Asylum, Again

Like so many embarrassing stories out of the United States this one comes not from the mainstream media but from a blog--Pajamas Media (with a hat tip to another blog), which details two Bangladeshi men caught illegally entering the country in Arizona. One big problem--both admitted to being part of a terror group:

Two Bangladeshis who were caught by Customs and Border Protection illegally crossing the border in June 2010 admitted under questioning that they were members of a designated terrorist organization that signed on to a fatwa by Osama bin Laden pledging to wage war against Americans.

But amazingly, after one of the men requested asylum, he was released on bond. And now one Homeland Security official tells me, concerning the released terror operative, “We don’t have the slightest idea where he is now.”

Requested asylum? That triggered an old memory cell regarding a notorious terrorist from the past:

ON SEPTEMBER 1, 1992, Ramzi Yousef arrived at JFK airport. He presented an Iraqi passport without a U.S. visa, was briefly detained (and fingerprinted) for illegal entry, and granted asylum pending a hearing. Yousef went to stay at the apartment of Musab Yasin, an Iraqi living in Jersey City. So too did Abdul Rahman Yasin, Musab's younger brother, who arrived in America from Iraq soon after Yousef. (Musab had an unlisted telephone number under an Israeli-sounding alias, Josie Hadas.)

Obviously Ramzi never showed up for his hearing. He left the country right after his World Trade Center bomb failed to topple one tower into the other and kill perhaps 200,000, was granted access to an airliner under his real name and a real passport and took refuge in Pakistan. And here we are, almost 20 years later, allowing someone else with terrorist ties to claim asylum. The difference is this time, with 9/11 in the rearview mirror, we did it despite knowing he had ties whereas with Yousef he wasn't on any lists and didn't confess to being affiliated with a terrorist organization before being released.

When border security/illegal immigration is added to the picture it's no wonder this story never made big headlines. Remember, Obama was threatening to sue Governor Brewer last year.