Mohammad Dawood Alokozay, 30, an Afghan national who came to the United States under the Operation Allies Welcome parole program in 2022, has been federally charged for threatening to build a bomb, conduct a suicide attack and kill Americans and others, the U.S. Department of Justice stated on Tuesday.
He was arrested on Nov. 25 after posting a social media video in which he allegedly threatened to bomb a building in Fort Worth, Texas, by the Texas Department of Public Safety and the FBI Joint Terrorism Task Forces, Tricia McLaughlin, a U.S. Department of Homeland Security spokesperson, wrote.
McLaughlin said Alokozay has been charged with “making terroristic threats” and that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement “has lodged a detainer.”
“We have indefinitely stopped all immigration requests relating to Afghan nationals and all asylum decisions,” DHS wrote. “America will not provide sanctuary to those who want to harm our people.”
The Operation Allies Welcome program, launched by U.S. President Joe Biden in 2021, offered two-year humanitarian parole to resettle certain Afghan nationals in the United States who faced retribution from the Taliban after the U.S. military withdrawal from Afghanistan.
According to the Justice Department, Alokozay stated in the video that he admires the Taliban and, in his pursuit of carrying out his attack, was not afraid of deportation or being killed. He faces up to five years in prison.
“This Afghan national came into America during the Biden administration and, as alleged, explicitly stated that he came here in order to kill American citizens,” Pamela Bondi, the U.S. attorney general, stated.
“The public safety threat created by the Biden administration’s vetting breakdown cannot be overstated—the Department of Justice will continue working with our federal and state partners to protect the American people from the prior administration’s dangerous incompetence,” Bondi said.
According to the New York Post, a DHS official stated that it was not immediately known how Alokozay got his immigration status through the program.
McLaughlin also stated that Alokozay was taken into custody “just one day before the terrorist attack against our National Guard,” in which another Afghan national, Rahmandullah Lakanwal, 29, shot two National Guard troops in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 26.
Per the Post, DHS could not confirm a connection between the two men.
