Maryland Man Inspired by ISIS Taken Down Before Alleged Plot To Mow Down US Citizens with U-Haul
Remember radical Islamic terrorism? The threat from that? Probably not so much, at least if your memory is anything like the media’s.
If Islamic terrorism gets mentioned at all in this country, it’s only to state that it’s less dangerous than terrorism from white supremacists. Which, while terrorism from white supremacists is indeed dangerous, I don’t remember them crashing planes into the World Trade Center and Pentagon, killing nearly 3,000 people in the process.
Rondell Henry wasn’t thinking that big, according to federal prosecutors. However, the alleged wannabe terrorist still wanted to emulate the 2016 attack in Nice, France, that killed 87 people, according to documents unveiled in a Washington-area court this week.
“A Maryland man inspired by the Islamic State group plotted to ram a stolen U-Haul truck into as many pedestrians as possible at a popular convention and tourist destination just outside the nation’s capital, federal prosecutors said Monday,” The Associated Press reported.
“The allegation was made in a court filing as prosecutors in Maryland urged a judge to keep the defendant, 28-year-old Rondell Henry, detained on a charge of driving a stolen vehicle across state lines. The police arrested him on March 28 after officers who discovered the stolen truck saw him leap over a security fence,” the report said.
When he was taken into police custody, Henry began talking about his plans for the truck, according to prosecutors.
“‘I was just going to keep driving and driving and driving. I wasn’t going to stop,’ the document quotes Henry as telling law enforcement authorities who questioned him. He said he wanted to create ‘panic and chaos’ similar to a deadly truck attack that killed scores of people in Nice, France, in 2016, prosecutors say.”
Henry’s alleged target was National Harbor, a complex of restaurants, retail shops and hotels on the Potomac River in Maryland.
Later in the report, the AP notes the computer engineer was described in court documents “as harboring hatred for ‘disbelievers’ and looking to emulate Islamic State militants he saw on beheading videos and fighting overseas.
“On his phone, which prosecutors say he discarded on a highway in an apparent attempt to conceal evidence, authorities found images of the ISIS flag, armed ISIS fighters and the man who carried out the massacre in an Orlando, Florida, nightclub three years ago.”
Speaking of ISIS, when the last piece of Islamic State group-controlled territory was finally recaptured by the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, there was almost nothing in the way of celebration in the media or among Democrats.
Nor, in fact, is stopping radical Islamic terrorism a major policy priority of the Democratic Party.
However, this is the party that’s willing to push the Green New Deal — unless, of course, someone wants to vote on it, because it won’t pass. The plan isn’t just profoundly unrealistic about how soon we can eliminate carbon emissions, it could also end up costing us up to $93 trillion. (And it wouldn’t even eliminate cow farts!)
And then there’s H.R. 5, known as the Equality Act, which has been getting attention as of late. As Terry Schilling wrote in The Daily Caller, its idea of “equality” may or may not be yours.
“The ‘Equality’ Act would make it illegal to make private spaces such as changing rooms, bathrooms, and even your local gym’s locker room only open to women. Girls in school will have no say over who can enter their bathrooms and locker rooms,” Schiller wrote.
“Battered women’s shelters can and will be sued and shut down if they refuse to let men who claim to identify as women room with abused women. The ‘Equality’ Act would even criminalize doctors who refuse to perform sex-change surgeries simply because a patient ‘wants it.'”
These are the legislative priorities of the Democrats. In the meanwhile, Islamic terrorism remains a real threat.
Yes, we don’t know the exact details of Rondell Henry’s alleged plot or how serious he was. We don’t know how much of a chance he had of succeeding. We don’t know if he’s even guilty of any of this.
What we do know is that there are people who want to run U-Haul trucks into crowds — and worse — in the name of a twisted religious vision.
In the meanwhile, we can all be thankful that the left is looking out for those cow farts.
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