A United States Senator, Ted Cruz, has championed calls for heavy sanctions on Nigeria amid the ongoing Christian genocide uproar and claims which appear to be gathering international storm against the country currently.
Cruz, a top ranking US Senator, in a bill titled “Nigeria Religious Freedom Accountability Act of 2025” presented before the U.S Senate, is demanding sanctions against Nigerian officials accused of enabling widespread violence against Christian communities.
The legislation, introduced by Cruz in early September, targets federal authorities, state governors, judges, and law enforcement personnel implicated in enforcing Sharia and blasphemy laws that critics say disproportionately harm religious minorities, especially in the Nigeria’s muslim north.
Cruz, a Republican Senator from Texas, is said to have President Donald Trump’s ears on conservative issues, having been a vocal advocate for global Christian rights. Echoeing the ‘Christian genocide’ uproar, Cruz described the situation in Nigeria as a “systematic mass murder” orchestrated by Islamist jihadists, alleging government complicity through inaction or direct facilitation.
Cruz had introduced the bill in early September, just weeks before U.S President Donald Trump signed a memo labelling views leaning towards anti-Americanism, anti-capitalism, and anti-Christianity as domestic terrorism.
On Friday, Cruz doubled down on the need for his bill, insisting that it is vital in addressing the concerns.
The lawmaker was reacting to reports that more than 5,000 people had fled Borno state into neighbouring Cameroon after Boko Haram militants captured the border town of Kirawa.
“Officials in Nigeria are ignoring and even facilitating the mass murder of Christians by Islamist jihadists.
“It’s time to hold those responsible accountable. My Nigeria Religious Freedom Accountability Act would target these officials with powerful sanctions and other tools,” Cruz stated.
Tinubu Meets Northern Christian Leaders
Worried by the international ‘Christian Genocide’ uproar, President Bola Tinubu, on Saturday, met with Christian communities in the northern part of Nigeria.
During the meeting held in Jos, Plateau State, the President declared that he had a mission to unite Nigerians, assuring Christian communities in northern Nigeria that his administration would ensure fairness among all religions in the country.
Tinubu said: “I have a mission to unite this country, ensure its prosperity, and we are making progress.
“In our family, we have a strong Muslim background, and I married a Christian, a pastor for that matter, and I have never forced her to change her religion.
“I inherited Islam from my family. I didn’t change, but my wife is a pastor. She prays for me all the time. I have never changed her at any single time, convinced or converted her. So, I believe in the freedom of religion because we are praying to the same God.”
He emphasised that what binds humanity is greater than what divides it, adding that deeds, character, and love for one another were what truly mattered before God.
“We are answerable to the same Almighty God. We will answer to Him. Our deed, our character, our love to our fellow beings is what matters,” the President added.
He further urged the clergymen to have faith in his administration.
According to him, as leaders, we have the responsibility to manage religious issues for the benefit of all.
Tinubu also reiterated his government’s determination to end insecurity and revive the nation’s economy.
“We are defeating bandits, and we will defeat them. We will deal with them and end the farmers-herders clashes,” he said, adding that ongoing economic reforms were designed to improve the welfare of all citizens.
Reacting also to Cruz’s bill before the U.S Senate, Bayo Onanuga, special adviser on information and strategy to President Bola Tinubu, dismissed claims that Nigerian officials are ignoring the mass killing of Christians.
Onanuga maintained that Nigeria does not have a religious war and insisted that terrorists and bandits kill without discrimination.
He said: “Senator, stop these malicious, contrived lies against my country. We do not have a religious war in my country.
“The degraded Boko Haram terrorists operating on the fringes of Nigeria’s North East target everyone. They attack farmers, our soldiers.
“The bandits in the North West kill worshippers in their mosques. Christians are not targeted. We have religious harmony in our country. Stop these malicious lies.”
Whereas, both Christians and Muslims have fallen victims of the Islamist attacks in the country, the unending land-grab push by Fulani herders-cum-bandits in Nigeria’s north-central which has a significant Christian population sometimes punctures the rebuttals by the Nigerian government.
The patterns of the attacks described by locals as ‘displacement and replacement’ strategy by the marauding terrorists have become a commonplace. In early 2025, the rampaging terrorists were on a killing spree, ransacking agrarian villages in Plataeu and Benue states. Plateau Governor, Caleb Mutfwang had in April revealed that not less than 64 plateau communities were seized by bandits and 51 people killed in that act of violence alone, this digital magazine had reported.
Pan-Atlantic Kompass reports that the ‘Christian genocide’ uproar made it to the international headlines after a U.S comedian, Bill Maher, lambasted the Nigerian government over the killings of Christians.
Maher also criticised mainstream media for overlooking what he described as Christian genocide in Nigeria.
Maher had claimed that over 100,000 Christians have been killed since 2009, with 18,000 churches burned, labeling it “so much more of a genocide attempt than what is going on in Gaza.”
“Nigeria, the fact that this issue has not gotten on people’s radar, it’s pretty amazing. If you don’t know what’s going on in Nigeria, your media sources suck. You are in a bubble.
“I’m not a Christian, but they are systematically killing the Christians in Nigeria. They’ve killed over a hundred thousand since 2009. They’ve burned 18,000 churches. These are the Islamists, Boko Haram.
“This is so much more of a genocide attempt than what is going on in Gaza. They are literally attempting to wipe out the Christian population of an entire country.
“Where are the kids protesting this?” he asked, criticizing the lack of mainstream media coverage and noting the absence of public outcry in the United States over the killings.
Islamist Violence Pushes Nigeria Toward U.S. Blacklist Vote Again
This digital magazine understands that nearly four years ago, the former President Joe Biden’s administration had removed Nigeria from the U.S. State Department’s list of countries “of particular concern” for threats to religious freedom. But continuing attacks by Islamist militias have reignited calls from some members of the U.S. Congress to restore the designation.
The spike in violence, which Open Doors’ World Watch List reports saw about 3,100 Christians killed and roughly 2,830 kidnapped in Nigeria in 2024 — has renewed pressure from U.S. lawmakers and watchdogs to re-designate Nigeria as a ‘Country of Particular Concern’ after its removal in November 2021.
The Nigerian government has continued to fight the ‘Christian genocide’ uproar and claims, insisting that “the degraded Boko Haram terrorists operating on the fringes of Nigeria’s North East target everyone”, according to presidential spokesperson, Onanuga.
