following is a list of the deadliest known single-day terrorist attacks in the United States to date. Only incidents with ten or more deaths, excluding those of the perpetrators, are included.The W column gives a basic description of the weapons used: Failed attacks19th century
20th century
21st century
Alleged and proven plots19th century
20th century
2000s
2010s
2020s
|
|1867