New York [US], November 28: The FBI searched multiple properties in Washington state and San Diego on Thursday in what officials said was a terrorism probe into an Afghan national suspected of shooting two National Guard members, who remained in critical condition.
Investigators seized numerous electronic devices from the suspect's house in Washington state, including cellphones, laptops, and iPads, and interviewed the suspect's relatives, FBI Director Kash Patel told a news conference in Washington, D.C.
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U.S. Attorney for Washington, D.C. Jeanine Pirro identified the two wounded Guard members as Sarah Beckstrom, 20, and Andrew Wolfe, 24.
Pirro said the suspect ambushed the Guard members while they were patrolling near the White House on Wednesday afternoon. Armed with a powerful revolver, a .357 Magnum, he shot one member who fell and then shot again before firing multiple times at the second member.
SUSPECT WORKED WITH U.S. FORCES IN AFGHANISTAN
Attorney General Pam Bondi told Fox News the U.S. government planned to bring terrorism charges against the gunman and seek a sentence of life in prison "at a minimum."
At her briefing, Pirro said the gunman faces three counts of assault with intent to kill while armed and a charge of possession of a firearm during a crime of violence.
He could be charged with murder in the first degree if either of the Guard members does not survive their injuries, she said.
The father of Beckstrom, one of the wounded members, told the New York Times his daughter was unlikely to survive. "I'm holding her hand right now," Gary Beckstrom told the newspaper.
Patel described the shootings as a "heinous act of terrorism," but neither he nor Pirro offered a possible motive.
The assailant appeared to have acted alone, said Jeff Carroll, executive assistant chief of the Washington Metropolitan Police Department.
The suspect has been identified by authorities as 29-year-old Rahmanullah Lakanwal, who lived in Washington state with his wife and five children.
"He drove his vehicle cross-country from the state of Washington with the intended target of coming to our nation's capital," Pirro said.
Lakanwal, who was wounded in an exchange of gunfire before he was arrested, had been involved with U.S. partner forces during the war in Afghanistan, Patel said.
CIA Director John Ratcliffe said Lakanwal had worked with CIA-backed local units in Afghanistan.
According to the Department of Homeland Security, Lakanwal entered the U.S. in 2021 under Operation Allies Welcome, a Biden-era program to resettle thousands of Afghans who assisted the U.S. during the Afghanistan war and feared reprisals from Taliban forces who seized control after the U.S. withdrawal there.
President Donald Trump, who was at his Florida resort at the time of the attack, released a video statement late on Wednesday calling the shooting "an act of evil, an act of hatred and an act of terror."
It was unclear if the shooting would lead to changes to how the Guard operates in cities. Members typically patrol in small groups, including on foot, mostly armed with pistols.
LAKANWAL APPROVED FOR U.S. ASYLUM THIS YEAR
The DHS said the Trump administration would review all asylum cases approved during Joe Biden's presidency.
Pirro and Patel blamed the Biden administration for improperly vetting Lakanwal, although they offered no evidence to support this assertion.
"The Biden Administration justified bringing the alleged shooter to the United States in September 2021 due to his prior work with the U.S. Government," Ratcliffe said in a statement. "This individual - and so many others - should have never been allowed to come here."
A Trump administration official who spoke on condition of anonymity said Lakanwal applied for asylum in December 2024 and was approved on April 23 this year, three months after Trump took office. Lakanwal, who resided in Washington state, had no known criminal history, the official said.
The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services said on Wednesday it had halted processing of all immigration requests relating to Afghan nationals indefinitely, "pending further review of security and vetting protocols."
VANCE DEFENDS IMMIGRATION POLICY
Vice President JD Vance, who was in Kentucky on Wednesday, said on social media that the shooting proved the Trump administration's immigration policy was justified.
"We must redouble our efforts to deport people with no right to be in our country," he said.
Critics of the administration's immigration policy say it has employed harsh and illegal tactics and swept up immigrants indiscriminately, including many with no criminal history and others in the U.S. legally.
The two Guard members from West Virginia were part of a militarized law enforcement mission ordered by Trump in August and challenged in court by Washington, D.C., officials. Trump ordered 500 more troops to be deployed in the capital in the wake of the shooting, joining about 2,200 already in the city as part of the president's immigration and crime crackdown targeting Democratic-led cities.
Trump, a Republican, has suggested repeatedly that crime has disappeared from the capital as a result of the deployment, an assertion at odds with the police department's official crime statistics.
Source: Fijian Broadcasting Corporation
