10:06am: Talkline with Hoppy Kercheval

After New York and New Jersey bombings, congressman issues call to action, renewed vigilance

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — The New Jersey man suspected in weekend bombings in New York and New Jersey was in police custody by late Monday morning following a shootout with police in Linden, New Jersey.

Ahmad Khan Rahami, 28, was arrested in Linden, New Jersey within hours of the release of these photos.

The arrest of Ahmad Khan Rahami, 28, who was wounded, came with help from a tip within hours of authorities naming the naturalized U.S. citizen from Afghanistan as a suspect and the release of photos of him, according to ABC News.

One law enforcement officer was shot in the hand while a second officer was saved by a bulletproof vest in the shootout, authorities confirmed.

It was not immediately clear if other suspects were being sought.

“Quite frankly, I’m tired of hearing ‘These things happen.’ We’ve got to take some kind of action instead of just sitting back and talking about planning for the next thing,” said 1st District Congressman David McKinley (R-W.Va.) of the bombings on Monday’s MetroNews “Talkline.”

“We’ve got to be more serious about this. This administration has tried to use appeasement and other approaches toward solving this. I don’t think they take national security as serious as many of us do.”

Rahami’s arrest followed both the Saturday morning pipe bomb explosion in Seaside Park, New Jersey and the Saturday evening pressure cooker bombing and later pressure cooker bomb discovery in New York’s Chelsea neighborhood, the FBI reported. The second bomb in Chelsea did not detonate.

Rahami’s last known address had been in Elizabeth, New Jersey.

On Sunday night, a backpack containing as many as five explosive devices was reported near a train station in Elizabeth, New Jersey. One of the bombs detonated as a robot worked through the bag early Monday. No one was hurt.

The blasts injured dozens of people but had not claimed any lives as of Monday morning.

“What is our government doing to stop this?” McKinley asked. “We’ve got to get back and treat this as though we are in a war.”

“Let’s take action,” McKinley said while calling for more comprehensive monitoring of “bad actors” traveling overseas and a full briefing on the state of national security here in the United States.

The absence of large-scale terrorist attacks since Sept. 11, 2001, he said, should not lead to complacency.

“We know more than I can share. There are still those (larger) threats out there and they’ve been thwarted but, these threats (like the New York and New Jersey bombings) are still out there,” McKinley said.

“What we need to do is pick up the ball here a little bit stronger and figure out how we’re going to stop these individual attacks that are meant to create havoc.”





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