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State Department bars Customs from inspecting Muslim Brotherhood delegation
This despite the fact, according to Steve Emerson at the Investigative Project on Terrorism, that one of the members of the Muslim Brotherhood delegation that visited the White House last week, was being investigated for child pornography when he lived in the US a few years ago.The State Department broke with normal procedures last week when it ordered the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) not to conduct a secondary inspection on members of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) on their way to visit government officials and think tanks in the United States. This happened despite the fact that one member of the delegation had been implicated - though not charged - in a U.S. child pornography investigation, the Investigative Project on Terrorism (IPT) has learned. According to senior enforcement sources and documents reviewed by the IPT, investigators had information tying Abdul Mawgoud Dardery to the pornography investigation that was based in Pennsylvania. He was the senior member in the four-person FJP delegation which held court with academic groups and met with senior officials at the White House and State Department last week. (For more on what they said, click here.) Before returning to Egypt, Dardery lived in the United States long enough to attain legal permanent residency, known as a green card. That status lapsed after he left the country for more than six months. The child pornography investigation took place during Dardery's time here and was noted in his immigration file. It surfaced when CBP officials learned of his pending visit. A U.S. official familiar with immigration procedures told the IPT that extra inspection is standard operating procedure when a foreign visitor has been tied to criminal or terrorist activities. "Secondary inspections" involve going through the visitor's baggage and viewing the contents of computers and other electronic devices to search for evidence of illicit activity. Agents would typically search other members of the party to ensure Dardery did not hand off his computer equipment to an associate to avoid detection. The delegation's ties to Hamas alone should have kicked off the extra inspection. Instead, the State Department bent over backwards to accommodate our visitors, making them feel right at home. Posted by: Sherry 2012-04-11 |
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