Who is Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman
He is the last person you would invite into your home once you know what he has done.
The Big Picture
Mohammed bin Salman is tied to torture chambers, secret prisons, forced disappearances, mass executions, and the murder of a journalist whose only weapon was a pen. Reports describe his security forces crushing peaceful activists. Women who fought for the right to drive were dragged into detention and subjected to abuse. Critics were chased across borders and targeted with spyware. Families of dissidents were punished for the courage of the people related to them. People who questioned him inside the kingdom faced trials with no transparency and no due process, and people who questioned him outside the kingdom lived with the fear of retaliation. These actions define him long before you ever reach his official title.
He holds the real power in Saudi Arabia. His father King Salman elevated him and handed him authority over security, intelligence, the economy and foreign affairs. Since 2017 he has absorbed every lever of control. He removed rivals. He silenced other branches of the royal family. He claimed the country needed a strong hand and he used that claim to become the central decision maker in almost every part of Saudi life.
His so called anti corruption purge from 2017 to 2019 locked up princes, ministers and business leaders in hotels that became makeshift prisons. People were held until they signed away fortunes. The process crushed power sharing that once existed among senior royals. The kingdom became a place where loyalty to one man mattered more than law, custom or consensus.
His rule promotes the image of modernization while the state tightens its grip on speech, movement and basic freedoms. He built a government that presents itself as forward looking and open. The lived experience for the public is fear, control and punishment. He shaped a system that mirrors his personal style. It is concentrated, forceful and supported by security services that answer only to him.
The Khashoggi Murder: Approval and Cover-Up
On October 2, 2018, journalist and U.S. resident Jamal Khashoggi entered the Saudi consulate in Istanbul and never came out. Evidence shows he was strangled, dismembered, and his body destroyed. A U.S. intelligence assessment declassified in February 2021 concluded that the crown prince approved an operation in Istanbul “to capture or kill” Khashoggi.
Yet when the president of the United States welcomed MBS at the White House on Tuesday, he publicly dismissed the intelligence assessment, saying MBS “knew nothing” and downplayed the killing as “things happen.” That refusal to hold power to account undermines American values. When a leader knows that a U.S.‐resident journalist was eliminated by a foreign regime, and yet we treat the perpetrator as guest of honor, we signal that our commitment to truth and justice is hollow.
Khashoggi’s son and widow continue to demand that MBS acknowledge and compensate the harm. What they see is a regime that executed murder under the guise of statecraft, and a U.S. administration that looks the other way for strategic convenience.
Saudi Human Rights Abuses Under MBS
Under his rule the Saudi state’s repression has expanded radically. The courts hand down long prison terms for critical social media posts. The new penal code codifies gender discrimination, giving women fewer rights and entrenching patriarchal control. Independent media and free speech face crushing penalties. Dissenters inside and outside Saudi Arabia are subject to surveillance, torture, forced disappearance or worse.
In Yemen the Saudi‐led coalition under MBS has conducted air campaigns and imposed blockades that humanitarian agencies describe as war crimes. Activists and human rights monitors warn that the combination of internal suppression and external military adventure make Saudi Arabia among the world’s most dangerous autocracies.
When you think of a country that proclaims to be a U.S. partner but that abuses its own people, that silences critics, that carries out extrajudicial violence and refuses accountability, you are thinking of one of the nations MBS runs. And we are treating that regime as a trusted friend.
9/11 and Saudi Arabia’s Unresolved Role
Fifteen of the nineteen hijackers in the September 11 attacks were Saudi citizens. U.S. investigations identified significant evidence that Saudi donors, charities and local networks in the U.S. supported the hijackers, though the official 9/11 Commission (2004) found no proof that the Saudi government as an institution or senior Saudi officials individually conspired in the attacks.
Still, civil lawsuits by families of the victims argue strong connections between Saudi government employees and support networks for the hijackers. In August 2025 a U.S. federal judge allowed a lawsuit against Saudi Arabia to proceed, noting the legal claims were sufficient to go to trial. Newly declassified documents suggest Saudi officials acted as an “advance team” for the hijackers inside the U.S.
Why this matters: You have a regime whose people are alleged to have helped carry out the worst terrorist attack on American soil, and that regime today receives a hero’s welcome in Washington. Any government that gives safe harbor, financial support or logistical assistance to terrorists should trigger alarm in your memory when you see diplomatic fanfare.
Trump Family Business Conflicts
The fanfare in the Oval Office, the jet flyovers, the business announcements, all mask a deeper failure. When you watch that spectacle you have to ask: what values are being sold, whose interests are prioritized and whose suffering is being silenced for the sake of deals?
The Trump Organization and companies tied to his adult children are building an expanding web of licensing and development deals across the Gulf with Saudi-based Dar Global, including a one-billion-dollar Trump Plaza project in Jeddah, a Trump Tower in Jeddah, new Trump-branded projects in Riyadh, a luxury resort and golf development in Oman, and a first Trump real estate venture in Qatar.
At the same time, Jared Kushner’s investment firm, Affinity Partners, has secured a multibillion-dollar commitment from Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund and fresh capital from Qatar and UAE-linked funds, giving the family a direct financial stake in government-controlled money from the region.
Those arrangements allow the Trump family to profit from Saudi and Gulf government cash while the president shapes U.S. policy toward Mohammed bin Salman, which turns foreign policy into a personal business opportunity and leaves your country, your democracy, and your children exposed to foreign influence.
(spoiler alert- he never answered her question)
Final Thoughts
You have to care. You have to speak out. When a foreign leader who ordered the murder of a journalist and presides over systematic rights abuses is welcomed as a partner, you lose your moral edge. You lose your ability to say to the world we stand for freedom and rule of law. You lose the internal cohesion that democracy depends on.
Ask yourself: what am I telling my kids when I tell them we stood for partnership instead of principle? What am I modeling when I say deals matter more than justice? What am I agreeing to when I allow foreign repression, dynastic autocracy and suspected terrorist backing to be swept aside for strategic convenience?
You are not powerless. You are informed. Use your voice, your vote, your influence. The relationship with Saudi Arabia under MBS is a stain on the values America claims to uphold. Stand for transparency. Demand accountability. Question the ease with which power forgives power. Your voice will echo. Speak up.
Mitch Jackson, Esq.
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Nauseating on all levels. Two dictators with absolutely no regard for laws or rights yucking it up like a couple school boys. When karma lands for these 2, I would hate t be them. Just despicable