Mourners hold a vigil on Bourbon Street for the victims of the Jan. 1 terrorist attack in New Orleans, Louisiana, on Jan. 4, 2025.
President Joe Biden and wife, Jill Biden, will Monday visit New Orleans to grieve with relatives of the 14 people killed and 35 injured there when a man drove a rented pickup truck at high speed through a group of pedestrians in the early hours of New Year’s Day.
The Bidens plan to meet with family members of the victims who were run over when the suspect, identified by authorities as Shamsud-Din Jabbar, a 42-year-old military veteran from Houston, sped down bustling Bourbon Street, a prime tourist, restaurant and bar locale. Police fatally shot Jabbar after he opened fire on officers.
Biden, with two weeks remaining in office before President-elect Donald Trump is inaugurated, is also meeting with investigators who say that Jabbar acted alone in the attack but was inspired by the Islamic State (IS) to carry out the terror attack.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) said that Jabbar posted five videos on social media expressing support for the IS terrorist group, over the roughly hour and a half before the attack as New Orleans revelers celebrated the first hours of 2025. An IS flag was found in the back of the truck.
On the day of the attack, Biden, speaking from the Camp David presidential retreat in Maryland, offered condolences to the victims’ families in a national address.
Said he: “I want you to know I grieve with you”.
Biden said investigators told him the suspect had a remote detonator in his truck that was meant to set off two explosive devices placed inside ice coolers along Bourbon Street.
An official with the country’s top criminal investigative agency said Sunday that Jabbar, wearing specialised hands-free glasses, last October twice visited the French Quarter neighborhood where the attack occurred.
Lyonel Myrthil, FBI special agent in charge of the New Orleans Field Office, said video shows the suspect riding through the French Quarter on a bicycle wearing “meta glasses” that are capable of recording or livestreaming.
Myrthil also said officials were also investigating two foreign trips Jabbar took, one to Cairo in the summer of 2023 and then to Canada a few days later.
Said Myrthil: “Our agents are getting answers to where he went, who he went with and how those trips may or may not tie into his actions here”.
Stated FBI Deputy Assistant Director Christopher Raia to reporters at a news conference Saturday: “All investigative details and evidence that we have now still support that Jabbar acted alone here in New Orleans. We have not seen any indications of an accomplice in the United States, but we are still looking into potential associates in the U.S. and outside of our borders”.
Representative Mike Turner, chairman of the House of Representatives Intelligence Committee, on Sunday reiterated to CBS’s “Face the Nation” show a previously disclosed U.S. claim, that there were Islamic State members and other terrorist organisations that were inside the United States “working in conjunction with ISIS with the intention of harming Americans”.
Said Turner: “We don’t know where they are”.
Outgoing Homeland Security chief Alejandro Mayorkas told ABC’s “This Week” show that there haf been a “significant increase” over the last 10 years in “homegrown violent extremism”.
Observed Mayorkas: “It is a very difficult threat landscape”.
He pledged a smooth transition to Trump’s appointment as the incoming Homeland Security secretary, South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem.
Stated Mayorkas: “I have spoken with Governor Noem a number of times, including on New Year’s Day and immediately thereafter, with respect to the horrific terrorist attack.
“We have spoken substantively about the measures that we take, and I am incredibly devoted to a smooth and successful transition to the success of Governor Noem, should she be confirmed as the secretary of Homeland Security”.
Biden’s Monday visit to New Orleans is occurring with heightened security concerns in Washington as Congress meets to certify that Trump defeated Vice President Kamala Harris in the November election.
It is four years to the day after Trump supporters rampaged through the U.S. Capitol, ransacking congressional offices and attacking law enforcement officers to block certification of Biden’s victory over Trump in the 2020 election. Trump has vowed, within hours of taking office on January 20, to pardon many of those arrested and imprisoned in the January 6, 2021, attack.
