An FBI investigation disrupted a planned terrorist attack on the Mall of America, resulting in the arrest of an 18‑year‑old American citizen on Tuesday. Authorities said the suspect, Sheikhdoon Abdullahi Mohamud, was caught in a public park in Richfield, Minnesota, after paying $600 to an undercover agent posing as an ISIS member for an AK‑47 and 200 rounds of ammunition.
The investigation began in December 2024 when Mohamud began communicating with a confidential informant. Over the next months, the suspect repeatedly expressed intent to kill non‑Muslims at the mall on October 24, the date of a scheduled Hmong arts celebration, and expressed admiration for recent terror attacks. By May 2025, FBI agents had visited his home, but his parents declined to speak with them. The agency ultimately seized the rifle and ammunition on the spot, preventing the planned attack.
U.S. Attorney Daniel Rosen praised the FBI’s work, saying the operation “disrupted a threat before the defendant could carry out his intention to kill, perhaps 30 to 60 people.” Rosen urged parents across Minnesota and the United States to heed federal warnings about radicalization, noting that the suspect had become a “radicalized young man who needed to be watched.”
Minnesota hosts tens of thousands of people of Somali descent, a community that has seen several members charged with attempting to join ISIS or other terror groups since refugees began arriving in the 1990s. The arrest underscores the ongoing concern about radicalization within the state’s Somali‑American population.
