Federal prosecutors said they were weighing charges over the bombings that wounded 29 people.
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Rahami was arrested after a dramatic shoot-out with police on Monday morning in Linden, New Jersey, about an hour from Manhattan.
The agency said it wanted to speak to the two unidentified men as witnesses, not suspects, in the case against 28-year-old Ahmad Khan Rahami, who is accused of planting one bomb in New Jersey and two in NY. During the inquiry, the father backed away from talk of terrorism and told investigators that he simply meant his son was mixing with the wrong crowd, according to the official.
Mr Rahami’s wife left the United States a few days before the bombings, CNN reported, citing a law enforcement source.
Other passages lauded Osama bin Laden, Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hassan, and former al-Qaeda propagandist Anwar al-Awlaki.
A criminal complaint was unsealed in Newark, New Jersey, shortly after a virtually identical filing was unsealed in NY.
Rahami is thought to be behind two bombings and two attempted bombings that took place over the weekend. One injured 31 people when it blew up. He also mentioned wanting to live in peace.
Rahmani remains in hospital with gunshot wounds.
Mohammed Rahami (3-L), the father of the suspect behind the September 17 explosion in New York City and a second bombing in New Jersey, talks with FBI investigators in Elizabeth, New Jersey. Asked whether he thought his son was a terrorist, he said: “No”.
An FBI source told Mirror Online that the pair are being sought as witnesses rather than suspects – but the agency is “not ruling anything out”. They then took the luggage and left.
The FBI said in a statement it began an assessment of the younger Rahami in 2014 based on comments his father made about his son after “a domestic dispute”.
The charges come after the Federal Bureau of Investigation admitted that they had investigated Rahami for terrorism in 2014 following a complaint from his father, but found no link despite alleged acts of violence. Rahami traveled to Afghanistan and Pakistan and may have been radicalized there.
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Investigators used the cellphone connected to the device to link the bomb to 28-year-old Ahmad Khan Rahami, a US citizen of Afghan descent who is now charged in connection to planting bombs in NY as well as New Jersey.
