President Donald Trump signs an executive order to stop Tren de Aragua on his first day in office, Jan. 20, 2025. (Reuters/Getty)
The New York Times reported last week that the State Department has already informed several congressional committees of the organizations it plans to designate as terror groups.
This comes after President Donald Trump signed an executive order on his first day in office to direct the State Department and other executive agencies to move to designate cartels and other criminal groups as foreign terrorist organizations.
The order specifically mentioned Tren de Aragua – which is also known as "TdA" – as well MS-13 as groups needing to be designated as terror organizations. It gave Secretary of State Marco Rubio 14 days to make policy recommendations – in consultation with the secretaries of the Treasury and Homeland Security as well as the U.S. attorney general and director of national intelligence – to make a recommendation regarding the designation of criminal groups to be designated as terrorist organizations.
This compilation shows suspected Tren de Aragua members and the southern border, (Fox News/Border Patrol)
At the time, Joseph Humire, executive director of the Center for a Secure Free Society, who in 2024 authored a report on how to dismantle TdA, explained to Fox News Digital that designating these groups as foreign terrorist organizations places them "at the highest level" of U.S. national security interest, meaning their funding and any organizations enabling them can be targeted as well.
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"Trump just put all of them on notice," said Humire. "This said: ‘We know you're here; we know you're up to no good and we're going to come after you.'"
Peter Pinedo is a politics writer for Fox News Digital.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/trump-admin-reveals-list-cartels-gangs-designated-terrorist-organizations