For the first time in its history, United States has an introduced a national strategy for encountering terrorism on a domestic scale. The Biden administration released the policy on June 15, 2021, six months after the attack on the U.S. Capitol by supporters of former president Donald Trump.
The new strategy has been introduced in aftermath of the January 6 insurrection of the United States Capitol in Washington DC. The legal document in this regard indicates “forging a government-wide effort” to halt growing extremism in America.
President of United States, Joe Biden’s first week in office was mainly directed by an assessment of heightened domestic terrorism. President Biden had ordered a 100-day review of U.S. government efforts to respond to domestic extremism in January. The review culminated in form of the United States’ first-ever ‘National Strategy for Countering Domestic Terrorism.’
Biden’s focus on far-right domestic violent extremists stands in sharp contrast to the Trump administration’s approach, which viewed left-wing militancy as a greater threat.
“We have to take both short-term steps to counter the very real threats of today and longer-term measures to diminish the drivers that will contribute to this ongoing challenge to our democracy,” Joe Biden remarked about his new policy.
The strategy comprises four basic pillars. It focuses on enhancing and sharing information about domestic terrorism, preventing terror recruitment, disrupting and thwarting attacks, and confronting the long-term drivers of domestic terrorism.
Biden Administration seeks to understand and respond to a long history of domestic terrorist activity in the United States through the new policy. Additionally, it also suggests allocating separate funds to hire domestic terrorism analysts, investigators and prosecutors.
United States secretary of homeland security Alejandro Mayorkas said that the rise in domestic extremism was due to socioeconomic challenges and issues of divisiveness.
“They have been given greater space than we have experienced in many many years. It wasn’t understood to be one of the greatest threats that we face domestically on our homeland related to terrorism and now I think we do.”
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