Is the ISIS-Supporting Imam Deportable? WaPo Does Not Ask

This article was last updated on April 16, 2022

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The Washington Post (and the FBI) have both reviewed the strange case of a Maryland-based imam who is said to have publicly supported ISIS and to have "celebrated ISIS killings and immolations on Facebook", to quote the Post's article, which is titled

Second, and even more significantly, the iman lost a four-week-old job when his employer, a Muslim organization, fired him, in part, because the employer told the Post "he did not provide the proper government documents for employment."

The employer was Rashid Iqbal, president of the Annapolis, Md., unit of the Islamic Society of America. (My efforts to reach Iqbal on the phone have been in vain.) One of the possibilities is that Bengharsa had the documents, but for ideological reasons, did not present them. Or maybe he was simply careless. But another possibility is that he lacks legal status, and thus would be eligible for deportation simply on those grounds. The Post did not ask.

The matter of his possible illegal status is complicated by the fact that he had, at some point before 2012, worked for the U.S. Commerce Department — a job he lost when he was accused of plagiarism. It is perfectly possible that he had a nonimmigrant visa at the time that allowed him to work for Commerce, which has since expired. It is also possible that a small, but very careful Islamic organization screens its alien workers with more care now than Commerce did then.

If he is here illegally, why hasn't he been deported? Surely the FBI, which has investigated him at some length, knows his status. It strikes me that there are several possibilities:

  • The administration is loathe to deport anyone; or
  • A conscious decision has been made not to deport him, as he might cause more harm in Libya than he does here; or
  • The government is building a case that would send him to jail, and does not want to deport him before it can complete the case; or
  • No one has thought of it.

If developments occur in this case, we will report them.

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