The Next 9/11 | Trump’s 100 Days
One hundred days into Trump’s second presidency, America is more vulnerable to terrorism—foreign and domestic—than it has been in decades. The country’s security apparatus hasn’t just been neglected; it’s been gutted, politicised, and repurposed for spectacle and vengeance.
While Trump marked his 100-day milestone with self-congratulation, his National Security Advisor, Mike Waltz, was abruptly sacked—so abruptly that journalists had to inform the White House press office.
The chaos doesn’t end with his departure. The sacking is linked to a messaging scandal, where senior figures in the Trump administration have been using insecure communications apps in order to try evade the requirement to keep legal records. If someone is making legal decisions they want to keep legal records of them. If someone doesn’t want to keep legal records of decisions the implication is pretty clear.
Oversight of the intelligence agencies now falls to Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, whose public sympathies for Assad and Putin would be comical if they weren’t so dangerous. If she turned up in a fur hat singing Ra Ra Rasputin, no-one would be surprised.
The FBI is led by Kash Patel—a children’s author who peddles conspiracy theories and has accepted payments from Russia-linked sources. He intends to run the Bureau remotely from a Las Vegas mansion owned by a Republican megadonor. His deputy, Dan Bongino, made his name flogging far-right paranoia and now pulls FBI agents from their posts to serve as his personal security detail.
At Homeland Security, things are no better. Secretary Kristi Noem, known less for policy and more for PR stunts, once posed in front of a prison in El Salvador for a photo op. She has no relevant experience, and under her watch, counter-terrorism programs have been gutted. The department is now more concerned with theatrical abductions and deportations than preventing actual threats.
Meanwhile, databases tracking domestic terrorism have been defunded or shut down entirely. Extremists and insurrectionists have been pardoned, celebrated, and in some cases, rewarded. The signal is clear: chaos is fine, as long as it’s our chaos.
One of the most basic duties of government is to protect its citizens. But across the security state, professionals have been purged in favour of culture warriors and loyalist celebrities. Key personnel have resigned or been pushed out. Resources have been diverted from national security to fringe ideological crusades—including the deportation of American citizens to overseas labour camps.
Whether through incompetence or deliberate design, the Trump regime has left the door wide open to the next major attack. He may genuinely not grasp how exposed the country is—or worse, he may welcome it.
Because in the aftermath of terror, people turn to strongmen. They tolerate broken rules. They let autocrats tighten their grip in the name of safety. The first 100 days of Trump’s return have tested the limits of law and public tolerance. Extrajudicial abductions, unlawful deportations, and constitutional breaches have all been trialled—with no real consequences.
We don’t know what form the next 9/11 might take. But we do know this: it’s now a lot closer.