By Eric Longabardi
Today President Barack Obama accepted the blame for the security lapses that allowed a known Al-Qaeda terrorist suspect to board a flight to the United States on Christmas Day 2009.
The suspect, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, a Nigerian national, attempted but failed to ignite a bomb sewn into his underwear before being restrained by passengers and the flight crew. The flight from Amsterdam landed safely in Detroit, Michigan.
Newly revealed in today's presidential report to the American people about what caused the security breach, President Obama revealed that although the suspect was known to U.S. counter-terrorism authorities, his name was not properly checked against government databases, and a misspelling of his name prevented him from being identified as holding a valid U.S. visa that allowed him to travel to the U.S.
ABCNews.com "The Blotter" reported last year in October and December, in a series of exclusive investigative reports, that same problem in identifying suspect individuals was a serious issue for the TSA and FAA in being able to identify suspected aviation security threats due to errors in the databases maintained by U.S. security agencies. The December report exclusively identified over a dozen members of Osama Bin Laden's own family who had obtained American flight training and pilot's licenses and disclosed how a senior member of the Bin Laden family had secretly had his U.S. pilot license revoked by the TSA five years after 9-11 due to security concerns.
The reports highlighted the work of a small Mineola New York security firm known as Safe Banking Systems (SBS) which first uncovered the information. The ABC stories resulted in a bipartisan group of U.S. Senators calling for a Department of Transportation Inspector-General investigation into the issue.
The request for the IG investigation came just seven days prior to the terror attack attempted by the Al-Qaeda operative on Christmas Day 2009.
READ PRESIDENT OBAMA'S STATEMENTS RELEASED TODAY:
DIRECTIVE ON CORRECTIVE ACTION
