{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.cornyn.senate.gov/news/cornyn-presses-mayorkas-for-answers-on-vetting-of-afghan-parolee-charged-in-connection-with-terror-plot/", "Cornyn Presses Mayorkas for Answers on Vetting of Afghan Parolee Charged in Connection with Terror Plot", "2024-10-18", "2024", "2024-10", "Republican", "Senate", "TX", "John Cornyn", "C001056", "www.cornyn.senate.gov", "cornyn", "https://www.cornyn.senate.gov/news/", "scraper", "AUSTIN \u2013 U.S. Senator John Cornyn (R-TX), along with Senate Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Senators Ted Cruz (R-TX), Mike Lee (R-UT), Josh Hawley (R-MO), Tom Cotton (R-AR), Thom Tillis (R-NC) and Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), today sent a letter to U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas requesting more information in light of reports suggesting Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi, an Afghan national recently arrested in connection with a plot to commit a violent attack on behalf of ISIS in the United States on Election Day, was not vetted for a special immigrant visa as the Biden-Harris Justice Department originally claimed:\n\n\u201cWe remain deeply troubled by the increasing likelihood that foreign extremists may successfully exploit the weaknesses of our immigration system or our southern border to commit an act of political violence or an act of terror here on U.S. soil, and the policies of the Biden-Harris administration have only made matters worse,\u201d they wrote.\n\n\u201cThis ongoing failure to protect Americans from potential terroristic threats is unacceptable and it is only a matter of time before it yields deadly results. As part of our ongoing oversight of DHS\u2019s use of immigration parole and its response to the heightened threat environment the U.S. finds itself in, we are requesting that you provide to us for review a copy Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi\u2019s alien file (a-file) and any other records related to his parole and vetting he received prior to his arrest, no later than November 1, 2024,\u201d the lawmakers concluded.\n\nFull text of the letter is here and below.\n\nOctober 18, 2024\n\nThe Honorable Alejandro Mayorkas Secretary\n\nU.S. Department of Homeland Security\n\n3801 Nebraska Ave N.W.\n\nWashington D.C. 20016\n\nDear Secretary Mayorkas:\n\nWe write today to request more information about the immigration status of Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi, the Afghan national who was recently arrested in connection with a plot to commit a violent attack on behalf of ISIS in the United States on Election Day. According to the criminal complaint filed by the Department of Justice, Tawhedi \u201centered the United States on September 9, 2021, on a special immigrant visa and is currently on parole status pending adjudication of his immigration proceedings.\u201d However, according to reporting from Fox News, Tawhedi was never approved for a special immigrant visa and was not \u201cwell known to the US government\u201d when he was brought to the United States.\n\nWe remain deeply troubled by the increasing likelihood that foreign extremists may successfully exploit the weaknesses of our immigration system or our southern border to commit an act of political violence or an act of terror here on U.S. soil, and the policies of the Biden-Harris administration have only made matters worse. It was President Biden and Vice President Harris\u2019 disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan that led to Tawhedi being in the United States in the first place. In the chaos following the withdrawal, the Biden-Harris administration paroled into the U.S. over 77,000 Afghans with no or significantly incomplete security checks done on them prior to their arrival.\n\nIn the three years since, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has failed to conduct proper vetting of these parole recipients. A DHS Office of Inspector General report from May 2024 found that DHS has no established process or dedicated component for monitoring parole expiration for the Afghan parolee population, and that there are significant gaps in how DHS responds to potential derogatory information discovered in the recurrent vetting process.\n\nThis ongoing failure to protect Americans from potential terroristic threats is unacceptable and it is only a matter of time before it yields deadly results. As part of our ongoing oversight of DHS\u2019s use of immigration parole and its response to the heightened threat environment the U.S. finds itself in, we are requesting that you provide to us for review a copy Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi\u2019s alien file (a-file) and any other records related to his parole and vetting he received prior to his arrest, no later than November 1, 2024.\n\nThank you for your prompt attention and cooperation in this matter.\n\nSincerely,\n\n/s/", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-06T18:55:29Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.cornyn.senate.gov/news/cornyn-presses-mayorkas-for-answers-on-vetting-of-afghan-parolee-charged-in-connection-with-terror-plot/"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.4086505398154259, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}