Forget ‘extreme vetting’… has there been any vetting of immigrants at all?
The OSU student who drove his car into a crowd and started slashing people with a knife? We’ve now learned a thing or two about him.
He came from Mogadishu, Somalia. Ring a bell? It should. Remember Black Hawk Down?
Yes. THAT Mogadishu.
It turns out that DHS was aware that Abdul Razak Ali Artan was a KNOWN terrorist recruitment risk.
Department of Homeland Security officials knew Ohio State University attacker Abdul Razak Ali Artan was a possible recruitment target of Islamic terrorists but granted him asylum anyway, along with his mother and six of his siblings, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley revealed in a letter sent Wednesday to the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services.
While seeking asylum as refugees from Mogadishu, Somalia in 2013, Artan’s mother told immigration authorities that she feared persecution from al-Qaeda affiliate group al-Shabaab, and worried that Abdul and his siblings would be recruited by the terrorist organization if they remained in Somalia.
…“According to records obtained by the Committee, the mother sought asylum in 2013 for herself and seven of her eight children because she feared persecution from ‘Militia and Al-Shabaab.’ She also indicated that her husband was kidnapped, and that her children would be kidnapped and recruited by Al-Shabaab if they remained in Somalia.”
…“This information should have caused the asylum officer to conduct additional questioning of the older children to better understand ties to a group that the United States designated as a foreign terrorist organization in 2008. Further questioning could have eliminated the possibility that the asylees had dubious ties to the terrorist group and could have allowed for more robust vetting and data collection. However, although common practice in these cases, no additional questioning was conducted.”
Additionally, a press release from Grassley’s office states, “government forms used in the 2013 vetting interview appear to be from the Immigration and Naturalization Service, which was replaced by the Department of Homeland Security in 2002. It’s unclear whether the forms used in the interview excluded certain fields that may have been required in the 2013 version of the forms, leading to an incomplete review.” —DailyCaller
Extreme vetting?
Looks like any vetting at all would be an improvement.
