By Steve Neavling
The FBI is investigating a group of more than a dozen Uzbek nationals who crossed the U.S.-Mexico border as asylum seekers with the assistance of a smuggler with ties to ISIS, CNN reports.
Authorities are trying to “identify and assess” the migrants, some of whom may pose as possible criminal threats.
The discovery led to an urgent classified intelligence report to President Biden’s top cabinet officials and a flurry of meetings.
Some counterterrorism officials are worried that the border is porous enough to enable possible terrorists to sneak into the U.S. at a time when more migrants are entering the U.S. in search of asylum.
The migrants managed to go through routine screenings when they entered the U.S., and no intelligence in any of the government’s terrorist databases raised red flags. They were released into the U.S. pending court dates.
The FBI began searching for the migrants and recheck their backgrounds after authorities learned of the existence of a human smuggling network that “included at least one individual connected to ISIS.
The smuggler was arrested in Turkey.
