ERIC DEGGANS, HOST:
Authorities are still learning about what was behind the deadly attack in New Orleans in the early hours of New Year's Day. That's when a man slammed his pickup truck into a crowd celebrating the start of the new year, killing at least 14 people. The FBI is leading the investigation into what it is calling a terrorist attack. NPR justice correspondent Ryan Lucas joins us now to talk about this investigation. Hi, Ryan.
RYAN LUCAS, BYLINE: Hi there.
DEGGANS: Ryan, the driver has been identified as Shamsud-Din Jabbar. He was a U.S. citizen. What else do we know about him and why he decided to carry out this attack?
LUCAS: Right. Well, Jabbar was born in Texas. He grew up there. He served in the U.S. Army for many years as a human resource specialist, as well as an IT guy. He also started a few businesses. Several of them appear to have had severe financial difficulties recently. He's been divorced several times. Now, the FBI has said that Jabbar was inspired to carry out this attack by the Islamic State terrorist group. He uploaded several videos to the internet in the hours immediately leading up to the attack. Talking about this, here's the FBI's Christopher Raia.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
CHRISTOPHER RAIA: In the first video, Jabbar explains he originally planned to harm his family and friends. But was concerned, the news headlines would not focus on the, quote, "war between the believers and the disbelievers," end quote. Additionally, he stated he had joined ISIS before this summer. He also provided a will and testament.
LUCAS: Now, in addition to those videos, investigators also recovered an ISIS flag from the back of Jabbar's truck. Now, the FBI says Jabbar appears to have acted alone. And that's important because the Bureau originally said he might have had help - accomplices - but after an initial investigation, chasing down leads, it says, it does not appear that Jabbar did have any accomplices.
DEGGANS: So what does the FBI mean when it says this attack was inspired by ISIS?
RAIA: Well, there's an important distinction here between an attack that is directed by a terrorist group and one that is inspired by a terrorist group. In a directed attack, a terrorist organization is in contact with a person or a cell of people, say, in the United States, and directs them, for example, to attack a specific target. In an inspired attack, in contrast, there doesn't need to be any direct contact. An individual instead can, say, watch or read ISIS propaganda online, come to sympathize with the group's ideology or its world view, and then decide to carry out violence to act in the group's name on their own.
And in the case of the Islamic State, of ISIS, it has pushed this idea in its online propaganda. Its urged people to use whatever tools they have on hand, including cars, to attack soft targets, things such as public celebration like New Year's Eve. The FBI director told Congress this past summer, in fact, that this is the kind of threat that its seen from foreign terrorist organizations now. And those sorts of attacks, U.S. counterterrorism officials often say, are incredibly hard to stop, because there isn't a big operation that the FBI can penetrate beforehand to disrupt them.
DEGGANS: Right. And it seems terrorism doesn't necessarily dominate headlines in the U.S. now like it did, say, a decade ago. For a lot of people, it seemed like the threat of a mass-casualty terrorist attack in the U.S. had kind of disappeared. You cover this stuff. What have you been hearing?
LUCAS: Well, you're right. Terrorism is not a front-page issue the way that it once was - certainly not like we saw after 9/11, and also not like a decade ago when the Islamic State was at its apex. But the Islamic State still has branches, affiliates around the world that are very much active. And as for the threat in the U.S., what I would say is that counterterrorism officials here have been saying for a while that the threat may not be at the level that it once was, but it also most definitely has not disappeared.
FBI Director Christopher Wray has warned about the danger posed, in particular, by what the FBI calls homegrown violent extremists, people who radicalize on their own and decide to carry out an attack here in the U.S. Wray has also said that the threat level more broadly has really spiked after the Hamas attack on Israel in October of 2023. And I should note that the Justice Department has recently foiled what it says were plots on behalf of ISIS just in the past year, including one in Oklahoma and another in New York.
DEGGANS: Well, I want to turn quickly to the other incident we saw on New Year's Day - the Cybertruck explosion outside a Trump hotel in Las Vegas. Now, was that connected to what happened in New Orleans?
LUCAS: Authorities say at this point in time, there is no evidence that those two incidents are linked in any way. Investigators have identified the driver of the Cybertruck as Matthew Livelsberger. He was a master sergeant in the U.S. Army, a Green Beret, a decorated combat vet with multiple tours in Afghanistan. Authorities say that Livelsberger shot and killed himself in the Cybertruck right before it exploded. As for the question of why, the FBI says Livelsberger bore no animosity toward Trump, so it wasn't about that. It says their investigation so far suggests that Livelsberger was likely suffering from mental health issues and also had some other family issues. Here's FBI special agent Spencer Evans.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
SPENCER EVANS: It ultimately appears to be a tragic case of suicide involving a heavily decorated combat veteran who was struggling with PTSD and other issues.
LUCAS: Investigators also released excerpts of Livelsberger's writings in which he says America is headed toward collapse, that this is a wake-up call. And he also says in one that he needs to cleanse his mind of brothers that he lost and relieve himself of the burdens of lives that he took.
DEGGANS: Well, that's NPR justice correspondent Ryan Lucas. Ryan, thanks so much for joining us.
LUCAS: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
