Napolitano admits: Saudi was put on watch list

THE LATEST: Napolitano admits: Saudi was put on watch list


All week, TheBlaze has been following up on the Saudi national who was initially investigated for several hours before being downgraded to merely a witness and ultimately released. Where is he now? What did authorities find in his apartment? These are just some of the questions remaining as the case continues to unfold. And earlier today, Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano revealed that Abdul Rahman Al-Harbi was placed on a watch list.
TheBlaze reported:

But today, speaking at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on immigration reform, Napolitano responded to a question by Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA).
“Before the [Tsarnaev] brothers became the focus of the investigation, authorities questioned a Saudi student who reportedly was on a terror watch list,” Grassley said. “I sent a letter to you this morning asking for answers to questions about the bombers and how they interacted with your agency, I trust you will promptly respond…”
“With regard to the Saudi student, was he on a watch list, and if so, how did he obtain a student visa?” Grassley asked.
Napolitano firmly responded: “He was not on a watch list. What happened is — this student was, really when you back it out, he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. He was never a subject. He was never even really a person of interest. Because he was being interviewed, he was at that point put on a watch list, and then when it was quickly determined he had nothing to do with the bombing, the watch listing status was removed.” [Emphasis added]

That’s a very different statement than what Napolitano had said when questioned about the story last week when she told Rep. Duncan that his questions were ”so full of misstatements and misapprehension that it’s just not worthy of an answer”.
On radio this morning, Glenn updated viewers on the latest developments this story and asked many of the outstanding questions surrounding the Saudi national:

Glenn: We are in a country that no longer recognizes the truth

Tuesday, Apr 23, 2013 

In the days following the Boston Marathon we all watched the utter failure of the media to report factual, accurate, and pertinent information. We witnessed the cover up of important evidence by both the government and press – from the alleged deportation of the Saudi national to the radical underpinnings of the Tzarnaev brothers. And now we are inundated with countless conspiracy theories and falsities about the bombings that disrespect those affected by the horrific event.

Sadly, such behavior is nothing new. We have seen these practices in the aftermath of September 11, Fort Hood, Benghazi, Newtown – the list goes on and on. We no longer place the necessary emphasis on truth, and as a nation, we have collectively lowered our standards to the point where disinformation can easily flood airways, newspapers, and websites.

“Well, here we are, in a country now filled with people that can’t recognize the truth at all,” Glenn said on radio this morning. “We’re filled with a country that would rather eat each other than actually listen to reason. There is no such thing as common sense anything, anymore. There’s no such thing as reason anymore. We are being separated by conspiracy theories, by disinformation, out‑and‑out lies, money, power.”

In the aftermath of an event like Boston, we expect to see a period of unity and national pride. But there has been very little harmony over the course of the last week.

“When you talk about the Boston marathon – something that should have brought us together, something that we’ve never seen before in the streets of America,” Glenn said. “We have never seen people blown up in our streets like they blow them up in the Middle East. We’ve never seen that. We’ve never seen legs and arms blown off in the streets. And now, and now we don’t even know what’s true. Now we have no idea. Now we have a president and a press willing to go along with it, saying that ‘this is just religious extremism, this is just a problem with religion; this has nothing to do with Islamic extremism. Islamic extremism doesn’t exist. These were religious extremists.’”

The media has proven time and time again that it is no longer capable of performing its most basic duty: providing the public with the best, most factual information it possibly can.

“I’m wondering when America is going to turn it off.  When America is going to not feel relief when you watch this stuff on television and so you say ‘I’m not going to watch it anymore,’ and I highly recommend it,” Glenn said. “I do not recommend that you unplug. You have to know what’s going on. You have to be involved. But I highly recommend you stop listening to the merchants of disinformation, out‑and‑out lies.”

“I’m sorry,” he continued. “I wish we could be farther along on TheBlaze. I wish there were others that would join us. I wish there were those who had a sense of time, that had a sense of history, that had a sense of what’s worth fighting for, what’s worth standing for, what’s worth dying for.”

Similarly, we now have a government no longer seems to respect its job of being of the people, by the people. “So America, you are going to two places. You’ve got two choices,” Glenn said. “You’ve got the people who are in bed with big brother and are telling you things that you know are not true.”

“No, you see, see, America, it’s really not that hard to figure out what’s conspiracy and what’s not. You look at the patterns of people,” Glenn explained. “Is this pattern of this government to take responsibility, to tell you the truth on what’s really going on, or is the pattern of this government to tell you, ‘You’ve got to sign it before you figure out what’s in it.’ Is the pattern of this government to throw people under the bus that do not agree with them, while they hide the things that they’ve really done?”

There are certainly no easy answers to the problems that face America today. There has been a breach of trust on the part of both the government and the media that will be hard to reverse. But ultimately it will be up to the American people to put their differences aside and decide just how important the truth is. In turn, they will also have to be diligent in parsing out the disinformation that exists.

“You’re going to have to decide,” Glenn concluded. “I’ve made my decision, and I would suggest that we stop arguing with each other and we find people that maybe we disagree with, but we can still see the light of day. We can still see the light of truth. We can still see who we are and what the truth is of what happens to our country if we fly apart and we don’t trust anything. We’ve got to trust something. And that something has to be based in fact and has to be based in common sense.”