The following is a preview of Daily Signal Politics Editor Bradley Devlin’s interview with Rep. Riley Moore, R-W.V., on “The Signal Sitdown.” The full interview premieres on The Daily Signal’s YouTube page at 6:30 a.m. Eastern on Nov. 13.
The horrific slaughter of Christians in Nigeria has caught the attention of President Donald Trump and the United States government.
“If the Nigerian Government continues to allow the killing of Christians, the U.S.A. will immediately stop all aid and assistance to Nigeria, and may very well go into that now disgraced country, ‘guns-a-blazing,’ to completely wipe out the Islamic Terrorists who are committing these horrible atrocities,” the president wrote in a Nov. 1 post on Truth Social. “I am hereby instructing our Department of War to prepare for possible action. If we attack, it will be fast, vicious, and sweet, just like the terrorist thugs attack our CHERISHED Christians! WARNING: THE NIGERIAN GOVERNMENT BETTER MOVE FAST!”
As the president continues to weigh his options, he’s tapped Rep. Riley Moore, R-W.V., to provide a report about the situation unfolding in Nigeria, where estimates place the number of slaughtered Christians well over 50,000 since 2009, with more than 7,000 of these deaths having occurred in 2025 alone. In Congress, Moore was one of the first voices drawing attention to the intensifying atrocities committed against Christians in Nigeria, and he joins “The Signal Sitdown” this week to discuss.
“Nigeria is the most dangerous country on the face of the planet to be a Christian,” Moore told The Daily Signal. “This has been happening for a very long time, and it’s getting worse and worse and worse every year.”
There are many different perpetrators of what Moore believes is a “genocide” of Christians in Nigeria, however, as is these groups’ interests in persecuting Christians.
“The dynamics of it are obviously complex,” Moore said.
“In the northeast of the country, that’s where Boko Haram is and [Islamic State] West Africa,” the West Virginia Congressman explained. “In the middle band of the country, that’s where the Fulani tribe is,” which is a tribe of militant muslim herdsmen. “Essentially the southern part of the country is Christian, the northern part of the country is majority Muslim, and, in that middle, it’s obviously a mixture of that,” Moore added.
“All three of these groups are doing this,” Moore said of the islamic groups Boko Haram, Islamic State West Africa, and the Fulani tribe. While Moore told The Daily Signal that these groups “have different and varying ultimate objectives… there’s one specific thing that ties all this together: the genocide of Christians.”
Meanwhile, the Nigerian government “has essentially been turning a blind eye,” Moore said.
Moore first became interested in the plight of Nigerian Christians when he was a staffer for the House Foreign Affairs Committee. “I used to be staff on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and so I remember Save Our Girls and all of that when President Obama had elevated the issue and Boko Haram came onto the scene around 2009.”
“This has been an issue that’s bothered me for a long time. Not just Nigeria, but just, writ large, the persecution of Christians around the world,” Moore added.
As the violence against Christians in Nigeria has intensified over the course of the year, Moore has encouraged the United States, which provides various kinds of assistance to Nigeria, to take action.
In October, Moore authored a letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio encouraging the U.S. government to re-designate Nigeria as a “Country of Particular Concern” under the International Religious Freedom Act. Former President Joe Biden removed Nigeria from the list because his administration determined the root cause of the conflict was actually “land disputes related to climate change and not targeting Christians for their faith.”
Later that month, Trump announced on Truth Social that he was re-designating Nigeria a “Country of Particular Concern.”
In doing so, Trump “unlock[ed] 15 different levers that the president can use” to encourage the protection of Christian communities, Moore said. These levers include cutting off foreign aid, security assistance, and sanctions.
“Security assistance has gone to Nigeria in the agreement that they would use it to stop Boko Haram and these other terrorist organizations operating in their country,” Moore explained. “Obviously that’s not happening.”
Trump, however, has not only promised to create economic leverage, but has threatened military action.
The president has been “a great leader as it relates to peace in the world,” Moore said. “Why has he been so effective? Because he always puts all options on the table. He’s not gonna limit himself.”
That said, however, Moore has “no interest in regime change.”
“I have no interest in institutional building, nation building, any of this other nonsense we’ve gone through over the last several decades,” Moore continued. “This is a very targeted and specific issue.”
“I think this can be done without any military kinetic response, and we’re going to see if that’s possible as we continue to work,” Moore said.
