Tashfeen Malik’s visa "sloppily approved," according to congressman who reviewed immigration application

The chairman of the House Judiciary Committee on Saturday said U.S. officials “sloppily approved” the visa application of Tashfeen Malik, one of the shooters in the massacre in San Bernardino, Calif., that left 14 people dead.

Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) reviewed Malik’s visa application and said that immigration officials had not sufficiently vetted the information that Malik provided in her efforts to obtain a visa. He said the materials in the file did not conclusively show that Malik and her future husband, Syed Rizwan Farook, had met in person — a requirement for a foreigner who is seeking a K-1 fiancee visa.

Goodlatte’s review found that Malik’s application contained two items to show that the couple had met before: a statement from Farook and copies of pages of each of their passports that showed visas to visit Saudi Arabia. However, the passport stamps do not clearly demonstrate whether they were in Saudi Arabia at the same time, or whether they were together while in that country.

Malik’s passport pages show that she arrived in Saudi Arabia around June 4, 2013. A translator who attempted to decipher the partially illegible Arabic-language passport stamps was unable to determine what date Malik left the country, although her visa was valid for 60 days.