New York City’s Democratic socialist Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani has named Ramzi Kassem — an attorney who previously represented Al Qaeda terrorists — to serve as the city’s chief counsel in his administration.

“I will turn to Ramzi for his remarkable experience and his commitment to defending those too often abandoned by our legal system,” Mamdani said of Kassem, adding, “City Hall will be stronger with him in it, and our work of building a more prosperous city for all will have a powerful advocate.”

“My sincere hope is that New Yorkers who have long felt on the margins of this city, the homeless veteran straining to survive, the patient searching for the care that they need, an immigrant trying to get by will feel that they now have leaders in their corner who understand their struggles and care to fight for them,” Mamdani continued. “That is the city I want to build. The prosperity I intend to deliver and the leadership that has too long been lacking.”

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Kassem said that the appointment, to him, represented a chance to give back to the city he loved: “I grew up in war-torn countries in the Middle East, authoritarian regimes, and New York City was really my first stable and permanent home. This is an opportunity for me to repay that debt. I’ve been trying to repay that debt ever since I came to this country, ever since I immigrated.”

Critics argued that Kassem, who once represented al Qaeda terrorist Ahmed al-Darbi in court, was a strange choice to be chief counsel in a city that was devastated by an al Qaeda-linked terrorist attack on 9/11, 2001. Al-Darbi pleaded guilty in 2014 in connection with a plot to bomb the French oil tanker MV Limburg off the coast of Yemen. He was convicted in 2017, and in 2018, President Donald Trump’s administration transferred him to the custody of Saudi Arabia.

He also represented Mohammad Mani Ahmad al-Qahtani, who allegedly attempted to assist in the 9/11 hijacking and was held in detention at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, for two decades. Kassem, who was teaching law at City University of New York at the time, had been working with students over the course of a decade to get him returned to Saudi Arabia. They succeeded in doing so in 2022.

In more recent history, Kassem represented pro-Hamas Columbia University agitator Mahmoud Khalil — and prior to that, he served in President Joe Biden’s White House Domestic Policy Council as a senior policy adviser.

NEW: Zohran Mamdani announced the nomination of Ramzi Kassem as Chief Counsel of New York City.

Kassem returned to America from the Middle East in 2001, inspired by 9/11 to defend an Al Qaeda terrorist.

“I found myself pulled in the direction of doing rights work domestically… pic.twitter.com/Duxc04q3b3

— Wall Street Mav (@WallStreetMav) December 31, 2025

New York City Councilwoman Vickie Paladino responded to the appointment, saying, “Less than 25 years after thousands of New Yorkers were killed on 9/11, the Chief Counsel of New York is going to be an Islamist lawyer who came to this country after 9/11 specifically to defend the very Al Qaeda terrorists we were fighting against. The fact that our immigration system post 9/11 even allowed him to step foot into the country is a monumental failure. Disgraceful isn’t a big enough word for what’s happening here. The federal government must get a LOT more involved in New York. We cannot allow these people to go unchecked.”

In just one year, President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio have transformed foreign policy with their “America First” approach.

By rescuing Americans abroad, cutting bureaucracy, fighting narco-terrorists, and promoting peace, the administration has laid the groundwork to continue strengthening American influence in Trump’s final term.

Reflecting on the first year, State Department principal deputy spokesman Tommy Pigott told The Daily Wire that Trump has delivered “historic accomplishments,” making the United States  “great, strong, prosperous, and respected again,” and adding that “the best is yet to come.”

Here are Trump and Rubio’s foreign policy accomplishments of 2025:

Returning Hostages And Wrongfully Detained Americans

Since Trump took office, nearly 50 living hostages have been freed from Gaza. Just days before his inauguration, his team, working with the outgoing Biden administration, negotiated a ceasefire and a hostage deal between Israel and Hamas. That initial agreement led to the release of 38 hostages but collapsed in March.

In October, following another Trump-negotiated ceasefire, the remaining 30 living hostages were released. More than 30 bodies were also returned, leaving only one still in Gaza: Ran Gvili. Trump has promised to return Gvili’s body to his family. Americans were among those freed, including Keith Siegel, Sagui Dekel-Chen, and Edan Alexander.

Trump also secured the release of several wrongfully detained Americans. Just hours after the president’s inauguration, the Taliban freed Ryan Corbett, who had spent 894 days in captivity in Afghanistan, and William McKenty. The administration also secured the freedom of George Glezmann, held by the Taliban for over two years, and Amir Amiri, who had been detained for nine months.

In February, envoy Richard Grenell brought six Americans home from Venezuela, where some had been abused after being kidnapped as tourists. The administration also secured the release of American schoolteacher Marc Fogel in February and Russian-American ballerina Ksenia Karelina in April, both of whom had been imprisoned under harsh sentences in Russia. Anastasia Nuhfer was also returned home from Belarus in early 2025.

US President Donald Trump, left, greets US schoolteacher Marc Fogel. Daniel Heuer/CNP/Bloomberg via Getty Images

Cutting Waste And Bureaucracy

Trump and Rubio have overhauled the State Department, eliminating or consolidating nearly 45% of domestic offices and cutting staff to streamline operations. The department says the reorganization empowers embassies and regional bureaus and ensures America’s interests are being served abroad.

The State Department trimmed costs by $270.8 million by reducing the scope of 659 contracts and ending or not renewing 533 others, data from the Federal Procurement Data System shows. Travel expenses were also slashed, with the Department spending $100 million less on trips than the previous year.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio (R) and Kenyan Prime Cabinet Secretary Musalia Mudavadi (L) participate in a Health Framework of Cooperation signing ceremony at the State Department in Washington, DC on December 4, 2025. Photo by Allison ROBBERT / AFP via Getty Images

The Trump administration also overhauled how it distributed foreign aid, choosing to send funds directly to partner governments and bypassing what Rubio called the “NGO industrial complex.” Rubio said the previous model funneled aid through NGOs that consumed large portions of funding on overhead rather than the programs they were intended to support. He added that relying on NGOs left host countries with little control and created redundancy instead of strengthening existing health systems.

In April, Rubio announced the closure of the State Department’s Global Engagement Center (GEC), saying the agency “was labeling American speech by Americans as foreign interference.” Created in 2011 to counter terrorist propaganda, the GEC shifted after the 2016 election to targeting domestic “misinformation.” Rubio added that the Center would also be investigated for allegedly being “used as a weapon against the American people.”

In May, Rubio and Vice President J.D. Vance helped negotiate a ceasefire between nuclear-armed rivals India and Pakistan following a terrorist attack in the Indian region of Jammu and Kashmir on April 22, which left 26 civilians dead. The attack triggered military air strikes and cross-border small-arms fire. Trump said the ceasefire, which has held, was the result of a “long night of talks.”

Peace Push

The following month, Trump announced a “complete and total ceasefire” between Israel and Iran, ending a 12‑day conflict. The agreement followed a 37-hour B‑2 bomber mission by the United States targeting Iranian nuclear sites. While airstrikes have ceased, Iran continues hostile rhetoric, which Trump has matched, including stating his support for Israel to strike Iran again if it continues pursuing missile or nuclear programs during a December meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

President Donald J. Trump in The Situation Room, June 21, 2025 pic.twitter.com/SXyXiuYswI

— The White House (@WhiteHouse) June 22, 2025

Also in June, the Trump administration brokered a historic peace agreement between the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Rwanda at the White House in June. Rwandan Foreign Minister Olivier Nduhungirehe and Congo Foreign Minister Therese Kayikwamba Wagner were present in the Oval Office. The agreement calls for the withdrawal of Rwandan troops from eastern Congo and the establishment of a joint security mechanism. The agreement between the two neighbors also aims to attract investment to Congo’s mineral-rich provinces, including from the United States.

The Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda agreed to a US-backed peace deal meant to end years of deadly conflict and promote development in Congo’s volatile eastern region. Yuri Gripas/Abaca/Bloomberg via Getty Images

In July, Trump negotiated a ceasefire between Thailand and Cambodia after conflict broke out the previous month, leaving dozens dead. When violence flared again in December, he successfully pushed for a second agreement, saying the two nations will “go back to living in PEACE, as per our recently agreed to original Treaty.”

Trump rounded out the summer by facilitating the signing of a peace agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan, which have been in conflict since the 1990s. In the Oval Office in August, Trump said Christian-majority Armenia and Muslim-majority Azerbaijan had committed to “stop all fighting forever, open up commerce, travel, and diplomatic relations and respect each other’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.” The deal also grants the United States the right to develop a strategic transit corridor through the South Caucasus, which will be named in honor of Trump.

Taking On Illegal Immigration and Narco Terrorists

The Trump Administration has waged a full-fledged offensive against narco-terrorists trafficking drugs by sea. The U.S. military has sunk several vessels of the terrorists and arrested others, including Sinaloa Cartel leader Efrain Sanchez Cabanillas in the Dominican Republic, MS-13 leader Alvaro Osiris Acosta Bustillo in Honduras, and local Tren de Aragua leader “Chino San Vicente” in Colombia. Trump said that his efforts have slashed drug trafficking through maritime rights by more than 90% and saved “hundreds of thousands of lives.”

📹 ON VIDEO: This morning, President Trump ordered a strike on a vessel affiliated with a Designated Terrorist Organization conducting narcotrafficking. The strike was conducted in international waters, and six male narcoterrorists aboard the vessel were killed. pic.twitter.com/tKAtfQF7Tr

— The White House (@WhiteHouse) October 14, 2025

Encounters with immigrants at the southern border are down 99% since January. This sharply contrasts with The Daily Wire’s visit to the Mexico‑Texas border less than a year ago, when migrants were lining the Rio Grande after swimming across. Under the Biden administration, more than 10 million illegal crossings were documented. So far under the Trump administration, there have been roughly 102,000 apprehensions at the southern border.

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In 2025, the State Department signed “Safe Third Country” agreements to expedite the deportation of migrants in the United States and revoked more than 85,000 non-immigrant visas, often targeting holders whose views were considered opposed to American values. The Trump administration announced it began screening visa seekers’ social media for terrorist or antisemitic content, with any such findings potentially serving as grounds for denying student visas.

Trump introduced a “Gold Card” visa aimed at attracting high-net-worth immigrants to the United States. For $5 million, recipients would receive Green Card privileges with a potential path to citizenship. Trump said the program would boost the U.S. economy by encouraging spending, tax contributions, and business creation.