By ERWIN FREED

The Trump administration is using Afghan immigrant and U.S. permanent resident Nazira Haji Zada to jump start the never before used “Alien Terrorist Removal Court” (ATRC). The ATRC was created by the Clinton administration to facilitate fast removal of non-citizens using secret evidence.

Activating the ATRC could allow the Trump administration and future governments the ability to effectively carry out Guantanamo-type extraditions on a mass scale. All that is needed is the signature of the U.S. attorney general and one judge to facilitate an immediate removal process on “national security grounds,” utilizing classified evidence and without due process. Legal analysts compare the ATRC with the Foreign Intelligence Security Court, and in fact, all of the judges assigned to ATRC are also on the FISC.

The FISC is another secret court system whose decisions are classified to “protect national security.” FISC had some attention placed on it earlier this year during the debates over Foreign Intelligence Security Act Section 702, which regulates how government agencies can access the NSA and other intelligence agencies’ mass data collection.

The full meaning of this court is not yet clear, as thousands of migrants are pushed through the current shadowy deportation system with virtually no rights and only the barest fig leaf of due process. Kilmar Abrego Garcia, sheet metal worker and father—along with close to 250 immigrants from Venezuela—was deported to the CECOT torture prison in El Salvador on false charges of international terrorism and being a gang member. Abrego Garcia is the most well-known case, but these frame-ups happen everyday at all levels, from local to federal police agencies.

What are Nazira’s alleged crimes?

Nazira stands accused of facilitating the “radicalization” of her son and son-in-law, who both pled guilty to material support charges last year. Nazira and her family reside in Fort Worth, Texas. Her immediate family, including her husband and son, have been in the U.S. since 2018, when they received special immigrant visas due to her husband’s work as with U.S. forces in Afghanistan.

Nazira has never been accused of any criminal or “extremist” activity in the United States or anywhere else. The basis for the accusations against her remain not only unclear but completely unsubstantiated.

In one filing to the ATRC, an unclassified and unsigned DoJ “summary” dated July 15, 2026, the government claims that the “FBI has developed information that NAZIRA is a supporter of ISIS, has formally pledged loyalty to ISIS, and supported [an alleged election-day plot].” We will address below the details and contradictions of the “election-day plot,” which appears to have been completely made up by the FBI.

The document goes on to claim that Nazira was planning to move her family to “ISIS-controlled territory” and goes to pains to assert that her husband was unaware of the impending relocation. The assertions come from an unnamed informant. It is worth noting that while the government makes the bizarre statement that Nazira planned to move to “ISIS-controlled territory,” in other places, she is alleged to have one-way tickets to Kabul. However, there are no “ISIS-controlled” territories in Afghanistan or in its proximity, although ISIS-connected groups carrying out relatively small-scale underground operations do exist. So on its face, this claim makes no sense. The document concludes by saying that the “underlying information is classified.”

The totality of available information released by the government gives no proof that Nazira has done or promoted anything at all, let alone anything dangerous or “illegal.” All that exists are vague assertions that she supported “radicalizing” her family. Any evidence the government might claim to have is being kept hidden on the basis of “protecting national security.”

The “election-day plot”

Underpinning Nazira’s current ordeal lie two guilty pleas. Last April, her son Abdullah Haji Zada pled guilty to a single count of conspiracy to provide material support to a terrorist organization and conspiracy. In June, her son-in-law Nasir Ahmed Tawhedi pled guilty to two counts, conspiracy/attempt to provide material support or resources to a designated foreign terrorist organization and receiving, conspiring to receive, and attempting to receive firearms and ammunition for use in a Federal crime of terrorism, specifically conspiring and attempting to provide material support and resources to ISIS.

Publicly available court documents show that the government’s case hinges on a basically random and manipulated collection of “evidence.” Zada, like his mother, is a legal permanent resident due to his fathers’ work in collaboration with the U.S. occupation at the infamous Bagram Air Base between 2009-2016. Similarly, Tawhedi and his family were part of the mass evacuation of U.S. collaborators from Afghanistan and was paroled into the U.S. with special immigration status in 2021.

The nature of Tawhedi’s work with the U.S. military occupation has not been publicized. After his and Zada’s arrest on Oct. 7, 2024, far-right legislators used the opportunity to launch a propaganda attack against the Biden Administration and Afghani immigrants generally.

Government documents and statements claim alternately that Tawhedi and Zada (and now Nazira), “inspired by ISIS” developed a “plot” starting either in July or August to carry out an attack on election day. Either starting point appears to be meant to obscure the government’s role in facilitating the alleged “plot.”

The criminal indictment against Tawhedi and other documents show that on Sept. 3, 2024, a longtime FBI informant/”confidential human source” approached the brothers-in-law on Facebook to inquire about buying a laptop listed for sale. This was part of a general liquidation of assets, including selling their houses, that the government alleges was in part meant to fund the family’s repatriation to Afghanistan, minus Tawhedi, Zada, and Zada’s father. At Tawhedi’s residence on Sept. 6, the informant purchased a computer and indicated he was opening a firearm manufacturing company and gun store.

On Sept. 10, the informant returned to Tawhedi’s residence to purchase more electronics. At that point, he told Zada, “You guys still need to come up to the ranch [their gun range – EF] sometime and come shooting man … [I]f you want to… buy anything. We can… they’ll sell anything you want to get.” Zada, who was only 17 and translating between the informant and Tawhedi, who speaks Dari and appears not to understand English, said, “I don’t know if my brother’s going to come.”

Despite the hesitation, both brothers-in-law did take up the informant’s offer to meet at the ranch the following Saturday, Sept. 14. Part of the offer included purchasing a TV, for which Zada and Tawhedi received payment. At the gun range, the initial informant introduced the pair to an additional informant and someone identified as an undercover FBI agent. There, they shot what is described as a AR-15-style rifle. This is, of course, a very normal activity and deeply embedded in both Oklahoman and Afghan cultures.

Both Tawhedi and Zada said they had fired guns in Afghanistan, with the former quoted saying he had shot guns “a lot.” This evokes the obvious question if Tawhedi was part of the CIA/JSOC’s “Zero Unit” hunter-killer teams. Zero Units were thrust into the national spotlight last year after longtime CIA asset Rahmanullah Lakanwal allegedly shot two West Virginia National Guard troops in Washington DC last November. Zada allegedly stated he had shot guns in Afghanistan with his father, who was an employee of the U.S. government at the time.

Whatever the context for Tawhedi and Zada’s experience with firearms, the indictment indicates that Tawhedi and the undercover FBI agent agreed to a sale of two “AK-47s” for $1000 each and 500 rounds of ammunition. The date chosen for the transaction was Oct. 7. When the two went to pick up their purchases on that date, they were arrested in an FBI sting.

There is nothing particularly nefarious about two Oklahoma residents being interested in guns. According to data compiled by the RAND Corporation in 2020, between 52-70% of households in Oklahoma contain a firearm. In that vein, the government uses alleged Google searches about surveillance cameras in Washington, D.C., and gun permit laws in different states as “evidence” of planning an attack.

The claims of “extremism” and a “plot” stem from files allegedly contained in Tawhedi’s Google cloud and curious interpretations by the FBI of social media activity. The major scraps of “evidence” against Tawhedi are:

1. Alleged ISIS documents contained in his Google email and drive. These would seem to have been accessed by the FBI after the two were arrested. These files are simply stated as being in accounts connected with Tawhedi. When or how he received them is not discussed. This is very important because it is obviously possible that he was sent this material by a named or unnamed police asset. One of the documents, listed on page 12 of the indictment, is in Persian. It is unclear whether Tawhedi even understands the language. Additionally, the FBI states that “pro-ISIS” Telegram channels are included in those documents.

2. Conversations on Telegram between Tawhedi and someone the government claims uses the alias “Abdul Malik.” The indictment states that in “a prior investigation, FBI determined that Malik had facilitated recruitment, training, and indoctrination of persons who expressed interest in terrorist activity.” Who Malik actually is, what his full correspondence with Tawhedi contains, and how the two initially got in contact are left unstated.

There are highly selective messages included between Tawhedi and Malik, all taking place between Sept. 20-24, 2024, a week after Tawhedi and Zada had been connected with an FBI undercover agent. These conversations are the apparent basis for the existence of an alleged election-day plot. The messages that are included begin with the following remarks from Malik on Sept 20: “How did you buy it? What is the name of it? When do you do the work? No, we have a person, we bought weapons. How much did you pay for each?”

The next series of texts are one-sided from Tawhedi, ranging from Sept. 21-22, explaining how they met the FBI informant, updating about the sale of the family’s Oklahoma property, and attempting to confirm with Malik that preparations are being made for the family members planning to move back to Afghanistan.

It is this message from Tawhedi on Sept. 22 that is the only mention of “election day” by either of the defendants or anyone else in the indictment: “Brother, our house was sold today. We’ll receive the money by the 15th of October, next month. After that we will begin our duty … we will get ready for the election day.” The basis of this being a “plot” comes from a particular interpretation of Malik’s use of the word “work” in his first message.

Nathan Wilkins, the FBI Special Agent credited with authoring the indictment, claims that “based on my knowledge, training, and experience, ISIS and other FTOs use the word ‘work’ to refer to terrorist attacks and other similar activity.”

3. Two cryptocurrency donations worth approximately $540 allegedly sent by Tawhedi to “Syria-based organization that engaged in an online fundraising campaign benefitting ISIS members and their supporters. The organization purported to support ISIS member dependents, including women and children, who are detained at Al-Hol and Roj camps.”  The indictment does not dispute that these funds were used for humanitarian aid. However it uses the fundraising campaign being posted in unnamed “pro-ISIS” Telegram channels to justify the guilt-by-association logic.

4. Overtly racist interpretations of normal behavior contained within Tawhedi’s Google account. These include a video of Tawhedi reading a passage from an unnamed text about martyrs to family members and two pictures of Tawhedi “displaying the ‘Tawhid’ gesture,” which consists of an upward pointing index finger.  Tawhid is a fundamental concept in Islam referring to the oneness of God. The gesture is simply an affirmation of monotheism.

The FBI recognizes this while effectively painting all practicing Muslims as ISIS supporters. The indictment abruptly switches from explaining that “signaling tawhid is the gesture of raising one’s finger to denote one’s belief in monotheism” to asserting with no explanation or sources that “the raised index finger … is used by ISIS militants to signify the oneness of God in Islam. While this gesture is common among Muslims, ISIS uses it in other contexts to signal its support for acts of terrorism. More specifically, when ISIS uses this gesture, it is affirming their ideology that demands the destruction of the West and polytheism.”

This is like saying putting one’s fist up is a sign of intending to assassinate a president because Lee Harvey Oswald was pictured with his fist up after he was arrested.

In summation, the “evidence” of an election plot is one sentence in a conversation, racist interpretation of normal statements and poses, and documents whose origins are not clear and likely were not understood by their alleged owner. Tawheri initially pled not guilty, but changed his plea to guilty in June. His stated reason, given through an interpreter, was, “I believe this is in my best interests” (page 10). From court filings, it appears he was supposed to be tried in January 2025, but that did not happen due to the government arguing this was a “complex case” and the defense waiving the right to a speedy trial.

Zada’s attorneys argued that there was no evidence at all against him, since everything presented even circumstantially involved only Tawhedi. This would appear to be true; however, Zada took a plea deal in April. Despite cooperating to the fullest extent, in his words, “[t]o accept responsibility for my part and to get this situation behind me,” Zada was not only convicted as an adult but also given the maximum sentence of 15 years. At the time of writing (Aug. 3), Tawhedi has not yet been sentenced.

FBI creates “terror plots”

Capitalist governments always maintain a secret political police force of undercover agent provocateurs, criminals, and coerced informants. In the United States, there is a long history of “plots” made out of whole cloth by these nefarious actors. The real victims are people who become entrapped due to racist or anti-democratic targeting. According to a 2012 report by Project SALAM, at least 94% of terrorism convictions were either pre-emptive prosecutions based solely on assumed ideology or cases in which the government was foiling its own agent provocateurs’ plots.

There are virtually an endless number of cases to point to, some of which became quite prominent, but mostly they create brief headlines and are quickly forgotten. U.S. intelligence agencies have done everything from creating large informant networks within oppressed communities to fabricating violent cults. The former includes the so-called “mosque crawlers,” orchestrated by the CIA and New York City Police department, who work to surveil Muslim religious organizations and entrap young men (who are often mentally ill) in police-created “plots.” The above mentioned Project SALAM report goes into detail about dozens of these cases.

In multiple cases, the government’s hand in actual attacks leads to embarrassment before being quickly covered up. This includes the 2015 Curtis Culwell Center attack, where undercover FBI agents gave Elton Simpson and Nadir Soofi the means, opportunity, and motivation to shoot up a far-right anti-Islam event. While the FBI initially claimed to not have knowledge that the two were going through with the attack, it later surfaced that agents were following the whole time and watched them carry it out. A third person, Abdul Malik Abdul Kareem, was convicted with helping to facilitate the shooting; however, there is mounting evidence pointing towards his innocence. This includes basic facts withheld by the government from both the jury and his defense team, such as the existence of a police camera pointing directly at the front door of Simpson and Soofi’s house.

End the secret court system! End the FBI war on Muslims!

The full meaning of the Alien Terrorist Removal Court remains to be seen. We can say that the choice of Nazira Haji Zada as its first target is significant. Nazira is a permanent resident and by all accounts an upstanding and law-abiding community member. Her only “crime” involves what appears to be an FBI frame-up of her son and son-in-law. All of the publicly available evidence points in this direction, but the ATRC by its very nature is a secret court that does not allow defendants, much less the general public, to see the evidence against them. Therefore, the government can make whatever claims it wants against Nazira and, if they are successful against her, ever-increasing layers of immigrants.

As Workers’ Voice noted last month, there is a direct relationship between police attacks against Muslims and repression generally. A number of cases based on National Security Presidential Memorandum-7’s activation of Joint Terrorism Task Forces against the political left are taking place at the same time that frame-ups and FBI “stings” against Muslims proliferate. If the movements in defense of immigrants and civil liberties are to be successful, they must take the cases against Nazira Zada and Michael Sam Teekaye Jr. as seriously as they do those of Kilmar Abrego Garcia and the Minnesota defendants.

Capitalism’s methods of repression are the same regardless of target. Working-class methods of political defense must be as well. They are to expose the anti-democratic frame-ups, the imperialist context of the so-called “war on terror,” and building mass support for the hundreds and thousands of working-class political prisoners in ICE, federal, and state prison systems.

Photo: Joe Gratz / Wikimedia Commons

The post Justice for Nazira Haji Zada, a victim of the FBI and secret courts! first appeared on Workers’ Voice/La Voz de los Trabajadores.

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