Trump Counterterrorism Strategy Designates Cartels as Top Priority, Targets Left-Wing Groups
President Trump on May 6 signed a 16-page U.S. Counterterrorism Strategy placing elimination of Western Hemisphere drug cartels as the administration's top priority, the White House announced. White House counterterrorism czar Sebastian Gorka, who led the strategy's development, told reporters that secondary priorities include neutralizing Islamic groups capable of attacking the United States and identifying violent secular political groups the document characterizes as anti-American, "radically pro-gender," or anarchist. The strategy also calls for preventing nonstate actors from acquiring weapons of mass destruction. Gorka said administration officials would meet with allied partners later in the week to discuss strengthening their counterterrorism postures.
The strategy formally elevates Western Hemisphere cartels above jihadist networks, inverting the post-9/11 counterterrorism hierarchy governing U.S. doctrine for more than two decades and giving DOJ and intelligence agencies explicit doctrinal cover to pursue cartel leadership under terrorism statutes. The inclusion of 'radically pro-gender' and anarchist organizations in the 'violent secular' threat category widens the counterterrorism aperture to encompass domestic political actors in ways prior strategies did not, and Gorka's central role in drafting the document signals this framing was deliberate rather than incidental. We assess it is
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- Trumps new counterterrorism strategy makes targeting Western Hemisphere cartels the top priority -
ABC News - 2026 U.S. Counterterrorism Strategy -
White House - Trump's counterterrorism strategy puts focus on left-wing 'violent secular groups' -
The Hill - Trump's new counterterrorism strategy makes targeting Western Hemisphere cartels the top priority -
The Washington Post