17National Strategy for Countering Domestic Terrorism
In addition, the Federal Government must constantly update and advance its eorts to share
relevant information externally, as some of the first to identify a potential threat of domestic
terrorism are often state, local, tribal, or territorial partners, or those in their communities.
That is why we have already increased our focus on information sharing with those partners,
providing, at the unclassified level, more information, with more details, more quickly. This
includes publishing and disseminating intelligence products that provide our partners with
greater insight into the evolving threat, as well as situational awareness notifications to inform
public safety and security planning eorts in advance of potential violence. That emphasis on
fuller, faster information sharing will continue and expand, as we are committed to ensuring
that state, local, tribal, and territorial partners receive not just warnings of specific, credible
threats of violence but also, where appropriate, broader indicators and warnings that can
inform our partners’ level and type of preparation for potential violence.
As discussed further below, we are also developing new resources as part of our broader
eort to boost support to state, local, tribal, and territorial law enforcement in tackling
domestic terrorism, including resources that will cover relevant iconography, symbology,
and phraseology used by many domestic terrorists as well as data–driven guidance on how to
recognize potential indicators of mobilization to domestic terrorism.
Strategic Goal 1.3: Illuminate transnational aspects of
domestic terrorism.
In today’s interconnected world, very little remains wholly within a single country’s borders,
and domestic terrorism is no exception. Terrorists and their supporters increasingly connect
with each other via Internet–based communications platforms, recruit and encourage
mobilization to violence across international boundaries, and point to ideologically similar
foreigners as inspiration for their acts of violence. Some domestic violent extremists have
sought ties and connections to individual violent extremists overseas. Aspects of the domestic
terrorism threat we face in the United States, and in particular those related to racially
or ethnically motivated violent extremism, have an international dimension. Identifying,
confronting, and addressing that international dimension must be part of a comprehensive
approach to tackling the domestic terrorism challenge.
The Department of State, in consultation with the Department of the Treasury, is working with
other components of the Federal Government and with our foreign allies to assess whether
additional foreign entities linked to domestic terrorism can, under the relevant statutory
criteria, be designated as Foreign Terrorist Organizations or Specially Designated Global