Afghan accused of Election Day plot wasn’t fully vetted

The Afghan man accused of plotting an Election Day massacre was not fully vetted before being allowed into the U.S., according to a media report Wednesday.

Biden officials had told a federal judge that Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi came to the U.S. on a special immigrant visa, indicating he had undergone extensive vetting. But a Fox News reporter said officials now acknowledge that isn’t true.

Fox reporter Jacqui Heinrich said on X that Mr. Tawhedi “was never vetted or approved by the State Department” for the special visa. She also said his prior service as a security guard for the CIA in Afghanistan wasn’t a close enough role to earn him thorough vetting.

Prosecutors say Mr. Tawhedi was operating in conjunction with ISIS-K, the Afghanistan branch of the Islamic State terrorist outfit, when he sought to purchase two AK-47 rifles and planned to use them for an Election Day shooting.

U.S. officials had been coy about Mr. Tawhedi’s path to the U.S. beyond a curious description in an FBI affidavit filed in the court case against him in Oklahoma.

The FBI said he came to the U.S. on Sept. 9, 2021, just days after the American troop withdrawal was completed and the nation was abandoned to the Taliban. He arrived on a special immigrant visa but was in the U.S. on parole status and is in immigration proceedings — which usually means he faces a deportation case.

Immigration law experts said that indicated he had some worrying information in his background, though U.S. officials insist they saw no flags to raise suspicions.

They had also said he was thoroughly vetted before he reached the U.S., both because of his service for the CIA and getting the special visa, which is supposed to be reserved for those who assisted the American military in the war effort.

The Washington Times has reached out to Homeland Security for this report.

Republicans seized on the news as evidence the Biden administration has allowed dangerous people to reach the U.S.

“Americans ought to be enraged, not just by the Biden-Harris administration’s mass parole of nearly 80,000 Afghans in our country — many of whom were not sufficiently vetted — but also by the administration’s lack of forthrightness,” said Rep. Mark Green, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee.

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas has repeatedly claimed the Afghan evacuees were heavily vetted to screen out threats.

But inspector general investigators say the government missed spotting critical information in some known cases and, for many of the earliest arrivals during the 2021 airlift, they made it to the U.S. without thorough checks being completed.

It’s unclear when Mr. Tawhedi became radicalized.

The FBI uncovered material from his devices and online accounts where he shared ISIS messages. In one video, he recorded himself reading about martyring himself.

Mr. Tawhedi stands accused of trying to buy two AK-47 rifles as part of a plan to conduct a mass killing on Election Day next month. He planned to carry out the attack with a nephew, a juvenile who wasn’t named in court documents, while sending the rest of his extended family back to Afghanistan several weeks before the attack.

Mr. Tawhedi told federal agents he had been in contact with someone named Malik, who was part of ISIS.

NBC News reported Wednesday that Mr. Tawhedi’s mother still lives in Afghanistan and is believed to be an ISIS sympathizer. Another relative of Mr. Tawhedi was charged by French authorities this month with planning an attack on a soccer stadium or shopping center.