NEW YORK (AP) — Federal authorities said they found explosive residue in a Pennsylvania storage unit as part of an investigation into two men charged with bringing homemade bombs to a protest outside the home of New York City’s mayor.
Emir Balat, 18, and Ibrahim Kayumi, 19, told investigators after their arrests Saturday they were inspired by the Islamic State group, according to law enforcement officials and a criminal complaint. The men live in the Philadelphia
suburbs, and traveled to New York City together to carry out the attack, officials said.
Overnight Monday, the FBI’s bomb technicians conducted controlled detonations of the explosive residue found at a public storage facility in Langhorne, Pennsylvania, near where Balat’s family lives, according to social media posts.
The explosion resulted in “several loud bangs,” the Middletown Township Police Department said Tuesday, adding that there was no threat to residents. The FBI said Monday that it had conducted multiple searches in connection with the investigation.
Much remains unknown about the motives, planning and relationship between the two young men accused of carrying out the attack.
Court documents show Emir Balat’s father, Selahattin Balat, is a native of Turkey who was granted asylum in the United States in 1998 and later became a U.S. citizen. In a 2009 bankruptcy filing, he listed his occupation as painter and said he had three children.
Emir Balat is a senior at Neshaminy High School. A school spokesperson said he enrolled in a virtual program in September and had not attended in-person classes since.
His lawyer, Mehdi Essmidi, said his client had “complicated stuff going on” in his personal life, without elaborating. Essmidi said he did not believe the two young men had known each other for long.
Kayumi, meanwhile, is from Newtown, about 4 miles (6.5 kilometers) north of Langhorne. He graduated in 2024 from Council Rock High School North, according to a school spokesperson.
His attorney did not speak during a court hearing Monday and declined to comment when reached by The Associated Press.
Prosecutors, police and FBI officials say Balat and Kayumi drove to New York City on Saturday and joined a throng of counterprotesters at a small, anti-Muslim rally organized by the far-right Christian nationalist Jake Lang.
Journalists photographed Balat hurling a device, smoking with a lit fuse, that was later found to contain the explosive TATP. The object, which also contained nuts and bolts, extinguished itself without harming anyone.
Balat then dropped a second object near some police officers and tried to run, but was tackled and arrested, according to a court complaint.
Balat and Kayumi were being held without bail after their court appearance on charges that include attempting to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization and using a weapon of mass destruction. They were not required to enter a plea.
New York Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said Monday there were no indications that the attack was connected to the ongoing war in Iran.
After Balat was arrested, police officers asked him whether he was aiming to accomplish something akin to the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing that killed three people.
“No, even bigger,” Balat replied, according to a criminal complaint.
