A group of US senators, including Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, have sent a letter to the Biden Administration, requesting a special category be established for certain Afghans trying to escape the country as the Taliban take control and begin executing people in the streets and in their homes.
Forty-three of the 46 signers were Democrats, and the others were Murkowski, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, and Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma, Republicans.
“We and our staff are receiving regular reports regarding the targeting, threatening, kidnapping, torturing, and assassinations of women for their work defending and promoting democracy, equality, higher education, and human rights. While we welcomed the expansion of the eligibility requirements for Special Immigrant Visas and the creation of the Priority 2 category in the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program, we must also protect those women who might fall through the cracks of the U.S. Government’s response,” the letter said.
It seems like a big ask for an administration that announced today that it cannot even ensure the safety or help any Americans in Afghanistan who are not already at the Kabul airport.
THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT CANNOT ENSURE SAFE PASSAGE TO THE HAMID KARZAI INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT,” the US Embassy in Kabul told American citizens in a security alert today. Space of flights out of Kabul are now on a first-come, first serve basis. “Please be advised that a significant number of individuals have registered and space on these flights is available on a first come, first serve basis. You may be required to wait at the airport for a significant amount of time until space is available.”
In addition, the Biden Administration in June canceled the Trump program that was set up to oversee the evacuation of American citizens stationed overseas. Just as the Taliban were breaking the terms of the agreement set forth with the Trump Administration, Biden’s State Department dismantled the Trump crisis response program, according to an internal State Department memo obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.
“That memo, which was marked sensitive but unclassified and was signed by Deputy Secretary Brian McKeon, approved the ‘discontinuation of the establishment, and termination of, the Contingency and Crisis Response Bureau (CCR),’ a new State Department entity created during the Trump administration to coordinate emergency response services overseas,” the news agency reported.
“The CCR bureau was established late last year by then-secretary of state Mike Pompeo. In a notification sent to Congress in October and also obtained by the Free Beacon, the Trump administration said the new bureau would provide ‘aviation, logistics, and medical support capabilities for the Department’s operational bureaus, thereby enhancing the secretary’s ability to protect American citizens overseas in connection with overseas evacuations in the aftermath of a natural or man-made disaster.'” the Beacon reported.
The senators’ letter to the Biden Administration can be read at this link:
