US Deports Legal Resident Via Alien Terror Court

For the first time in its 30-year history, the U.S. government has used a specialized court to deport someone from the United States—removing a lawful permanent resident to Afghanistan after she conceded she is an “alien terrorist.” The case is now raising fundamental questions about due process and the limits of a court that allows secret evidence and a lower standard of proof.

Nazira Haji Zada, 47, an Afghan national who had lived in Fort Worth, Texas, as a green-card holder since 2018, was removed from the country in August, according to NPR, which first reported the case. The Alien Terrorist Removal Court (ATRC), created by Congress in 1996, had never before been used by any administration. The removal order was unsealed in September after Zada’s return to Afghanistan.

The Justice Department said Zada supported a plot by her son and son-in-law to carry out an Islamic State-inspired mass shooting on Election Day 2024. In a statement, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche called the outcome “a win for national security and the rule of law,” adding that “those who support and condone terrorism should not be living in the United States.”

A Court Dormant for Three Decades

The ATRC was established through the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act, following the Reagan administration’s failed attempt to deport the “L.A. Eight”—immigrant activists allegedly tied to a Palestinian faction—using classified evidence that immigration judges refused to accept, according to a Brennan Center for Justice explainer. For 30 years, no administration invoked it, and legal scholars once described it as a “veritable zombie court.”

The court operates very differently from criminal or standard immigration proceedings. The government must prove someone is an “alien terrorist” only by a “preponderance of the evidence”—a lower bar than the “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard in criminal cases or the “clear and convincing evidence” required in immigration court. The Federal Rules of Evidence do not apply, opening the door to hearsay, and the court permits the use of “fruits of electronic surveillance and unconsented physical searches.”

The five judges who staff the court are federal district judges appointed by the Chief Justice. All five current members were appointed by Republican presidents and also serve on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, the Brennan Center noted.

The Underlying Terror Plot

The case against Zada grew out of a 2024 investigation. According to the Justice Department, her son, Abdullah Haji Zada, and son-in-law, Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi, were arrested on Oct. 7, 2024, after purchasing two AK-47-style rifles, 10 magazines, and 500 rounds of ammunition from an undercover FBI employee.

Abdullah Haji Zada, who was 17 at the time of his arrest, pleaded guilty as an adult and was sentenced to 15 years in federal prison in November 2025. Tawhedi, 28, pleaded guilty in June 2025 to two terrorism-related offenses and is awaiting sentencing, facing up to 20 years plus 15 years. Both are slated to be removed to Afghanistan after their sentences.

Prosecutors alleged that Zada, described in filings as the family’s “matriarch,” helped radicalize relatives and supported the plan. According to the criminal complaint, the family sold off furniture, computers, and two vehicles to raise funds, and purchased one-way airfare to Kabul for some family members shortly before the planned attack.

A Case Built on Classified Evidence

The Justice Department filed its first-ever ATRC application to remove Zada on July 15, 2026, certified by Blanche. She was arrested at her Fort Worth home and appeared in open court on July 30 before Chief Judge Joan N. Ericksen.

At that hearing, much of the evidence against Zada remained classified. Under questioning from Judge Ericksen, prosecutors said the FBI had developed information that she supported the Islamic State and worked with her son-in-law to “radicalize” family members. The government said it provided Zada and her two federal public defenders with roughly half a terabyte of documents supporting its case.

Her court-appointed attorneys, Matthew Farley and Mary Manning Petras, challenged the constitutionality of the proceedings, arguing they were not permitted to review the classified evidence. “This entire scheme is in violation of due process and is unconstitutional,” Farley said at the July hearing. “The lack of process and due process provided to the respondent in these proceedings is woefully inadequate.”

In unsealed filings dated Aug. 20, Zada waived her right to challenge detention, conceded she is an “alien terrorist,” and agreed to removal. Judge Ericksen signed the order the same day. Zada’s attorneys said her consent “should not be seen as an endorsement of this court’s legitimacy,” and predicted the court will “be struck down as unconstitutional as soon as a judge is asked to address the issue.”

Judge Ericksen, who normally serves on the Minnesota district court, said at the July hearing that she was committed to “exactness, carefulness, circumspection and fealty to the Constitution and the rule of law,” acknowledging there “may be moments that appear inelegant” as the dormant court restarts its procedures.

Broader Implications

The ATRC’s use is part of a broader push to accelerate deportations. The administration has also invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798—a move that led to litigation and a Supreme Court ruling that immigrants can challenge gang-membership accusations—and expanded expedited removal.

The Brennan Center argues the court may be attractive to the government precisely where evidence is weak or was obtained unlawfully, given its lower evidentiary standard and restrictions on disclosure. Because Zada conceded and waived her appeal, the courts have not yet squarely ruled on the court’s constitutionality, leaving that central question unresolved.

“The ATRC embodies the recognition that the government should not have to choose between allowing a dangerous alien to remain in the United States and disclosing sensitive classified information in a traditional removal proceeding,” Assistant Attorney General for National Security John A. Eisenberg said. FBI Director Kash Patel called the removal “a historic and vitally important step” in protecting the homeland.

What to Watch

Zada is now permanently inadmissible to the United States, and the government has signaled it will use the ATRC as one of “every tool at its disposal.” Whether it will widen the court’s use—potentially to gang- or cartel-related cases—remains an open question. So does the constitutionality of a system that lets the government deport a lawful resident using evidence the person may never see. Until a judge is asked to decide, the first case of the Alien Terrorist Removal Court may be remembered less for who it removed than for the due-process questions it left behind.