A little-known secret court is being used for the first time to quietly deport a Texas green-card holder over alleged ISIS ties that she is not allowed to fully see or challenge.
Story Snapshot
- The Justice Department is using a secretive deportation court built to rely on classified evidence against alleged “alien terrorists.”
- Afghan permanent resident Nazira Haji Zada is the first person ever hauled before this court, over claims she backed an ISIS-inspired Election Day plot.
- She has no known criminal record, yet the government says classified information shows she radicalized her own family.
- Her lawyer calls the process unfair and unconstitutional because she cannot see or test the secret evidence used to deport her.
Secret Terror Court Awakened After 30 Years
The Department of Justice has turned to the **Alien Terrorist Removal Court**, a special tribunal Congress created in 1996 to deport noncitizens accused of terrorism when key evidence is classified and cannot be aired in open court. For three decades, this court sat dormant and was never used in a single case. Now, the Trump administration has activated it for the first time to seek the removal of an Afghan woman living in Fort Worth, Texas, who holds lawful permanent resident status.
Court records and news reports say this is the first-ever hearing in this secretive court, making it a major test of how far the federal government can go using hidden evidence against people on American soil. The Justice Department argues that regular immigration courts are not suited for cases where revealing intelligence could expose sources, methods, or ongoing operations. That structure gives national security officials broad power, but it also raises hard questions for conservatives about due process, transparency, and the risk of unchecked government overreach.
Who Is Nazira Haji Zada And What Is Alleged?
The government identifies **Nazira Haji Zada**, 47, as an Afghan-born legal permanent resident who settled in Texas with her family. Public reports say she has **no known criminal history** and has never been charged with a terrorism crime in any regular court. Yet an unclassified summary from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) claims that a “reliable source” told agents she is a supporter of the Islamic State group and that she had her children pledge loyalty to ISIS.
That same summary and related filings link Zada to a foiled **Election Day 2024 mass shooting plot** in Oklahoma. Her teenage son, Abdullah Haji Zada, and her son-in-law, Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi, were prosecuted there for an Islamic State-inspired plan to attack voters, and the son received a 15‑year federal prison sentence plus an agreed order of removal after his term. The Justice Department now calls Nazira the “matriarch of an ISIS‑sympathizing family” and alleges she helped “radicalize” relatives and “supported” the Election Day plot, even though she herself has not been criminally convicted.
How The Secret Process Works — And Why Her Lawyer Says It Is Unfair
The **Alien Terrorist Removal Court** was designed so the Justice Department can present classified intelligence to a judge without revealing it to the public or to the person it wants to deport. Targets of these proceedings, including green‑card holders like Zada, are **not allowed to review the classified evidence** against them and cannot challenge how that evidence was gathered, unlike defendants in normal criminal trials. They receive only a short unclassified summary, which in this case reportedly runs just a couple of paragraphs and largely repeats information from her son’s criminal case.
Zada’s court‑appointed lawyer told the judge he plans to fight the deportation aggressively and argued that the entire process is **unfair and unconstitutional** because his client cannot see or test the core evidence. The presiding judge, sitting in Washington, pressed Justice Department lawyers to provide more detail, after they initially offered only vague claims that classified material suggested she was an “alien terrorist.” The government did describe the FBI’s view that Zada covertly radicalized her family while her husband was “unsuspecting,” but key intelligence remains sealed, leaving the defense and the public unable to weigh its strength.
Balancing Security And Liberty — A Conservative Crossroads
Congress built this court at a time of growing fear about foreign terrorism, aiming to make it easier to remove noncitizens who “should never have been here in the first place,” as the current acting Attorney General put it. For many conservatives, protecting Americans from terror plots is non‑negotiable, especially after federal prosecutors detailed how Zada’s son plotted a mass casualty attack on Election Day and pledged to the Islamic State. Strong national security tools are vital when real threats exist, and no one wants dangerous extremists using our freedoms against us.
The government has activated the constitutioanlly dubious "Alien Terrorist Removal Court" for the first time in its 30 yrs of existence to speedrun the deportation Nazira Haji Zada to Afghanistan.
As with many repressive terrorism laws, @ADL was a key player in its creation. 🧵 https://t.co/cVfcPaGX1H
— darryl li (@dcli) July 30, 2026
At the same time, this case hits core conservative concerns about **secret government power** and respect for the rule of law. A legal resident with no criminal record is being labeled an “alien terrorist” and pushed toward deportation based largely on evidence she cannot see. The court’s design leans heavily on trust in federal agencies instead of open, adversarial testing. For readers who care about the Constitution, that raises hard questions: How do we defend the country without creating tools that can be misused or expanded against others later?
What Comes Next In This Test Case
Because this is the first use of the Alien Terrorist Removal Court, there is almost no public precedent on how far the government can go or what protections noncitizens will actually receive. Any ruling in Zada’s case could shape how future administrations, friendly or hostile to conservative values, wield this secretive mechanism. Legal experts expect debates over whether classified summaries are enough, whether special security‑cleared lawyers should get deeper access, and how courts should weigh family ties versus direct terrorist activity.
For now, much of the evidence remains behind closed doors in Washington. What is clear from public records is that federal officials see Zada as part of a family tied to an ISIS‑inspired plot, while her attorney insists the process itself violates basic fairness. As this test case moves forward, conservatives who value both strong borders and limited government will want to watch closely — not only to keep Americans safe, but also to ensure that new national security tools do not quietly chip away at the rights and safeguards that define this country.
Sources:
cbsnews.com, aa.com.tr, bangordailynews.com, vpm.org, justice.gov
