Quazi Mohammad Rezwanul Ahsan Nafis, 22, had earlier pleaded guilty to attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction and admitted under oath that he intended to use a cell phone to detonate the 1,000-pound device.
His plot was foiled by an FBI undercover agent posing as an al-Qaeda facilitator. Unaware that he was being recorded, Nafis repeatedly declared that he had come to the United States to carry out a terrorist attack.
"Nafis's goals of martyrdom and carnage were thwarted by the vigilance of law enforcement," said US district attorney Loretta Lynch after US District Court judge Carol Amon handed down his sentence.
"He will now spend the next 30 years where his own actions have landed him -- in a federal prison cell," she said.