Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson acknowledged Tuesday that under orders from a U.S. immigration judge, his department was forced to release two men who said they were part of a Marxist terror organization from Turkey.
Johnson told the House Homeland Security Committee that while he would have preferred that the men remain in U.S. custody while authorities sought their deportation, he had no choice but to release them after the judge's ruling,
The Washington Times reports.
Earlier this year, Johnson told Congress that four men who were apprehended while crossing the U.S.-Mexico border Sept. 3 and claimed to be members of the Revolutionary People's Liberation Party/Front would be deported.
But on Tuesday, he testified that just two of the four terror suspects remain in U.S. custody and two others were released into the United States and subsequently fled to Canada, where they are attempting to get asylum.
Utah Republican Rep.
Jason Chaffetz, incoming chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, was incredulous after hearing Johnson testify that two of the terror suspects had been released.
"You tell the world that you're going to deport these four people tied to terrorists — these are terrorists — and they don't. They get released," Chaffetz told Johnson.
Johnson appeared uncertain of the whereabouts of the two freed terror suspects, but said it was his understanding that the pair were in custody in Canada.
The Times reported last month on a smuggling network that brought the four from Istanbul through Paris to Mexico City, where they were kept in a safe house for several days.
They were then driven to the U.S. border and crossed illegally into Texas in early September, where they were captured by the Border Patrol.
The four initially claimed to be members of the Revolutionary People's Liberation Party/Front, known by the acronym DHKP/C. The group claimed responsibility for a 2013
suicide bomb attack on the U.S. embassy in Ankara that killed the bomber and a security guard.
But U.S. counterterrorism officials said the men were more likely members of the PKK, or Kurdistan Workers' Party, which has been fighting the Turkish government since the 1980s, The Times reports.
More recently, the PKK and Turkish officials have been attempting to negotiate an end to hostilities.
Both the DHKP/C and the PKK are listed as terror groups by the State Department.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.