Last week Seb Gorka, the National Security Council senior director for counterterrorism, released the 2026 Counterterrorism Strategy, and by most accounts, it was the kind of report you might expect an eighth grader to draft up the night before it’s due.
It wasn’t so much a strategy, as it was a set of MAGA culture-war talking points. Example? It listed “Violent Left-Wing Extremists” — described as anti-American, radically pro-transgender, anarchist – as a major threat.
Tom Nichols wrote in the Atlantic that, as silly and poorly drafted as this document is, it’s actually leaving all of us less safe.
Andra Watkins agrees that it leaves us less safe, but not for the reasons Nichols outlines. You’ll have to watch this episode of Unholy Ground to find out why this document should keep you up at night.
