Donna Chabot

Donna Chabot is a retired federal agent with more than 34 years of law enforcement and counterterrorism experience, working primarily with Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).  Beginning her career as an Immigration Inspector, she rose through the ranks to become an Immigration Adjudicator, and subsequently a Senior Special Agent on the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF). While serving on the JTTF, she disrupted and dismantled terrorist organizations through criminal investigations, deportations, and denaturalization.  She also served as the DHS case agent on the largest-ever terrorist financing investigation in U.S. history, United States v. Holy Land Foundation, et al, which resulted in prison sentences of 65 years for multiple defendants linked to HAMAS fundraising networks.  She was subsequently appointed as the ICE Supervisory Special Agent and Attaché in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, where she established the first DHS Visa Security Office overseas, implementing protocols to prevent terrorists and criminal actors from entering the United States. She was later selected to serve as the National Security Liaison from HSI to the CIA's National Clandestine Service, where she coordinated activities between the two agencies.  She went on to serve as the Deputy Unit Chief of the National Joint Terrorism Task Force at FBI Headquarters in Washington, DC, jointly supervising over 80 agents, officers, and analysts from more than 40 agencies. She completed her career in 2019 at the U.S. Embassy in Dakar, Senegal, serving as the Supervisory Special Agent and Attaché, overseeing HSI operations across 13 countries in West Africa. Through her work, she became recognized as a subject matter expert on national security, Middle East affairs, and West Africa issues.

Publications