The U.S. government has motioned to dismiss Sayed Naser’s immigration case on the grounds his notice to appear in court — a component of his legal arrival in the U.S. — was mistakenly issued, his lawyer said Tuesday.
Naser served as a translator and logistics contractor for U.S. troops at the Kandahar and Marmol Mazar bases during the military response to the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks in the United States, attorney Brian McGoldrick said.
Naser was in court on June 12 for his master calendar hearing — the first time an asylum-seeker who has been paroled into the U.S. appears in court.
According to ICE, the master calendar hearing is the first stage of deportation proceedings, and people who do not show up may be deported.
The trial lawyer for the Department of Homeland Security moved to dismiss Naser’s case on the grounds that his notice to appear was “improvidently” issued, McGoldrick said.
“They’re alleging that some sort of mistake happened, that they mistakenly issued this notice to appear, which is ludicrous,” McGoldrick said. “It was issued in a standard fashion, the way they’re issued for everyone.”
The DHS lawyer said he only has to make the allegation that a mistake that was made by letting Naser into the country — not explain what the mistake was.
McGoldrick called the premise a ruse.
“They just want to put this person in expedited removal, and this is just something they’re making up to use,” McGoldrick told the judge.
The judge did not immediately grant the government’s motion to dismiss Naser’s case. They will make a decision once McGoldrick files a brief in opposition to the motion, which he was given 10 days to draft.
McGoldrick said he’s hopeful the brief, which he plans to submit by the end of the week, will be well received.
“I don’t think the government’s position of saying ‘It was improvident and we don’t have to explain why’ is going to really hold water with this judge,” McGoldrick said.
If the judge sides with Naser, he could be granted asylum at his individual calendar hearing — also known as a merits hearing — in a few months.
After the hearing Thursday, two ICE agents in the hallway outside the courtroom took Naser into custody without immediately presenting a warrant.
McGoldrick said agents put Naser in detention in the basement of the building and presented him with a copy of the warrant about 15 minutes later. The warrant, which was signed by an ICE officer, it was an administrative warrant that does not require a judge’s signature.
Naser went into hiding in September 2023 after the Taliban killed his brother, who also supported the U.S. military in Afghanistan, at a family wedding. He fled with his wife and children to Iran in late 2023, and they received a humanitarian visa from Brazil in 2024.
Leaving his family in Brazil, Naser traversed the Darien Gap and trekked north, legally entering the U.S. at the San Ysidro Port of Entry in July 2024 via a CBP One appointment. He was paroled with an initial notice to appear in Chicago at a September 2027 hearing, which McGoldrick moved to San Diego, where cases were processed faster.
Shawn VanDiver, the president of AfghanEvac, a non-profit that helps Afghan allies resettle in the U.S., said Naser has two pending requests that would fortify his status in the U.S. — an asylum case and a Special Immigrant Visa application.
Naser’s detention is not about law and order, according to VanDiver; he said that in order to fill a quota of 3,000 detentions a day, it reflects the Trump administration’s asphyxiation of legal pathways for Afghans, who served alongside our soldiers, seeking the American Dream.
“What happened to Sayed is not the beginning,” VanDiver said. “It’s just the most recent and most visible moment in a long line of quiet decisions designed to make it harder for our allies to reach safety.”
Naser is currently being held at the Otay Mesa Detention Center.
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