The FBI Says the San Bernardino Shooters Talked About Jihad in 2013

Three days after married couple Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik killed 14 people at a holiday party in San Bernardino, California, members of the Islamic State claimed the duo as followers during an online radio broadcast.

While there's no available evidence that the militant group directly ordered or organized the attack, Malik posted a message praising the group on Facebook around the time of the massacre. But on Wednesday, FBI Director James Comey told the Senate Judiciary Committee that "as early as the end of 2013 [the couple] were talking to each other about jihad and martyrdom before they became engaged and married and were living in the US." That predates the emergence of ISIS as a global phenomenon, suggesting the two may have been on the road to violent extremism independent of the notorious group's influence.

The new timeline conflicts with the idea that Malik came over from Pakistan and radicalized Chicago-born Farook once she was on American soil. What's more, citing US officials, the New York Times reports that Farook had plotted an attack in 2012 that never came to fruition—further evidence that he was interested in terrorism before his relationship with Malik, and before ISIS was attracting hundreds of American sympathizers online.

The FBI's announcement proved that the government's vetting process for visa applicants missed that Malik was sympathetic to terrorists and pursuing martyrdom. On the application for her K-1 visa, which is for people intending to marry US citizens, she would have had to check "no" next to a box asking if she intended to come here to conduct terrorist activity. The Los Angeles Times previously reported that she was a "modern girl" who grew intensely religious in college and was posting "extremist messages" on Facebook around the time she arrived with Farook. In his address from the Oval Office on Sunday, President Barack Obama said that the visa program would be reviewed by the departments of State and Homeland Security.

While Comey provided the most complete timeline so far about how the couple turned toward violent extremism, there are still unanswered questions, chief among them whether Farook and Malik were given any overt instruction from terrorists in Syria or anywhere outside the United States.

"It would be a very, very important thing to know," Comey told the Senate committee.

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