Homeland Security News

President Trump stepped before the cameras at a White House news conference less than a month after his inaugural and declared that he was already taking bold steps to keep “radical Islamic terrorists” out of the United States.

“Our citizens will be very happy when they see the result,” Mr. Trump said, foreshadowing orders he would issue requiring tougher screening of visa applicants. “Extreme vetting will be put in place.”

But that “extreme vetting” did not stop precisely the sort of person Mr. Trump’s policy was supposed to root out: Second Lt. Mohammed Alshamrani of Saudi Arabia, a 21-year-old Qaeda loyalist who was part of a prestigious training program at the naval air station in Pensacola, Fla. This past December, Lieutenant Alshamrani opened fire in a classroom building at the base, killing three sailors and wounding eight other people before being fatally shot by sheriff’s deputies.

Read more: New York Times

A Tennessee newspaper said Sunday, June 21 it is investigating what its editor called a “horrific” full-page advertisement from a religious group that predicts a terrorist attack in Nashville in July.

The paid advertisement that appeared in Sunday’s editions of The Tennessean from the group Future For America claims President Donald Trump “is the final president of the USA” and features a photo of President Trump and Pope Francis. It begins by claiming that a nuclear device would be detonated in Nashville and that the attack would be carried out by unspecific interests of “Islam.”

The group also ran a full-page ad in Wednesday’s editions of the newspaper stating its intention to warn Nashville residents about next month’s event “so that they may be able to make a decision intelligently.”

Read more: Fox 6

A 25-year-old man suspected of launching a fatal terror attack in Reading, England on Saturday has been identified by a security source as a Libyan national.

Speaking to CNN, the security source named the suspect as Khairi Saadallah. The source said mental health was considered to be a factor in the assault, which contributed to the reasons police took some time to declare it a terrorist incident.

Saadallah, who is currently in police custody, is under investigation by the UK's Counter Terrorism Policing unit after a knife attack in Reading's Forbury Gardens on Saturday afternoon that left three dead and several others injured.

UK Assistant Commissioner for Counter Terrorism Policing, Neil Basu, said no further suspects are under investigation by the police.

Read more: CNN

A Northeast Philadelphia native was among three people stabbed to death Saturday evening during an attack at a park in Southern England that is being investigated as a “terrorist incident.”

Joe Ritchie-Bennett, 39, grew up on Brous Avenue in Mayfair but moved to England about 15 years ago, his father, Robert Ritchie, said.

Ritchie said that his son worked for a law firm in London before taking a job about 10 years ago at a Dutch pharmaceutical company with British headquarters in Reading, where the stabbing attack took place.

Ritchie-Bennett’s brother is 7th District Police Capt. Robert Ritchie, a 24-year veteran of the Philadelphia force.

Read more: Philadelphia Inquirer