Two people have been charged in connection with planning what FBI Director Kash Patel called “a potential terrorist attack."

Patel announced the arrests on Friday morning, writing on X.com that the agency had “thwarted a potential terrorist attack” and arrested “multiple” people in Dearborn.

On Monday, he posted that the “FBI stopped a massacre before it could happen.”

Mohmed Ali and Majed Mahmoud are now facing charges of “receiving and transferring, and attempting and conspiring to transfer, firearms and ammunition knowing and having reasonable cause to believe that the firearms and ammunition would be used to commit a Federal crime of terrorism," according to the criminal complaint.

They face up to 15 years in federal prison and a $250,000 fine, according to a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Michigan.

The legal filing said that Ali, Mahmoud and several co-conspirators "used online encrypted communications and social media applications to share extremist and ISIS-related materials that encourage attacks similar to what they planned" and that Ali and a person identified as “Person 1,” "discussed when to conduct their attack, which they appeared to set for Halloween, and they sought guidance from the father of a local Islamic extremist ideologue (the “Islamic Ideologue”) on this question."

The FBI said that they recovered three AR-15-style rifles, two shotguns, four handguns and more than 1,600 rounds of ammunition, along with sights, GoPro cameras, tactical vests and other items at Ali’s and Mahmoud’s homes and a storage unit rented by Ali.

The Associated Press reported that the group had scouted LGBTQ+ bars in Ferndale, Michigan, outside of Detroit.

Ali’s attorney, Amir Makled, said over the weekend that the allegations against his client were the result of “hysteria” and “fearmongering,” the AP reported. The comments were made before the charges were released.

©2025 Cox Media Group