New Frontiers

Charlotte Tate: From the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs at Middlebury College. This is New Frontiers. I'm Charlotte Tate, the Center's Associate Director. In this episode, Mark Williams talks with counter terrorism expert Jason Blazakis about how individuals or groups are placed on US terrorist lists, the strict processes meant to justify those designations and their consequences, and how recent changes could enable misuse.

Mark Williams: Especially after 9/11, the word terrorist became part of the average American's vocabulary, and rightfully so. But what is a terrorist? In the context of US security policies, who makes that determination? Is it the FBI, CIA, the president, a governor? Can local law enforcement do this? Equally important, how does that determination get made? Has this process of making the determination remained static or has it changed over time? And if it's changed, to what effect? Here to help us understand some of these issues is Dr. Jason Blazakis, professor of the practice at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey.

Jason is the founding director of CTEC, the Center on Terrorism, Extremism, and Counter Terrorism. Prior to this, he gave many years to public service, including leadership roles in the Department of State and the US intelligence community. His research on violent extremism, terrorist financing, and digital radicalization has helped inform policymakers and practitioners domestically and in more and multilateral settings. Jason Blazakis, welcome to New Frontiers.

Jason Blazakis: Thank you for having me on the program. Looking forward to the conversation.

Mark Williams: We're glad to have you here. Why don't we dive right into it. For 10 years you directed the Counterertrorism Finance and Designations Office inside the Bureau of Counterterrorism at the State Department, and your office was very much involved in determining which states, groups, or individuals would earn the US government's label of terrorist. So let's start off by talking about the actual process of designating someone a terrorist. Who's involved in this? Who gets to decide? What are the normal steps or procedures that officials typically follow when deciding who is or who isn't a terrorist?

Jason Blazakis: So there are three, what we call national competent authorities in the United States to designate terrorists. The Treasury Department who uses an executive order that is shared legal authority with the State Department, and that's executive order 1-3-2-2-4. The president of the United States who can issue executive orders, deeming individuals or organizations to be terrorists. And then, where I worked at the US Department of State, in the Counterterrorism Bureau, the Secretary of State has multiple legal authorities to designate individuals or organizations as terrorists.

And that process to designate a terrorist is a time consuming one, at least historically. It takes, in some cases, years for that process to be completed. And the process itself, has historically been a very bottom up approach where you have analysts who are reviewing intelligence and unclassified information that are giving in what we call this kind of aha moment, where they think an individual or group should be sanctioned.

And then from there, the process really takes motion, beginning with what we call an equity check, where the idea of that analyst is sensitized with multiple components of the US national security architecture. Think along the lines of the State Department sharing this one-page document that really outlines the who, what, when, where, why of this individual and why they should be treated as a terrorist being shared with the Department of Defense, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Department of Treasury, the Department of Justice, elements of the National Security Council, and many more. And from there, if there's no objection, after a two week process of evaluating that who, when, what, where document, the beginning of the review gets really intensified at that point–where the analyst starts drafting what we call, the administrative record.

That's the legal document for when the United States makes this determination of why somebody is a terrorist. And that document is making sure that the various components of the legal criteria are being met. And once that document is completed, it's shared with lawyers within the State Department, Justice Department, and the Treasury Department. And those lawyers are reviewing every sentence to make sure that the finding that the Secretary of State signs off on is something that can withstand court scrutiny. And this can take months because the lawyers are reviewing essentially the equivalent of a document the size of a dissertation.

Mark Williams: Really?

Jason Blazakis: Yes. Making sure all those citations are something a judge can understand, because in the end we have an eye towards these challenges going to court. And the lawyers want to make sure that the US government wins those court cases. And then after the lawyers have reviewed these documents, we put together, when I was in the US government, what we call an action memo, a really short, one-page document that outlines this very long document and the Secretary of State signs off on it.

And then ultimately, this becomes publicized because in democratic countries, if you're doing your decision making as it relates to who's a terrorist correctly, you're making sure those are public findings. And then we announce these new listings of individuals or groups as being terrorists to the public.
Mark Williams: That's amazing. That's a very, very, extensive set of steps and procedures you're talking about. And the process sounds more like a legal process than a political one. Is that an accurate reading of it? And if so, what's the importance of that legal dimension?

Jason Blazakis: So, absolutely, this is a legal process because the results of such a finding can have profound effects on individuals or people who are part of organizations that have been labeled terrorists. And that generally ranges from any assets that they may have are subject to an asset freeze; individuals who might be connected to that individual who's been listed could be, for instance, prosecuted for providing material support to that designated actor, so jail time is a real possibility. And there is immigration consequences attached to a listing as well. Essentially, by that I mean if a group is found to be a foreign terrorist organization by the US Department of State, pursuant to the Immigration Nationality Act, anybody who's part of that organization is inadmissible to the United States. And if somebody's already in the United States connected to that group, they could be of course prosecuted, but also they could be subject to removal as well. So there are very significant legal repercussions to anybody being listed as a terrorist and as a consequence, the process itself historically is very legally focused.

Mark Williams: I see. So it's not just the individual or group that might be labeled that would be the recipient of consequences of that label, but anyone affiliated or associated, closely or perhaps tangentially.

Jason Blazakis: Absolutely. There is this secondary effect that goes beyond the original or primary listing, as we call it. But also there is an extraterritorial effect that can't be ignored because when a listing is added by the United States, because of the power of the US dollar, individual banks, who might have a banking relationship with a US Bank are going to respect the US listing because if they don't, they run the risk of losing access to the US dollar. They run the risk of losing a correspondent bank account they may have of a US bank that allows for them to facilitate the transfer of dollars. So there are these extraterritorial effects as well that are pretty severe, and that's another reason why a lot of due diligence has to be put in place as it relates to a listing.

Mark Williams: Okay, that's fascinating. How would you assess the process that you've just outlined? Do you feel that it contains a lot of inherent value or are there ways that you, given your experience with it, are there ways in which you would like to see the typical process improved or refined?

Jason Blazakis: So when I was in the chair as the director of that office, there was a lot of frustration, I'll admit, on how slow the process could unfold.

Mark Williams: We talked about several months, right?

Jason Blazakis: It could take months. In some cases it can take years. And that can be frustrating, especially if you've identified an actor who your office may see as being a threat to US national security interest. But now, being outside of the US government for a little over eight years, I see now the value of having such a rigorous process because of the profound effect a listing can have.

Mark Williams: During your time in government, who are some of the better known individuals or organizations that received the terrorist label? Did you work on any cases that our listeners might know about?

Jason Blazakis: Sure. So early in the 2010 time period, one of the analysts that was working for me at that time had his aha moment by reviewing pretty sensitive information. My deputy director, at that time, his name was Brian Coger. And Brian, if you're listening, hello. Brian, fantastic analyst, essentially put together the case for the designation of an individual that we knew at that time as Abu Dua, which was a nom de guerre that we would all later learn, some years later, as Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi, who had become the leader of the Islamic State, also known as ISIS. We knew this was an important person. We had what we call great bio identification information on this individual because this person had been put in US custody during the time of the Second Gulf War. The United States learned a lot about this person, but didn't really understand that person's significance and the role he would play later with the formation of the Islamic State. So that was one of the listings that I think maybe listeners might have some familiarity with.

Mark Williams: We hear a lot about the foreign terrorist organization list. Can you tell us about it? How does somebody get on this list, and what happens or potentially can happen once they are on it?

Jason Blazakis: So the FTO list, the foreign terrorist organization list administered by the US Department of State, in the eyes of many experts is seen as the gold standard of terrorism lists. Created under US law in 1996 by Congress, the first set of foreign terrorist organization listings came into being in 1997 when 30 groups were added to that list.

This list has three primary consequences, very similar to the consequences I outlined before, that being inadmissibility into the United States if you're deemed to be part of a designated foreign terrorist organization; the asset freeze, any assets that the group may have are subject to a freeze by banks and non-banks alike; and then if somebody provides material support to that designated foreign terrorist organization, they can end up behind bars between 20 to 25 years. So very significant consequences.

Mark Williams: Wow. Let's talk a little bit about the recent US intervention in Venezuela, which occurred on January 3rd, 2026. This military operation was premised in part on the idea that somehow Venezuela had become a sort of narco state, or at least its President Nikolas Maduro was collaborating with what Trump officials and supporters were calling narco terrorists. On a scale of one to 10, where one is totally inaccurate and 10 is absolutely accurate, how accurately do you feel the narco terrorist label fits Venezuela and Maduro?

Jason Blazakis: Yeah, it's a great question. I'll probably come up with something in between those two polls. And, there is a lot of documented evidence that the US government has provided over years of Maduro's connections to problematic organizations. As an example, the US government has sanctioned several what we call foreign terrorist organizations that Maduro has some kind of connection to. I would put this number at five in terms of my comfort level in terms of the connections the US government has drawn.
What the US government hasn't done, from my mind, is to illustrate true leadership and control over some of these organizations like, the Tren de Aragua, the TDA criminal gang that has been labeled as a foreign terrorist organization by the US government. They haven't made a clear case to me that Maduro is controlling the organization. To me it seems as if it's a relationship where Maduro might be getting, and other government officials, kickbacks for that group's ability to operate in a more flexible manner than we would like. Does that mean that there's control and ownership? That's, to me, a question I think the court case that's happening in New York's going to have to document, and the US government's going to have to document successfully for some of those charges to stick.

But even if, let's say, there was sufficient information to show that this activity is occurring at that nine or 10 level, it still, to me, seems like vast overstep by the US government to swoop in, the dead of night, and arrest a world leader, as opposed to going through other processes the international community might be more comfortable with, such as Maduro having maybe his day at the International Criminal Court, which of course the United States doesn't recognize. And that becomes a challenge. But to me, this is an issue where multilateralism, when there is such a deep concern about a specific state, needs to be the focus as opposed to a unilateral decision that we saw with the Trump administration that is partially justified by some of these listings.

Mark Williams: You had mentioned the TDA criminal gang.

Jason Blazakis: That's the Tren de Aragua. That has been a significant focus of the Trump administration really since the beginning of 2025 when the president instructed Secretary of State Rubio to designate all the Mexican drug cartels, and I guess they said plus a Venezuelan gang, very quickly. And in fact, the president mentioned the need to designate those groups plus the TDA, as fast as possible. So the president makes this announcement, early days of the administration January 20 or 21st, and then, fast forward in time, just a few weeks, eight groups including the TDA are all added to the state department's FTO list in early to mid-February time period.

And the administration then begins leveraging the TDA’s listing as a foreign terrorist organization as one of the basis for its kinetic strikes against a number of vessels operating in international waters that the administration has said is linked to the TDA and the TDA’s movement of drugs according to the administration such as fentanyl. Even though this is not an area historically of our understanding of TDA’s focus in terms of fentanyl, so it really does call into question the basis and justification for those strikes against those vessels in international waters.

But we see how the listings of foreign terrorist organizations have been used for these kinetic strikes against vessels allegedly moving drugs on behalf of a designated foreign terrorist organization like TDA. Then fast forward in January 2026, we have seen it as the part of the justification for going after Maduro specifically.

So these aren't the stated legal consequences of FTO listing. These are ways in which FTO listings can be leveraged by policy makers, and often for political purposes, to go after actors that they find to be a national security threat. And in my mind, it is problematic, because it makes me, as somebody who had been in that chair, very uncomfortable to see these listings now being leveraged for such aggressive, kinetic military oriented action–actions also that you could argue are, at least from the international prism, extrajudicial.

Mark Williams: So with Maduro gone and the Venezuelan state now taking orders from the US government, is the amount of cocaine or fentanyl being smuggled into the US likely to fall dramatically? Is that something we should anticipate? I guess another way of asking the question is, was decapitating the Venezuelan state an effective means to help win the war on drugs?

Jason Blazakis: So the so-called war on drugs has been going on since I was a little boy, I think, and I just turned 51. So I don't think it's going to result in a turning point for the US war on drugs. Just like the so-called global war on terrorism, you know, declaring war on things like drugs and terror to me is a recipe for becoming dissatisfied, because you're not going to win a war like that. From my perspective–this is probably a subject of another podcast altogether–it's going after challenges related to the demand side, quite frankly, where there's been little investment in trying to come up and devise true education and health-focused approaches by the federal government to try to deal with the demand, the insatiable demand that, no doubt, exists in the United States that’s resulted in so many people becoming addicted to things like fentanyl.

Putting that broader question aside, for me the decapitation of Maduro, the strikes against these vessels, isn't going to have a profound effect on the fentanyl coming into the country. Fentanyl comes into this country primarily through the Mexican cartels, primarily through the southern border, not necessarily through Venezuela, up through the islands.

Mark Williams: Yes, I was going to say, Venezuela is not the primary source for fentanyl. not even a gateway into the US market.

Jason Blazakis: That's exactly right. So in this context, I hope listeners will understand that the fentanyl challenge doesn't go away merely because Maduro no longer runs Venezuela. And also doesn't go away because he might face stiff prison time. And doesn't go away because we strike 30 or 40 vessels traveling between Venezuela and other Caribbean islands where drugs are certainly being trafficked, but it's not fentanyl.

Mark Williams: Jason, the most spectacular terrorist attack Americans have ever witnessed on US soil was, of course, 9/11, when Al-Qaeda operatives flew commercial airplanes into the World Trade Center and Pentagon. These attacks were crimes of enormous magnitude, literally mass murder. Yet these crimes are also acts of terrorism. Can you help us understand the difference between crime, per se, and terrorism, and why this distinction matters in your mind?

Jason Blazakis: In my mind, the distinction between crime and terrorism is critically important. And it definitely connects to everything we've been talking about related to listings of terrorists under US law.
So, no question, 9/11 was an act of terrorism. The idea of the attack itself was to unmoor the United States and have a crippling effect on the US government, as well as those who provide support in the form of taxation by the US government. Bin Laden was very clear on these being primary areas of justification for the attack. So there is a religious and political motive. It was a premeditated attack against civilians. The focus was not crime. The focus was not for making money. The focus was for creating social change, and that's really what makes it terrorism,

A focus not on creating change within government. It's about making money. And that's why some of the listings that we've talked about, like for instance, the Mexican drug cartels, Venezuelan gangs, they're not really focused about creating change in the United States. They don't really care if Trump's the president or somebody else is the president. What they care is making sure that their wallets and their bank accounts become fatter. And, that motivation matters to me because it really guides the tools that we use to counter organizations. Using terrorism tools to counter criminal groups, for me, is potentially problematic for a myriad of reasons, to include amongst those, how we focus our resources on those threats that are perhaps the most pernicious and most likely to change our government's contours.

Mark Williams: Terrorism in my mind would be acts of violence for a political end. Whereas, there's certainly a lot of violence connected with drug cartels, but that's about the control of product and routes and profits as opposed to trying to change the government or making a political statement.

Jason Blazakis: Precisely.

Mark Williams: We've touched on this before, but I wanted to give you a chance to speak more broadly on the topic if you'd like to. Since you've left government service, have the procedures or protocols used to label someone a terrorist stayed pretty much the same, or have they changed? And if they've changed, will these changes make the process, in your mind, more reliable and more effective, more useful for our national security?

Jason Blazakis: So there is no question that the speed of terrorist designations carried out by the Trump administration have increased rapidly. This tells me a few things. First, it tells me that the process that I outlined from the aha moment of the identification of a bad actor for possible designation to the public unveiling of that designation is no longer being followed in the way in which it was followed when I was in the US government. And I say this because the process I described is a very consensus-driven process. Multiple agencies have to be in agreement before something moves forward, because those agencies have equities at stake.

I think that consensus is no longer the barometer in which these listings are being measured. Consensus is being ignored for political purposes, and I find that really unfortunate. And I think one of those outcomes might result in possible court challenges that could come forward, challenging these listings that may result in the US government potentially losing a case because the due diligence that I described before clearly is no longer being followed. We don't have a consensus-driven process any longer, and that creates great risk.

Mark Williams: So are you saying that when you were in government service, there was an interagency distribution of the materials? And then, are you saying that the interagency distribution has stopped or is it the consensus itself that you're saying seems to have stopped?

Jason Blazakis: Yeah, think it's the latter. I think it's more likely the information might be sent to the interagency with the message saying this is going to happen, you know, by this time period. We are letting you know. And the process will move forward by this date. So even if there might be an objection, you know the interagency may be informed, but it's another thing for the interagency to come to an agreement. So it's that latter half. The consensus is what's likely being missed here.

And as a consequence, the other part of this I think we can't skirt, is the fact that the lawyers are probably being asked to review these things much more quickly than they have historically done. And they may not be perhaps doing as much due diligence as we would like to make sure that these administrative records, these underlying reasons for the designations are being held to that same standard historically. So I think there's also this legal risk because the lawyers are moving so quickly, that this could create scenarios where people are being incorrectly designated, too.

Another concern is the information that's being used may not be the most credible, the best information, because the speed in which these packages have to be created, there might be reliance on information that's not firsthand from a reliable source. It might be information from a thirdhand source.

Mark Williams: In September 2025, Trump signed an executive order which designated Antifa a domestic terrorist organization. A few days later, he issued National Security Presidential Memorandum Seven, I think it was called, countering domestic terrorism and organized political violence. Could you walk us through these documents and help us understand what they say, what they mean, and what they could eventually lead to?

Jason Blazakis: I think it's really important, and I like how you brought the two of them together with respect to this question, because one in isolation of the other, to me, may not necessarily have the impact that the administration is hoping to have.

So that first executive order, to me, I would characterize as a signaling, normative type of action where the president is trying to create a new norm that Antifa, is quote, a domestic terrorist group. The executive order by itself, in isolation, doesn't really create new authorities for executive branch agencies to do work against Antifa. And that's why when I first read the executive order on September 22nd, I thought to myself, well, this is just rhetoric. This is the bombast of President Trump that we've all become accustomed to. And there will be no real teeth to that rhetoric. But then, as you say, three days later, National Security Policy Memorandum Seven is published. And that's what really does operationalize that previous executive order that I saw as being toothless. Here, it's asking joint terrorism task forces throughout this country, of which there are hundreds from state to state, to start investigating domestic terrorists. To prioritize them.
And for me that didn't mean a lot because there's no regime in legal capacity to operationalize domestic terrorism listings. The US government has historically only listed foreign terrorist groups, and there's good reason for that. For instance, the possibility of bypassing civil liberties, the First Amendment, Freedom of Assembly, amongst other things.

The listing of Antifa being operationalized by this domestic law enforcement set of entities known as joint terrorism task forces allows for not only federal government resources, but also state and local forces to be shepherded in a way to go after specifically Antifa. Antifa is very much named in the National Security Policy Memorandum. Left wing extremism is the core focus of that National Security Policy Memorandum.
And there's other elements included in that policy memorandum that are problematic, that includes a call on the United States Financial Intelligence Unit. Around the globe, you have financial intelligence units that look at problematic financing by bad actors. Here it all calls on the USFIU, known as FINSEN, to go after the finances also of left-wing actors. So here you have executive branch power, historically focusing on foreign born threats now focusing on domestic threats, specifically so-called left-wing extremism and very specifically Antifa.

Mark Williams: Do we know who the leader or leaders of Antifa are?

Jason Blazakis: Yeah. It's hard for me not to chuckle also Mark, when thinking about that. Because you know, quite frankly, there are no known seminal figures, that I'm aware of, that are sort of the core leadership figures of Antifa. For me, taking a step back, I don't see Antifa as a coherent organization. I see it more as an ideology, a movement of individuals who are very simply against fascism. I don't see a real leader as part of what the administration characterizes as the Antifa terrorist movement. I think for me, I see it more as a way of thinking.

Mark Williams: Given what you've said about Trump's executive order and about the National Security Memorandum, could some of the tools or strategies and force capabilities that were designed to combat international terrorism after 9/11 somehow be turned on Americans domestically for doing fairly American types of things like, you know, calling out political malfeasance or protesting a government action or advocating for a specific policy or voicing an opinion that's critical of some current government policy? Is that possible that we would see this?

Jason Blazakis: I think in some ways we are already seeing it, unfortunately, Mark. And I say that especially in the wake of the death of Renee Good in Minnesota, and the way in which she's been characterized by senior officials within the Trump administration to include JD Vance, who very openly talked about Renee Good as being a terrorist.

So I see the deployment of ICE, Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, not only as a tool being used to round up so-called illegal aliens, but also as a mechanism to go after extremism writ large. When the president talks about deploying ICE or US government assets to cities like Los Angeles, Portland, or as he's threatened in Chicago previously, that's not really about getting at criminal elements. It's about trying to, in my mind, change the discussion where there's disagreement, civil disagreement and protests about some of the administration's policies. I see it as a coercive set of behaviors and deployments to change that discussion. And that frightens me. And some of this is absolutely being done under the lens of Antifa now being labeled as a domestic group.

ut we've even seen charges against individuals who’ve carried out acts of violence where ICE is operating, in places like Prairieland, Texas, where individuals have been arrested and they were after the fact labeled as Antifa in the court documents.

Mark Williams: After the fact.

Jason Blazakis: After the attack occurred. So throwing that Antifa label at these individuals after these decisions have been made is very disturbing.

Mark Williams: One of the disturbing things about what you're saying are the precedents that could be set and the acceptance, both within the government and within the general public, that current operations are becoming normalized or will become normalized, and this would be how things are going forward. That could be very, very disturbing. I think a lot of this sounds pretty grim, Jason. For people who are interested in protecting domestic liberties from government overreach, do you have any suggestions and what would you most like our listeners to take away from the discussion that we've been having today?

Jason Blazakis: That's a great question. So for me. I think one of the most important things to do is to remain active, not to feel that you're powerless, that there's nothing you can do. There's always something that you can do, and I would just encourage people to focus on civil nonviolent responses to the challenges that are happening in this country. Not so different from the ways in which the Governor of Minnesota tried to calm down Minnesotans in the wake of Renee Good's death.

I would share Waltz's position that the administration does want more chaos, unfortunately, to be able to use these tools even more and more aggressively. So as a consequence, I would encourage listeners, whether they're Republican or Democrat, who might be concerned about federal government overreach to tell their members of congress about those concerns about these tools, the FTO tool, the executive order 1-3-2-2-4 tool being used in ways that haven't historically been utilized against Americans–going against the purposes originally intended by the United States Congress when the foreign terrorist organization regime was created.

And I think there is this glimmer of hope, if people take a look at the recent Senate vote on Venezuela, where, I think 54 Republicans and Democrats come together and said, you know, for any other military kinetic actions the administration might be pursuing, that this is something that they're opposed to.
And of course, in 2026, every American should use their right to vote for members of Congress who they feel will hold the administration to account where these tools are being misused. And to encourage their members of Congress to think deeply about these types of issues. So, I know it sounds trite to say, write your member of Congress, talk to your senator, but I do think they're listening. And I think that recent vote on Venezuela is an indicator that there could be some bipartisan agreement on these issues, for what it's worth.

Mark Williams: Yeah. I think you might be right. Jason, I want to end by thanking you for your years of government service and for helping us understand some of these issues today. And I want to thank you very much for joining us on New Frontiers.

Jason Blazakis: Thank you for having me.

Rob Ambat: Jason Blazakis grew up in southwest New Jersey. He loves food, especially pasta and Italian cuisine, is a passionate fan of the professional and collegiate Philadelphia sports scene, and when not engaged in research, writing or consulting, he plays vintage baseball under 1864 rules, which means playing bare hand while wearing hot wool uniforms.