The FBI has arrested a man from Afghanistan for allegedly planning a radical Islamic terror attack on Election Day in the United States.
According to a CBS News reports, federal prosecutors charged Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi with planning the attack in support of ISIS.
He was arrested Monday in Oklahoma City where he did not enter a plea in court, but remains in federal custody.
According to a federal charging documents, Tawhedi and unnamed co-conspirators — which included a juvenile who is Tawhedi’s brother-in-law — were followers of ISIS and took steps to carry out their attack in the U.S., including by trying to sell their family home, relocate their families abroad and purchase firearms and ammunition.
“Their ultimate aim was to stage a violent attack in the United States in the name of and on behalf of ISIS,” prosecutors said.
According to the report, the federal complaint said that Tawhedi entered the U.S. on a Special Immigrant Visa. However, a Department of Homeland Security official said that contrary to the information in the complaint, he did not have this visa.
The path for Tawhedi to enter the U.S. was more complicated.
According to multiple sources, Tawhedi was paroled into the country, like most Afghan evacuees, and allowed to live in the country temporarily under that immigration authority.
According to a statement from the State Department, the U.S. offers Special Immigrant Visas to individuals who worked with the U.S. armed forces or under chief of mission authority as a translator or interpreter in either Iraq or Afghanistan — which is what Tawhedi did while in Afghanistan.
He did apply for an SIV, available to those who assisted American forces, and had his case approved initially, though he never received a green card or permanent U.S. residency. His green card application is pending. The green card application is likely to be denied due to his criminal arrest and charges. If he’s found guilty and is released from federal criminal custody in the future, he’d face deportation as a national security threat — a priority for removal under Democratic and Republican administrations, according to the report.
Records accessed by the FBI to CBS News show Tawhedi allegedly viewed ISIS propaganda and contributed about $540 in cryptocurrency to a charity in Syria “which fronts for and funnels money to ISIS.”
Federal investigators allege Tawhedi searched for access to surveillance and security cameras in Washington, D.C., and checked webcams showing the White House and Washington Monument in late July. They also believe Tawhedi was seeking out places in which gun laws were not as strict.
Federal investigators said they sent a confidential human source and later an undercover FBI agent to secretly interact with the men as they sought to sell their home and other possessions on Facebook and purchase weapons.
In a Sept. 21 message to a person allegedly associated with terrorist activity, Tawhedi said he had purchased two rifles and ordered 500 bullets.
“What do you think, brother? Is it enough or should we increase it,” the message said.
In on-going messages, Tawhedi said his father-in-law’s house had sold for $185,000, and they would receive the funds by Oct. 15. He also asked for help in resettling his family, which included his mother-in-law, wife, their young daughter and five of his wife’s siblings, in Afghanistan. Tawhedi purchased one-way plane tickets for the family to travel to Kabul on Oct. 17.
“After that we will begin our duty, God willing, with the help of God, we will get ready for the election day,” Tawhedi wrote.
According to the criminal complaint, Tawhedi and his brother-in-law received two AK-47 rifles on Monday, shortly before their arrest.
Tawhedi told investigators during a post-arrest interview that they had purchased the weapons to carry out an attack on Election Day and target large gatherings of people, during which they “expected to be martyred,” the complaint says.
An attorney for Tawhedi did not immediately comment on the charges.
FBI Director Christopher Wray said he was “proud of the men and women of the FBI who uncovered and stopped the plot before anyone was harmed.”
Attorney General Merrick Garland said, “We will continue to combat the ongoing threat that ISIS and its supporters pose to America’s national security, and we will identify, investigate, and prosecute the individuals who seek to terrorize the American people.”
However, national security and intelligence officials continue to warn that these types of threats are going to be on-going.
Last year, Wray told Congress, “The terrorism threat has been elevated throughout 2023, but the ongoing war in the Middle East has raised the threat of an attack against Americans in the United States to a whole other level.”
This is an on-going story. Check back for further developments.