FTOs

The following is an excerpt from the State Department Daily Press briefing of June 26th.

QUESTION: Yesterday, as you will recall, we had a long back and forth about the visa issued to Mr. Al-Din, the self-proclaimed member of Gama’a al-Islamiyya, the U.S.-designated Foreign Terrorist Organization.

...Based on the background checks that were conducted as part of his visa application and other additional information that has come to light since that time, we neither had then nor do we have now any reason to believe that this particular individual, who at the time of his application was a member of parliament, would pose a threat to the United States. So after careful review, we concluded that the appropriate procedures were followed, including a review of the claimed affiliations. So --

QUESTION: Isn’t the membership in an FTO in and of itself by U.S. law grounds for their said person’s inadmissibility to the United States?

MS. NULAND: In and of itself it is grounds for inadmissibility. However, there are also waiver procedures when it is in the U.S. national interest. I’m not going to get into the specifics of how this case was handled for all the confidentiality reasons. But as a general matter, yes, if you are a member of an FTO, you are excluded unless your admission is waived.
Read full briefing: http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/dpb/2012/06/194095.htm

Ryan Mauro writes about The other Eric Holder scandal.