Weeks away from the inauguration, a wrinkle intersects Donald Trump as president-elect and still leader of the Trump Organization — cities that are hosts to business-branded properties of his might be more susceptible to terror attacks, The Washington Post reported.
Trump properties, especially hotels on foreign soil, could become prime targets for terrorists who want to kill as many people as possible — including Americans — and make the biggest splash possible.
"If you kill Americans, you're going to get attention. And if you blow up a nice hotel in a foreign country, you're likely to kill Americans," Victor Asal, a professor at SUNY Albany told the Post.
Attacking a Trump property, terrorists also get to say, "'We're also attacking President Trump,'" Asal told the Post.
President Trump, whose rhetoric toward ISIS and Muslims has reverberated from campaign trail to post-election.
"This type of high-profile behavior has the tendency of drawing the attention of potential attackers and further increases the risk of attacks to properties with his name distinctly displayed," Charles Regini, a former FBI agent told the Post.
And sitting in Istanbul, in the heart of Turkey, struck by several terrorist attacks the past year, including one this past weekend that killed dozens, is the Trump Towers.
"The Secret Service and entire United States intelligence community now is now going to be scraping the world for threats because any potential threat against a Trump-branded property is also a threat against the president," Fred Burton, a former deputy chief of counterterrorism at the State Department's Diplomatic Security Service told Politico.
© 2024 Newsmax. All rights reserved.