Coverage spread: 2 sources — 1 left · 1 right
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The Justice Department has for the first time invoked the Alien Terrorist Removal Court, a specialized federal tribunal created by Congress in 1996 that had never once been used, in an effort to deport Nazira Haji Zada, a 47-year-old Afghan woman living in Fort Worth, Texas. Court records made public on Wednesday show the government is seeking her removal on the grounds that she is an “alien terrorist” tied to a foiled Islamic State-inspired plot to attack Election Day voters in 2024. A hearing was scheduled for Thursday morning in Washington, D.C., where a judge will weigh evidence presented by the government.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche described Haji Zada as “the matriarch of an ISIS-sympathizing family” who aided a plan “to launch a mass casualty attack on American voters on Election Day,” and said the case demonstrates that “terrorists have no place in the United States of America.” According to an unclassified FBI summary filed with the court and dated July 15, authorities allege Haji Zada supported the ISIS-inspired conspiracy carried out by her son and son-in-law, had her children pledge loyalty to the Islamic State, and worked with her son-in-law to indoctrinate the family while concealing their pro-ISIS beliefs and a planned relocation to Islamic State territory from her husband, who was reportedly unaware. The FBI said this information came from a “reliable source.”
The Underlying 2024 Plot
Haji Zada is identified in filings as the mother of Abdullah Haji Zada and the mother-in-law of Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi, both of whom were prosecuted in Oklahoma federal court over a 2024 plot to attack the U.S. election with firearms. Abdullah, who was 17 at his 2024 arrest but charged as an adult, later pleaded guilty to gun offenses and was sentenced in November to 15 years in prison; he has agreed to be deported after completing his sentence. Tawhedi, who had previously worked as a security guard at a U.S. military installation in Afghanistan, pleaded guilty to terrorism and firearms charges, admitting he tried to advance the plot by ordering AK-47-style rifles and roughly 500 rounds of ammunition from an undercover FBI agent, liquidating family assets, and buying one-way tickets to send his wife and child back to Afghanistan.
How the Alien Terrorist Removal Court Works
Congress created the Alien Terrorist Removal Court in 1996 under President Bill Clinton to handle deportations of noncitizens — including legal permanent residents — whose cases rely on classified national security information that cannot be disclosed in ordinary immigration or criminal proceedings. Notably, as CBS News details, the process is unusual by American legal standards: applications must be certified by the attorney general, hearings are conducted ex parte and in camera, meaning the person facing deportation is not treated as a party to the proceeding, cannot review the classified evidence against them, and has no ability to challenge how that evidence was obtained. Haji Zada’s case marks the first time in the court’s roughly 30-year history that the government has filed a petition with it.
Where the Coverage Aligns and Diverges
Fox News and CBS News largely agree on the core facts: Haji Zada’s arrest earlier in the week, the Thursday hearing in Washington, the FBI’s allegations about her role in radicalizing her family, and Blanche’s statement. Both outlets also connect the case to the broader 2024 Election Day plot and the convictions of Abdullah Haji Zada and Tawhedi.
The two accounts differ somewhat in framing and emphasis. Fox News’ coverage is presented alongside footage of a U.S. Attorney, Dominick S. Gerace II, describing a separate but related set of federal charges against eight individuals accused of plotting to attack a UFC event and to murder federal officials, “potentially including the president and vice president,” with penalties up to life imprisonment — material that appears to be part of a broader package of terrorism-related reporting rather than developments specific to Haji Zada’s case. CBS News, by contrast, more directly emphasizes due-process concerns, spelling out in greater detail how the court’s secretive, ex parte procedures deny the target of removal any ability to see the classified evidence or contest how it was gathered. CBS also explicitly notes that Haji Zada has never been publicly charged with any terrorism-related crime and has no known criminal history — a detail not present in the Fox account — underscoring that the removal effort rests on classified allegations rather than a criminal conviction.
Why It Matters
The case is significant because it represents the first real-world test of a legal mechanism that has sat dormant since its creation three decades ago, one designed specifically to allow the government to remove people from the country using secret evidence that would not survive scrutiny in an open criminal or immigration court. Its use here, against someone with no public criminal charges or record, raises questions — highlighted especially by CBS’s framing — about transparency and the rights of individuals facing deportation based on classified allegations they cannot see or contest, even as the Justice Department frames the action as a necessary response to a family accused of supporting a plot to attack American voters.
Sources
Featured photo: ajay_suresh via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)