The Obama administration’s policy of not vetting the social media accounts of visa applicants contributed to the December terrorist attack in California, Republican Texas Sen. Ted Cruz suggested on Friday.
“In light of the terrorism in San Bernardino on December 2, it appears that [the] policy of willful blindness toward the reality and danger of radical Islam in the United States contributed to the death of 14 Americans here at home,” Cruz wrote in a letter addressed to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson.
“Much more information is needed about the logic and decision-making behind this exceedingly dangerous policy and the DHS investigation that created it, including whether any replacement policies have been implemented, and how they work,” Cruz added. “Given the rise and proliferation of social media, and younger generations’ increasing reliance on these media, DHS cannot afford to have policies that are blind to information made available on social media and the Internet.”
Media reports suggested in December that the terrorists, Tashfeen Malik and Syed Rizwan Farook, posted content to their social media accounts that would have set off red flags for federal authorities had it been revealed. Officials at DHS and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services acknowledged that it wasn’t routine practice to scan social media accounts when vetting visa applicants, although the FBI later said there were no easily visible social media posts from Malik that might have been uncovered.
Regardless, Cruz wrote that the agencies had engaged in “colossal negligence,” and demanded that they retain any additional information, classified or unclassified, regarding departmental policies on social media screening.
“Rather than being an aberration, this policy seems to be all too consistent with other policies of DHS and USCIS, which restrict fraud and terrorism investigators from fulfilling their missions and (arguably) enable fraudulent and dangerous people to enter and remain in the United States,” Cruz wrote, concluding with a call for a future administration to prosecute staffers who try to hide the relevant documentation.
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“I will also take this moment to remind you [and] your fellow political appointees. … that destruction of any of the requested documents or information could subject those responsible for such destruction to criminal prosecution in the future,” Cruz said. “It is my hope that a future administration would pursue justified prosecutions with all due energy.”
