In another persuasive example of how diversity increases our strength, the FBI conducted what appears to have been a sting operation that netted a Minnesotan Somali man who was planning a terrorist attack at the Mall of America later this month.
🚨 U.S. Attorney for Minnesota Dan Rosen says the FBI has arrested and charged 18-year-old Sheikhdoon Abdullahi Mohamud for planning a mass casualty attack in support of ISIS at the Mall of America https://t.co/MyMZa6NMCo
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) October 7, 2026
Details of the plot are still emerging, and it’s unclear whether the man was acting alone. Clearly, the FBI had reason to suspect him, since the charges indicate that he bought a weapon from an FBI agent and discussed his intentions, pledged support for ISIS and terrorism in general, and his desire to die for Allah. Obviously, something directed the FBI to this man as the plotting was going on, since they had been following his movements for two years.
🚨BREAKING: Sheikhdoon Abdullahi Mohamed charged with plotting mass casualty attack at Mall of America.
— Liz Collin (@lizcollin) October 7, 2026
The FBI doesn’t randomly try to sell weapons to people, hoping to catch terrorists. At least not under Trump. That was an Obama thing with the cartels, I believe.
The FBI thwarted an attack on the Mall of America by a teenager after agents supplied him with an assault rifle, authorities announced Wednesday.
The 18-year-old had been under investigation for nearly two years, trading messages with a confidential informant, before agents sold him the rifle and ammunition, according to a federal complaint described by U.S. Attorney Daniel Rosen.
Sheikhdoon Abdullahi Mohamud, 18, was arrested Tuesday in a public park after he paid $600 to an undercover FBI employee posing as a member of ISIS for an AK-47 and 200 rounds of ammunition, according to the criminal complaint.
There is no immediate information about his immigration status, so he could be an immigrant, a naturalized citizen, or born here. All three are possible, and the Somali diaspora has been here long enough that most are natural-born citizens whose parents came here as refugees.
According to an affidavit unsealed on Wednesday, FBI agents arrested 18-year-old Sheikhdoon Abdullahi Mohamud on Tuesday directly after he purchased an AK-47 and 200 rounds of ammunition with the stated intent of carrying out a mass shooting.
The criminal complaint alleges Mohamud had messaged an informant for nearly two years, discussing his hatred of non-Muslims and his desire to align with an Islamic terror group. He floated the idea of joining al Qaeda and al Shabaab before deciding to lend his support to the Islamic State.
Mohamud repeatedly expressed his admiration for Islamic terrorist attacks, including the New Year’s Eve 2024 attack on Bourbon Street in New Orleans; the 2017 Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando, Florida; and the 2025 mass shooting during a Hanukkah gathering at Bondi Beach in Sydney.
When the informant tried to talk Mohamud out of such an attack, he replied, “I am 100% committed [sic] to the cause of dying for the sake of Allah only.”
Messages indicated he planned to target the Hmong Arts Celebration at Mall of America on Oct. 24 because “it will be a lot of people.” … During that transaction, he explained that he was “an active member of ISIS” and that “part of his motivation was that the Mall of America was owned by Jews,” the complaint states.
There has been a longstanding link between the Minnesota Somali “community” and Islamic terrorists in the Middle East. When ISIS was at its height, it focused a lot of recruiting efforts here in Minnesota, and there was a lively labor market here for terrorists to fight over there.
In the mid-2000s, Somalis went to Somalia to fight for al-Shabaab. In the 2010s, it was ISIS. Minnesota has been described as the most prolific source of ISIS fighters from the United States, and it all comes down to the concentration of Somalis here.
In 2016 there was a major trial of Somalis who were on their way to fight for ISIS. They were mostly second-generation immigrants, giving the lie to the claim that these immigrants’ children integrate. Often, they are more radicalized than their parents and get their ideas from the mosque.
In hours of recordings, the defendants expressed their desire to join ISIS, their regret over the failure of their previous efforts to make it out of the United States, their commitment to wage jihad against nonbelievers, and their ardent wish to die as martyrs. They expressed their contempt for the United States. They thrilled to the videos of ISIS butchery in the name of Allah. They talked excitedly about their communications with friends who had made it to join ISIS in Syria.
As Bashir, Daud, and Farah approached their rendezvous with the FBI in San Diego, Daud expressed what seemed to be a common feeling among them: “I can’t believe I’m driving out of the land of the kuffar, I’m going to spit on America at the border crossing. May Allah’s curse be upon you.” The government was hoping to keep the surveillance going until they learned who had recruited them, but they may have recruited themselves. The defendants needed no more prodding than that contained in ISIS’s online promotional videos.
Perhaps most shocking to me was what utterly ordinary members of the Minnesota Somali community the defendants and their friends appeared to be. So far as I can tell, Somali culture is alien and hostile to the United States. Many among the local Somali community considered the defendants to be persecuted innocents entrapped by the government. It would be unduly charitable to characterize the attitude as willful blindness.
They are taught to hate the West, and indeed they do.
Unfortunately, this reality never sinks in with people who have grown up believing the myth that diversity is our strength, and that all immigrants should be welcome here. It is a wonderful myth, I have to say, and one that I once largely believed.
But experience has disabused me of this illusion. Even second- and third-generation Somalis keep to themselves and openly express contempt for American values. It’s no surprise that young men leave the country to fight for ISIS, spitting on the US as they go.
It’s not bigoted to notice that. It is self-defense. Just as it takes a special kind of idiot not to be wary when walking through a tough neighborhood in order to avoid seeming prejudiced, the same can be said for people who refuse to see that not all immigrants are the same.
It’s striking that the intended victims were Hmong immigrants and their families. The Hmong came here after fighting on the American side in the Vietnam War and are notably patriotic.
No wonder Sheikhdoon Abdullahi Mohamud saw them as enemies.
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