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 ransacked the town and 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, 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.
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".