Since Boko Haram’s 2009 insurgency, over 50,000 Christians have been killed in Nigeria.
Senator Ted Cruz (R., Texas) is taking action to fight the ongoing persecution of Christians in Nigeria by Islamist groups and government officials who enforce sharia law.
Cruz is introducing the Nigeria Religious Freedom Accountability Act of 2025 to protect Christians from persecution by Islamist groups and to pursue accountability for Nigerian government officials who enable Islamist persecution, National Review has learned.
“Nigerian Christians are being targeted and executed for their faith by Islamist terrorist groups, and are being forced to submit to sharia law and blasphemy laws across Nigeria,” Cruz said in a statement.
“It is long past time to impose real costs on the Nigerian officials who facilitate these activities, and my Nigeria Religious Freedom Accountability Act uses new and existing tools to do exactly that. I urge my colleagues to advance this critical legislation expeditiously.”
The bill would require Secretary of State Marco Rubio to classify Nigeria as a country of particular concern. Doing so would add Nigeria to a list of countries where religious freedom is severely limited.
The State Department’s list includes Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, North Korea, Iran, Cuba, and other nations outside the Western world. Severe violations of religious freedom include but are not limited to torture, detention without charges, forced disappearances, and other flagrant denials of basic rights.
Similarly, Cruz’s legislation ensures the State Department keeps Islamist terrorist groups Boko Haram and ISIS-West Africa designated as entities of particular concern, a classification for non-state actors responsible for egregious violations of religious liberty. Boko Haram has a stronghold in northeast Nigeria and an active presence in several countries bordering Nigeria.
Additionally, Cruz’s bill imposes sanction on Nigerian government officials who facilitate persecution against Christians and other religious minorities. If enacted, the State Department would have 90 days to submit a report on the Nigerian officials responsible for pushing blasphemy laws and justifying violence from Islamist groups.
Since Boko Haram’s 2009 insurgency, over 50,000 Christians have been killed in Nigeria, according to a 2023 report from the International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law, a Nigerian human rights watchdog. Over 18,000 Christian churches and 2,000 Christian schools have been attacked during the same time period. The watchdog also concluded that 34,000 moderate Muslims died from Jihadist attacks.
Between 2015 and 2025, an estimated 145 priests were kidnapped in Nigeria, according to a study from the Vatican news outlet Agenzia Fides. Multiple priest kidnappings have happened this year, including one that Boko Haram carried out in June. The terror group abducted Fr. Alphonsus Afina and held him in captivity for weeks before releasing him unharmed. Afina spent over 50 days in captivity and the kidnapping gained international prominence in part because of his six years of ministry in the U.S.
Violence against Christians in Nigeria regularly makes international headlines. In June, Jihadists killed over 200 Nigerian Christian villagers in a farming community that is 97 percent Catholic. The attack was the latest in a spree of targeted attacks on Christians in Nigeria earlier this year. Pope Leo XIV and the State Department led the chorus of international condemnation following the brutal killings.