Following the August 2021 Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, the Afghan allies—including interpreters, government professionals, media members, and military personnel—who supported U.S. efforts to bring democracy to their country have lived in fear of Taliban reprisal inside their homeland. Hundreds of thousands applied for visas or sought other forms of legal status in the U.S. and began the process of finding safety.
Over three years later, up to 140,000 primary applicants—and their spouses and unmarried children under the age of 21—were mired in slow-moving processing pipelines when a pair of January 20 executive orders from President Donald Trump suspended the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP) for 90 days and canceled the foreign funding that supports Afghans in transit from overseas processing hubs. A January 24 stop-work order from the State Department dealt a further blow, ending resettlement assistance for new arrivals in the U.S.
On March 14, The New York Times published a draft copy of a State Department travel ban that would end all travel to the U.S. from about a dozen countries, including Afghanistan. Three days later, State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce denied that such a list existed. However, at a press briefing on March 31, Bruce responded to questions about the travel ban by saying, "Because there's not a date, it doesn't mean that it's not being worked on."
Afghans who arrived in the U.S. after 2021 are also experiencing immense strain as news has spread of deportations, parole revocation, and a pause in green card issuance.
Further complicating their struggles, on April 11, Department of Homeland Security officials announced the end of temporary protected status (TPS) for Afghans. An estimated 9,000 Afghans have used TPS to find safety in the U.S. while applying for asylum or another status. When the TPS designation runs out in May, they will be under threat of forced return to a country where the Taliban have stripped women of basic human rights and continue to target their former enemies—our allies—for death.
These moves have signaled a marked change in the posture toward our allies, not only impacting their futures but also affecting the Americans who supported them.
The USRAP Suspended
Afghan allies who are known to the U.S. government can be submitted to the USRAP by the entities that employed or can vouch for them. These include Afghans in the Priority 1 and Priority 2 categories who worked for the Afghan military and government, media institutions, or judicial staff.
Afghans who were separated from their families during or after the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan have reunification cases that may be classified under the Priority 1 or Priority 3 categories, according to founder and president of the #AfghanEvac coalition, Shawn VanDiver.
Trump's January 20 executive order suspended resettlement under each of those categories.
The International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP) quickly challenged the USRAP suspension, filing Pacito v. Trump on behalf of refugee resettlement groups and individual clients on February 10. A judge ruled in IRAP's favor on February 25, placing an injunction on the suspension. The judge later ordered the federal government to provide updates demonstrating its compliance with the injunction.
IRAP is embroiled in legal battles over the government's failure to comply with injunctions. Megan Hauptman, litigation fellow at IRAP, tells Reason that "the government's recent actions not only demonstrate non-compliance with court orders, but open defiance," which "wreaks daily harm on refugees and the organizations that serve them."
On April 11, Whitehead granted in part IRAP's motion to enforce the preliminary injunction. However, on April 21, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals issued clarifications about whom the government is required to process under the injunction, limiting the scope to approved refugees who already had their travel scheduled before Trump's executive order blocked their arrival.
A State Department spokesperson would not comment on the status of the USRAP "as a matter of policy," given ongoing litigation. They stated the department "continue[s] to comply with relevant court orders."
All movement for USRAP applicants is halted due to the program's suspension. However, one applicant and her family have been able to use the injunction to enter the U.S., thanks to a global boarding letter issued by the State Department in December.
"The Department is actively considering the future of our Afghan relocation program and the Office of the Coordinator for Afghan Relocation Efforts," a State Department spokesperson says, adding that "no final decisions have been made."
The State Department would not enumerate how many USRAP cases are currently open, citing "policy" and "protection of those individuals," but in August 2024, the State Department said that of the 56,000 Afghan applicants referred to the USRAP, 28,000 primary applicants were still undergoing processing.
That creates uncertainty for Afghans awaiting resettlement in other countries, including Pakistan, where an estimated 700,000 Afghans fled in the aftermath of the U.S. withdrawal. Pakistan announced plans to expel "up to 3 million [Afghan] migrants by the end of the year," reported Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. Pakistan says this includes Afghans in resettlement pipelines. Thus far, 80,000 Afghans have been deported. It is unclear whether this includes Afghans with a path to resettlement in the U.S.
A State Department spokesperson says the department is in "close communication with the Government of Pakistan on the status of Afghan nationals in U.S. resettlement pathways."
There is a particularly acute pain for Afghans in the U.S. who have waited over three years to be reunited with their families through the USRAP. John Moses, co-founder of the Massachusetts Afghan Alliance, says he is following several dozen reunification cases in Massachusetts and works directly on three cases in his own town.
Moses explains that a local Afghan high schooler has managed to become "one of the top wrestlers in the state" despite also supporting his father, who "is having nervous breakdowns" while his wife and daughters are "thousands of miles away."
The young man's father arrived in the U.S. because he drove a bus through Hamid Karzai International Airport to ferry our allies to safety. When U.S. operations ended, American military personnel told the driver that he could not be safely released into the crowds for fear that he might be killed by the Taliban. "He helped, and this is how we repaid him," Moses laments.
Moses says that Trump's executive orders harm not only Afghans but "all the Americans that support them," particularly in reunification cases in which "the trauma spreads, because it's continuous."
"I don't have the luxury of being hopeless," Moses explains. "I just get to keep working."
Nasrullah is a medical doctor who entered the U.S. through the Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) program after supporting the U.S. mission in multiple capacities. Nasrullah's family was submitted to the USRAP program on account of his prominent position with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).
Nasrullah's family had cleared several stages of the process and was awaiting final travel arrangements when the USRAP was suspended. In the interim, Nasrullah was one of many USAID employees to lose his job when 5,200 of the agency's 6,200 programs were cut. He explains that he now has no source of funds to help his parents pay their rent, and his parents risk deportation in Turkey.
"My hope to see or visit my parents is fading away," Nasrullah says.
Nonprofit Steps in for SIV Applicants
The largest number of Afghans still in the processing queue for admission to the U.S. are applicants to the SIV program, designed to assist interpreters or employees of the U.S. government or U.S. contractors with at least a year of "faithful and valuable employment." Per the latest Afghan SIV quarterly report, there were more than 128,000 primary applicants still in the processing pipeline as of October 2024. Not all applicants will qualify for an SIV. About 80,000 applicants remain in the first hurdle of processing, of whom an estimated 37 percent typically receive approval.
A State Department spokesperson confirmed that the program's Chief of Mission approval, visa adjudication, consular interviews, and security vetting are ongoing.
Unlike applicants in USRAP pipelines who cannot leave third countries for transportation to the U.S. due to their program's suspension, SIV applicants can continue moving to the United States. However, because of the freeze in foreign funding, the U.S. government no longer pays for their travel, and the resettlement funds they once received on arrival are no longer available.
Among the organizations that have filled this void is the nonprofit No One Left Behind. Its executive director, Andrew Sullivan, tells me that the organization "immediately saw what was in the pipe."
An unforeseen challenge to getting "up and running" was the spending limit on the organization's corporate credit card, which fell far short of the funds required to book flights for hundreds of Afghan SIV holders at worldwide processing hubs. To make up for the shortage, Sullivan says that he and other members of the organization used personal credit cards to pay for travel.
"At one point, I had $70,000 in credit card debt," Sullivan recalls. "Thankfully, we've all reimbursed ourselves again because of the incredible generosity of everyday Americans."
Sullivan's team first traveled to Tirana, Albania, where they helped around 200 SIV holders leave for the United States. Next, they went to Doha, Qatar, where conditions were "starkly different." It "reminded me of every military base that I ever went to on my way to Iraq," Sullivan says.
According to Sullivan, the State Department Coordinator for Afghan Relocation Efforts (CARE) team on the ground in Doha was "doing their absolute best, doing incredible work to try and support our wartime allies," despite numerous services being impacted by the foreign aid pause.
In Qatar, No One Left Behind moved over 350 SIV holders, though Sullivan says that there remains "a major population of refugees" whose futures are yet to be determined.
Sullivan encountered some "incredibly sad cases," including a family in Qatar who were unable to bring their 19-year-old daughter with them to the U.S. because she had signed a contract when becoming engaged to a man in Afghanistan. Though the marriage was never performed, the U.S. government considered the paperwork proof that a marriage had transpired, leaving the daughter stranded in Qatar.
The case illustrates "why the refugee program…is so important" Sullivan says, explaining that it supports family members in unique situations or who have aged out of visa-dependent status, Afghans who are shy of the time-in-service requirement for an SIV, and Afghans who "were paid by the government of Afghanistan because they were a special operator or female tactical platoon member."
No One Left Behind also encountered SIV applicants whose struggles illustrate Taliban brutality. One Afghan who spent years working with a West Coast–based SEAL team during a violent period of the war was arrested by the Taliban after the U.S. withdrawal. Sullivan says the man was imprisoned and "tortured for a week" before village elders secured his release.
Another story came from an SIV-eligible mechanic who logistically supported Americans and refused to heed the Taliban's warnings to stop working for the United States. After being shot twice in the chest by the Taliban, the SIV applicant "is a paraplegic and he will be confined to a wheelchair for the rest of his life," Sullivan explains.
"There's this idea that somehow you have to have been…working directly alongside counterterrorism forces or a tactical interpreter to be at risk of reprisal from the Taliban," Sullivan says. "That's just not true."
If Afghans in our visa programs were returned to their country, Sullivan continues, "they would have to go through a Taliban-controlled immigration checkpoint where they could potentially see that they had a U.S. Special Immigrant Visa in their passport." The repercussions for these individuals would be "everything up to torture and murder," Sullivan says. "That's why it's so important that we are able to continue moving these folks and protecting them."
On April 8, No One Left Behind announced that it has booked flights for a total of 1,000 allies since February 1.
Unfortunately, other difficulties plague the SIV process. There were approximately 13,600 visas remaining for the Afghan hopefuls in the pipeline as of October 2024. A recent provision in the House Budget Committee's continuing resolution to fund the government would have added 20,000 SIVs to this total. But the provision was removed on March 11.
Sullivan urges Americans "to raise the issue with their member of Congress, with their senators, to tell them that we have to keep the promise" to our allies.
Living in Fear
Since the start of Trump's second term, Afghans in the U.S. have been on tenterhooks about their legal status. An unknown number of Afghans were among the migrants deported to a Panamanian hotel in February. That same month, I reported for Reason about an asylum-seeking ally who was detained during a routine check-in with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in the lead-up to his asylum hearing. The parole he received on entering the country was revoked at the time of his detention.
"Thousands of Afghans are living in the United States in legal limbo," explains immigration lawyer Alison Tabor. "They arrived here seeking safety and stability but instead find themselves facing prolonged uncertainty." Tabor says she's "seen Afghan allies detained, asylum seekers turned away at the border, and even expulsions to Panama."
According to Tabor, "green card processing has paused for many eligible Afghans," leaving them to face "an uncertain waiting period" for stability. "My clients tell me they're anxious about their futures and unsure if the country they believed would protect them will truly allow them to stay and rebuild their lives," she explains.
An estimated 8,100 Afghans have arrived in the U.S. through the southern border since 2021. Most have accomplished this by procuring humanitarian visas to Brazil, traversing the deadly Darién Gap, being ferried to Mexico by cartel members, and claiming asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border.
Those who are still waiting for asylum adjudication are especially concerned, particularly since the Trump administration announced on April 8 that it was revoking parole for all Afghans who entered the country via the CBP One app, introduced in January 2023. A number of Afghans in this situation, including Christian Afghans, received letters from the Department of Homeland Security informing them that they had seven days to depart the country by April 18—Good Friday.
Nasrin has been sharing her story since December 2021. After trying to evade her abusive former husband for years, she ultimately fled to the U.S. in late 2024 to avoid his threats to marry their daughter to a Taliban member.
Nasrin and her daughter were released from ICE custody soon after arrival in the U.S. and now await asylum hearings. Her two adult sons have remained in a southern ICE facility for five months with no word about their future. "My little son calls every day, crying," Nasrin tells Reason.
One former interpreter, Mahmud, arrived in the U.S. in 2014 through the SIV program. His brother, Fawad, applied to the SIV program based on his work for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. After being beaten by unknown strangers in 2022, the same year that his half-brother was murdered, Fawad escaped to Pakistan. He followed a path to Mexico in 2024.
Mahmud says that Fawad waited eight months in Mexico for SIV approval or an appointment to request asylum through the CBP One app, but received neither. Fearful of dangerous conditions in Mexico, Fawad fled to the port of entry in San Diego last month and requested asylum. ICE detained him.
Fawad has not received an asylum interview or a court hearing and has not had the opportunity to request bond. Mahmud says that his brother "is under immense pressure and stress" and explains that Fawad believes that he is in deportation or removal proceedings, but ICE has not informed him of his fate.
"If he is deported to Afghanistan, it will be a death sentence for him," Mahmud says.
ICE did not respond to my questions about parole revocation, the outlook for detained Afghans, or the prospects for Afghans who have sought protection through another pathway: humanitarian parole.
Over 52,870 Afghans applied for the status, which provides a pathway for those with "urgent humanitarian" needs. Afghans who applied for humanitarian parole between March 2021 and 2022 spent $19 million in $575 per-person filing fees. As of January 2024, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) had conditionally approved just 1,860 applications.
USCIS did not respond to questions about how many humanitarian parole applications remain open and how many have been conditionally approved.
Congress Speaks Up
In the tumultuous early months of the second Trump administration, a few congressional leaders have spoken out about our allies' uncertain future.
In February, Sens. Amy Klobuchar (D–Minn.), Richard Blumenthal (D–Conn.), Dick Durbin (D–Ill.), Mark Kelly (D–Ariz.), and Chris Coons (D–Del.) implored leaders in the Trump administration "to provide Congress with information on how…executive orders and directives affect our Afghan wartime allies." Their open letter also requested information from the departments of Defense, State, and Homeland Security about policies impacting Afghans.
On March 4, Reps. Michael Lawler (R–N.Y.), Michael McCaul (R–Texas), and Richard Hudson (R–N.C.) addressed a letter to the president, noting that shutting down the CARE and Operation Enduring Welcome platforms "would abandon over 200,000 wartime allies and have lasting consequences for America's global credibility, military operations, and veterans."
Citing "over 3,200 documented killings and disappearances of former Afghan military personnel, interpreters, and U.S. government partners," the representatives defended our allies as among "the most vetted immigrants in U.S. history having undergone extensive screening by DHS, DOD, FBI, CIA, and the State Department."
Among the serious consequences the representatives outlined should we abandon our allies are a loss of trust in the U.S. military and intelligence communities, the empowerment of American adversaries who will propagandize the country's failures, and an immediate threat to the "over 3,000 spouses, children, and parents of active-duty U.S. service members" trapped in Afghanistan.
On March 6, Reps. Jennifer McClellan (D–Va.) and Doris Matsui (D–Calif.) penned a letter signed by 47 House Democrats urging Trump "to fully restore humanitarian and refugee protections for our Afghan allies and all refugees."
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D–N.H.) addressed a letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio on March 18 expressing concern for the SIV program, and in particular for the Afghans stranded in U.S. processing platforms with "no clear path to travel to the United States."
National security adviser Michael Waltz, a former Army Special Forces officer, was often an advocate for Afghans as a Florida representative, co-sponsoring the Support Our Afghan Partners Act in July 2022 and introducing a resolution supporting the people of Afghanistan against the Taliban's human rights abuses in July 2023.
Waltz told 60 Minutes in July 2021 that his interpreter "was often more important to me than a heavy machine gun or a radio to be able to talk to the Air Force because without that asset, I was basically deaf and in many ways culturally blind." Waltz's interpreter was discovered by the Taliban at a checkpoint while awaiting SIV processing and was beheaded along with several of his relatives.
Waltz did not respond to my questions about his stance on our allies' plight.
Silence from the Trump administration about our allies has allowed an atmosphere of mistrust to grow among immigration hawks, like the Center for Immigration Studies' Phillip Linderman. In a series of questionably sourced pieces for The American Conservative, Linderman makes damning and often inaccurate statements about our Afghan allies' qualifications for safety in the U.S. and the veterans and volunteers who stepped up to fill the shoes of the federal government by providing support for our allies as they awaited seemingly interminable processing for pathways to safety.
Linderman not only wrongly insinuates that our allies are poorly vetted and "may bring the next terrorist attack," but he implies that the #AfghanEvac coalition, which fought tooth and nail to support allies, is in bed with the "open-border lobby."
VanDiver rejects the notion, explaining that the #AfghanEvac coalition "has insisted that advocates in our ecosystem only work to move Afghans to safety through legal and durable mechanisms. Coming through the southern border, for refugees, results in loss of eligibility for that status."
Breaking Promises to Veterans
In the course of nearly four years covering newsworthy developments in Afghanistan, I have interacted with dozens of selfless Americans from both civilian and military backgrounds who have been involved in supporting Afghans since the withdrawal. Several sent me their thoughts about the meaning of their accumulated years of efforts and the difficulties our allies are currently facing.
One anonymous veteran told me that the efforts have "been massively traumatic" for volunteers, especially those with post-traumatic stress disorder. "Leaving SIVs behind will absolutely eviscerate our reputation," he says. "We cannot break this promise."
Another veteran who spoke on condition of anonymity says that the uncertainty of the last few months brought back her "nightmares of friends dying and others being killed." She says she wonders "if it was all worth it, [or if] maybe our allies should have just protected themselves and not stuck their neck out for people like me." In the end, she feels that the betrayal is not just "of our allies but…against us as well."
Another veteran, who missed the birth of his daughter during his Afghanistan deployment, says of the 20-year effort, "I guess it wasn't that important." He explains that he went to the steps of his state's capitol building multiple times to try to drum up support for our allies. In the end, he says, he "had to quit going.…You sometimes feel like a fool for having gone there because of how people look at you as if you are making the whole thing up."
Kate Kovarovic, formerly the director of resilience programming for the #AfghanEvac coalition, has talked to me over the last several years about fielding calls from overtaxed volunteers with suicidal ideation in the aftermath of the withdrawal. She says she began receiving similar calls again after executive orders threatened long-awaited successes.
The nonprofit Operation Recovery's Impacts of War initiative found that volunteers who assisted Afghans in the aftermath of the withdrawal spent over $2.2 million, selling homes, cashing out pensions, or taking on debt in order to support Afghan allies. Volunteers were found to have donated 59,330 hours of labor to the cause, with 78 percent of respondents saying that "the track of their life has drastically changed" as a result of their efforts.
House Resolution 4517, the Ensuring Voluntary Actions Are Compensated Act of 2023, intended to have the State Department draw up plans to reimburse Americans who helped Americans and Afghan allies evacuate from Afghanistan. Introduced in the House in July 2023 and co-sponsored by Waltz, it never passed.
The Path Forward
To truly understand the impact of the Trump administration's pause—and possible closure—of the USRAP and the tenuous future of the SIV program, we must look at the incredible variety of humans they impact. This includes the populations of Afghan allies who believed in the promises of the U.S. government, and the American legal professionals, refugee resettlement teams, civilian volunteers, and veterans who have supported them.
The frustrations that came along over three and a half years of dawdling bureaucracy and a general sense of neglect from the Biden administration have been compounded by the early efforts of the Trump administration to realign American priorities. Preserving our national security and our moral standing on the world stage are paramount, but both require that we deliver on the promises we made to our partners.
The post Washington's Broken Promises Leave Afghan Allies in Limbo appeared first on Reason.com.
