The list of designated terrorist groups has grown at an unprecedented rate. Counterterror policies are being stretched to include drug cartels – with serious international consequences, as we saw in Venezuela at the beginning of January. Since early 2025, Trump has added a whopping 26 new groups to the Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) list. The main US terrorist list has sprawled beyond traditional terrorist organizations. Apart from anything else, it stretches the resources of US crime-fighting agencies away from actual terrorist groups.