Report: Refugees are among ISIS plotters recently charged in U.S.

The Daily Mail reports that in the past 18 months, U.S. law enforcement authorities have charged at least 66 men and women with ISIS-related terror plots on American soil. A handful of those charged are refugees, according to the Daily Mail.

More typically, the plotters are American Muslims including some who converted to Islam. The conspirators include a U.S. Air Force veteran, a National Guard soldier who allegedly plotted to gun down his own colleagues, a young nurse, a pizza parlor boss, and schoolgirls tricked into becoming
ISIS brides.

For present purposes, though, it’s the refugees who are most relevant, given President Obama’s plan to take in 10,000 from Syria. The refugees include a Bosnian couple who allegedly gathered cash to buy military equipment for ISIS fighters in Syria and a 21-year-old native of Somalia who was born at a refugee camp in Kenya and arrived in the US when he was only nine.

These refugees aren’t ISIS plants; they came here before ISIS existed. The wave of Syrian refugees, by contrast, almost surely includes some whom ISIS seeks to sneak into this country. These refugees would almost certainly constitute a more dangerous cohort than any set previously taken in by the U.S.

But the existence of several refugees among the relatively small number (fewer than 70) of those recently charged with acting on behalf of ISIS illustrates that the appeal of Islamic terrorism to Muslim refugees extends beyond terrorist plants. This reality, coupled with the likelihood of plants and the impossibility of reliable vetting, presents a solid argument against admitting the Syrian refugees.

No wonder roughly two-thirds of our nation’s governors are resisting.

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