The chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee this week warned that the man arrested on Wednesday for plotting to blow up the Capitol and the Pentagon represented a type of homegrown, "lone wolf" threat to security that the U.S. needs to guard against.
"It means [terrorists are] probably less sophisticated, or less well trained; on the other hand, they're living under the radar screen, we have no way of knowing who they are,” Rep. Pete King (R-N.Y.) told a New York local CBS affiliate on Wednesday night.
King, who said he'd been briefed on the FBI investigation over the past several months, commended the agency for its "outstanding" work and arrest of Rezwan Ferdaus, 26, who has also been charged with attempting to aid the terrorist organization al Qaeda.
“The fact that Ferdaus is a very well-educated physicist should serve as a reminder to us that the threat of Islamic terrorism transcends socioeconomics and does not only emanate from the poor and under-privileged," King said in a statement released Wednesday after Ferdaus's arrest. "Ferdaus’ arrest also underscores the need to continue efforts to combat domestic radicalization and the evolving threat of ‘lone wolf’ extremists.”
King is perhaps best known for holding a series of committee hearings on Islamic radicalization in America, which he has defended from critics as an important exploration of the threat posed by homegrown Muslim terrorists.
Ferdaus was arrested as part of an FBI sting operation in which he thought he was plotting an attack with members of al Qaeda who were actually undercover agents. King cautioned that while Ferdaus did not get very close to implementing his plan, he still represented a serious threat.
"[Ferdaus] didn't have the technology, he didn't have the equipment, but he had the brains, he had the plan, he had it all thought out. So really, he was 95 percent of the way there,” King told New York’s CBS 2.
