Alleged ISIS Sniper Indicted, Came to U.S. on ‘Visa Lottery’ from Kazakhstan

An alleged sniper for the Islamic State (ISIS) has been indicted, the Department of Justice announced on Thursday, years after he was able to obtain American citizenship by arriving in the United States on the “Diversity Visa Lottery.”

Ruslan Maratovich Asainov, 43-years-old, was indicted in federal court on five counts of conspiracy to provide material support to ISIS; providing personnel, training, expert advice, assistance, and weapons to ISIS and ISIS fighters; as well as receiving military training from ISIS fighters.

Asainov, according to federal prosecutors, traveled to Istanbul, Turkey in December 2013 with the intention of going on to Syria to fight for ISIS. After arriving in Syria, Asainov is accused of joining ISIS by becoming a sniper for the terrorist organization.

While sniping for ISIS, Asainov moved up the ranks within the terrorist organization and was put in charge of training newcomer ISIS fighters. Asainov is also accused of trying to recruit other terrorist sympathizers living in the U.S. to travel to Syria to fight for ISIS.

Asainov’s traveling to Syria to allegedly snipe for ISIS came 14 years after he was first allowed to legally immigrate to the U.S. through the Diversity Visa Lottery program — which randomly gives out about 55,000 visas every year to foreign nationals from a multitude of countries, including those with known terrorist problems such as Afghanistan, Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Syria, Yemen, and Uzbekistan.

Then, in September 2006, the federal government allowed Asainov to become a naturalized U.S. citizen. Asainov now faces life in prison if convicted of the terrorism charges.

Since 2005, Breitbart News reported, more than half a million foreign nationals have come to the U.S. by randomly winning the Visa Lottery, bringing with them a chain migration of five million foreign nationals since 1994, according to researchers at the Center for Immigration Studies.

Over the last half-decade between 2012 and 2016, as Breitbart News reported, 72,794 foreign nationals have come to the U.S. on the Visa Lottery from countries that the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency has designated as terrorist-sponsors.

John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Follow him on Twitter at @JxhnBinder.