The border with Mexico is the path of least resistance if you want to get anyone or anything nefarious into the US. One Iranian (that we know of) seems to have figured this out:

An Iranian man is accused of trying to smuggle three of his countrymen into Arizona through Nogales, Sonora, federal prosecutors said Tuesday.

Zeayadale Malhamdary, 39, a Mesa tailor, was arrested Thursday after a nine-month undercover operation by the Southern Arizona Joint Terrorism Task Force. He is being held on attempted-migrant- smuggling charges, said Sandy Raynor, spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's Office.

The FBI, which heads the terror task force, has no reason to believe this is any more than a smuggling case, said Deborah McCarley, spokeswoman for the bureau's Phoenix office.

That's what they always say--nothing to see here, move along.

But:

Last September, Malhamdary told an FBI informant posing as a migrant smuggler that he had already sneaked in a group of 20 Iranians through Sonoita, Ariz. Wiretaps recorded Malhamdary asking the informant to help him obtain Mexican visas to be placed into Iranian passports so more Iranians could fly into Mexico City then slip through Arizona with a smuggler's help.

In a later phone call, he asked for a supply of Mexican visas because he already had one group turned away from a flight into Mexico after they were discovered with improper visas.

In March, Malhamdary flew back to Tehran, Iran, telling the FBI source he needed to gather the passports of three Iranians. He returned three weeks later with the passports and handed them over to the informant. The informant noticed several other passports in Malhamdary's possession that were not handed over.

At the same meeting, Malhamdary told the informant he previously had 60 more Iranians smuggled into the United States.

Two weeks ago, Malhamdary called the informant and told him that as soon as the three visas were created for the passports, he would bring $12,000 and eight more passports to be doctored, the affidavit stated.

On May 26, Malhamdary was arrested at his Mesa home. He told the agents he was trying to bring the Iranians into the United States so they could seek refugee status. Earlier, he told the FBI informant he'd successfully had his sister smuggled into the country.

By my count, and depending on when the sister was smuggled in, this one gentleman accounts for getting 81 people into the US and attempting to get at least three more in, just in the past few months. How many more did he help smuggle in, and where are they and what are they up to? That's an awful lot of OTMs running around.

It is of course good that he was caught, but our open border is a ticking timebomb. Or to put it a bit more precisely, our open border is the means by which a ticking timebomb is likely to enter the US, ultimate destination unknown.