United States officials knew of "no specific threat" of terrorist attacks in the country, despite Iraq's prime minister warning on Thursday they had information that attacks to subway systems may be planned, said Mike McCaul, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee.
"Very soon after this [announcement by Iraq's prime minister], the FBI and Homeland Security came out stating that there's no specific threat out there," the Texas Republican told Fox News' "America's Newsroom" on Friday. "It's always a concern. We need more security at the subway systems, but there's no specific threat to the subway system."
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Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi told reporters on Thursday his intelligence had received "credible" evidence Islamic State (ISIS) militants were planning to attack subways in the U.S. and Paris. McCaul said it was "interesting that the Iraqi intelligence didn't share this threat, if they had it."
Despite no knowledge of impending attacks, McCaul said the U.S. needed to be on a heightened state of alert because of "this idea of retaliation," and militants may be planning attacks in response to the airstrike campaign the U.S. is leading against ISIS in Iraq and Syria.
"ISIS issued a threat, both to the west European nations, but also to the United States, right as the strikes were occurring, to strike Americans. So, I take that very seriously. And, I think we need to be on a higher state of alert here," he said.
Officials had "ramped up security at our subway systems," McCaul said, because al-Qaida and ISIS militants "have always threatened transportation modes, including aviation and the subway system."
McCaul said the U.S. was monitoring Americans who may be sympathetic to ISIS, however cautioning there were times "you don't know what you don't know." He suggested seizing passports of people who might want to travel to the Middle East to join the terrorists.
"I do think that we ought to be looking at things like revoking passports, and we ought to be taking a closer look at radicalization within the United States, and how we can stop that," he said.
British Prime Minister David Cameron was "taking all precautions" as he urged members of Parliament on Friday to vote to join the U.S.-led coalition battling ISIS, McCaul said, adding that the U.K. could be more vulnerable to attack because it was "much closer to the threat."
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