Two arrested in NJ terror probe in wake of Michigan Halloween plot

Two men have been charged in connection with an alleged ISIS-inspired terrorist plot planned in Michigan, acting U.S. Attorney for New Jersey Alina Habba said Wednesday.

Habba said in a video on the social platform X that the men, one from New Jersey and one from Washington state, are charged with conspiring to material support to a designated terrorist organization and transmitting violent, antisemitic threats across the internet to people in New Jersey “and beyond”

Four other men have been arrested in connection with the plot: three from Michigan and one from New Jersey.

According to a criminal complaint against two of the Michigan men unsealed on Monday, the men scouted out LGBTQ-friendly bars in Ferndale, Mich., outside Detroit. The complaint also alleges that the men planned the attack in person and via WhatsApp, an encrypted communication platform. 

A lawyer for one of the men arrested in Michigan told the Associated Press Saturday that the men were not planning a terror attack, and that he does not “know where all this hysteria and this fearmongering came from.”

The men charged Wednesday, Habba said used encrypted messaging platforms to plan travel to Turkey and Syria from October 2024 until Tuesday. The two allegedly discussed joining ISIS, “detailed” travel plans, physical training methods, firearms and improvised explosive devices and ways to avoid law enforcement detection, she said.  

Both pledged themselves to ISIS, and plotted terror attacks in the U.S., Habba said.

On Wednesday, one man appeared in federal court in New Jersey, while the other appeared in federal court in the Western District of Washington.

FBI Director Kash Patel said on X Wednesday that he was “grateful” for the work of Habba, the FBI, the Department of Justice and Attorney General Pam Bondi on the case, staying “their efforts helped save lives and keep Americans safe.”