Three Republican senators recently sent a letter to Chad F. Wolf, Acting Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), wanting to know how a former al-Qaeda leader in Iraq was allowed to emigrate to the United States as a refugee and become a citizen.
The Department of Justice announced Jan. 31 that Ali Yousef Ahmed Al-Nouri had been arrested in Arizona. The Iraqi government wanted Al-Nouri’s arrested and extradited for a premeditated murder committed in 2006 in Al-Fallujah, Iraq.
In 2008, Al-Nouri entered the United States as a refugee and became a citizen in 2018.
The senators expressed concern that the vetting processes did not identify a former al-Qaeda leader. The letter requests information to explain how this happened, including the visa category in which Al-Nouri was admitted into the country, a description of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ vetting of Al-Nouri’s residency and/or naturalization petition, and the information contained in the Iraqi government’s extradition request.
The senators also asked for the location of the DHS personnel who conducted the visa application review, whether social media vetting was conducted, and whether DHS was aware of Al-Nouri’s affiliation with Al-Qaeda.
The letter was written by Sens. Tom Cotton (R-AR), Joni Ernst (R-IA) and Ron Johnson (R-WI).