Terrorist Tashfeen Malik entered the US on a K-1 visa.
AB Wire
It’s now a well-known fact that the San Bernardino terrorists, Pakistani Americans Rizwan Farook and his wife Tashfeen Malik, were planning to attack the United States for many years. The US government has also taken cognizance of the way Malik, who was born in Pakistan but grew up also in Saudi Arabia, entered the US – through the K-1 visa, also known as the fiancée visa.
Farook met Malik online when he was in Saudi Arabia, and then later applied for her to come to the US with him, on a K-1 visa.
She was one among the 35,000 individuals who entered the US on the K-1 fiance/fiancee visa, in 2014.
“Somebody entered the US through the K-1 visa program and proceeded to carry out an act of terrorism on American soil. That program is at a minimum worth a very close look,”‘ White House spokesman Josh Earnest said, last week, signaling the administration’s efforts to vet the visa with more layers of scrutiny.
The Los Angeles Times reported that to get a K-1 visa, a U.S. citizen seeking to marry a foreign national has to file a petition with U.S. immigration officials and prove that the relationship is real and that the couple have physically met.
The petitioner also has to provide evidence of the relationship, which could include travel, phone and hotel records, according to Los Angeles immigration attorney Paul Herzog.
It takes three to five months for United States Citizenship and Immigration Services to review and approve a petition, at which point the petition goes to the State Department. A U.S. Embassy or consulate conducts a medical exam, checks police records and interviews the foreign applicant, Herzog said.
“It’s a very detailed petition,” said Los Angeles immigration attorney Roman P. Mosqueda. “If you’re getting married in a church, you have to show proof of getting a church date for the wedding, a date for the restaurant for the reception…. It’s very strict.”
If the application is approved, the visa bearer has 90 days after entering the U.S. to marry his or her partner. After the marriage, the bearer can apply for a green card.
“It’s not an easy procedure,” Herzog said. “Beginning to end, you’re looking at at least six to nine months” from the date of application to the date of receiving a visa.
Questions for the partner seeking to come to the U.S. include: “Do you seek to engage in terrorist activities while in the United States or have you ever engaged in terrorist activities?” and “Have you ever or do you intend to provide financial assistance or other support to terrorists or terrorist organizations?”
Malik was born in Pakistan and moved with her family to Saudi Arabia when she was a child. State Department officials would have asked how Malik and Syed Rizwan Farook met; how they decided to marry; and some details about Farook, as the U.S. citizen.
Malik would have needed to detail for immigration and State Department officials every country to which she had traveled over the last five years and any family members she had in the United States, said the Los Angeles Times.
“Since 9/11, [any visa application will] involve multiple layers of vetting, with multiple agencies putting folks through various systems, where we watch individuals, what their affiliations are, whether they’re on any kind of watch lists,” State Department spokesman Mark Toner said in a news briefing, last week.
U.S. immigration data from 2013 showed that 26,046 people entered the U.S. on K-1 visas. By far the largest number were from the Philippines, with 5,131 Filipinos entering.
China (1,397) and Mexico (1,268) were next. Pakistan accounted for 272 K-1 visa bearers in 2013, the year before Malik arrived in the United States.
The Dallas Morning News in an editorial reflected the new feeling within the US:
“Obama was right to urge America’s Muslim community to exercise greater vigilance, implying that they should be on the watch for radical tendencies developing among them. He was short on specifics, however, as he was on the K1 visa review.