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U.S. President Donald Trump's threat to go "guns-a-blazing" into Nigeria over what he claims to be deadly persecution of Christians is prompting pushback in the West African nation. "Christianity is facing an existential threat in Nigeria," Trump declared on social media over the weekend. "Thousands of Christians are being killed. Radical Islamists are responsible for this mass slaughter," Trump said, following it up with another post saying he was ordering the Pentagon to prepare for possible military action against Nigeria. Amnesty International, the global non-governmental organization that monitors violations of human rights including religious freedoms, describes the long-running violence in northern Nigeria as "egregious crimes," but does not characterize it as religious persecution. Isa Sunusi, executive director of the group's Nigeria program, says there's no evidence of a religious motivation behind the attacks. "I don't think President Trump has any facts," Sunusi said in an interview with CBC News. "I don't think he has had a very good briefing about the nature of this conflict." Groups kill both Muslims, Christians: Sunusi Sunusi says Nigeria is "bedevilled by" what he describes as jihadist groups. "The jihadist groups kill both Muslims and Christians. They demolish mosques and churches. They don't differentiate." The most prominent such group, Boko Haram, launched its insurgency in northeastern Nigeria back in 2009. Tens of thousands of people have since been killed or kidnapped, and estimates of those displaced run into the millions. The group was founded on a strict interpretation of Islam. It views Muslims who work with any part of the Nigerian government and civil society as legitimate targets, according to Amnesty International's research. "Boko Haram fighters killed politicians, civil servants, teachers, health workers and traditional leaders because of their relationship with secular authority," Amnesty said in a report at the height of the conflict in 2015. "Christians living in the northeast were included in this category, but so were Islamic religious figures, from the leaders of sects to local imams." According to Armed Conflict Location & Event Data, a U.S. research group, 52,915 civilians have been killed in targeted political assassinations in Nigeria since 2009, reported Agence-France Presse. Data from the same organization for the period between 2020 and 2025 shows at least 389 cases of violence targeting Christians, resulting in at least 318 deaths, along with 197 attacks targeting Muslims, causing at least 418 deaths, AFP reported. Nigeria is the most populous country in Africa, at around 230 million people, roughly 54 per cent of whom are Muslim and 46 per cent Christian, according to the CIA. There has also been ongoing violence in other parts of northern Nigeria that has at times been depicted as fighting between Muslims and Christians, although access to land and resources is at the heart of the conflict, according to research by the International Crisis Group, a Belgium-based conflict-prevention organization. Trump's weekend posts about Nigeria at first appeared to come out of the blue. Data from Roll Call, a Capitol Hill website that tracks and transcribes all of Trump's public remarks, suggests that since his inauguration in January, the president had neither spoken of nor posted about Nigerian Christians until the weekend. Fox News item triggered Trump: reports According to reports by CNN and NBC, Trump's statements online were triggered by an item he saw on Fox News on Friday about Nigerian Christians. The first opportunity journalists had to question Trump about his posts came Sunday evening as the U.S. president returned to Washington from spending the weekend at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida. "They're killing record numbers of Christians in Nigeria," Trump told reporters onboard Air Force One. "They're killing the Christians and killing them in very large numbers. Not gonna allow that to happen." There's no evidence that the killing is currently happening in anything like record numbers. Nigerian President Bola Ahmed Tinubu says his administration is working to address security challenges that affect people across faiths and regions. "The characterization of Nigeria as religiously intolerant does not reflect our national reality," Tinubu said in a statement on social media. "Nigeria opposes religious persecution and does not encourage it." Trump vows 'guns-a-blazing' response to Nigeria over alleged anti-Christian persecution Leavitt doubles down on claim On Tuesday, the White House press secretary reiterated Trump's depiction of the conflict and his threats of consequences for Nigeria. "If the Nigerian government continues to allow the killing of Christians, the United States will immediately stop all aid and assistance to Nigeria and may take action to wipe out the Islamic terrorists who are committing these horrible atrocities," Karoline Leavitt told reporters at a briefing. Trump put Nigeria on a list of nations deemed by the U.S. to be guilty of severe violations of religious freedom. Others designated as "countries of particular concern" include China, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Russia and Saudi Arabia. Republican members of Congress and evangelical Christian groups have been lobbying Trump to put that designation on Nigeria since his return to the White House. "I have fought for years to counter the slaughter and persecution of Christians in Nigeria," said Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, in a statement thanking Trump for the designation.
