Efforts by President Biden to keep America’s commitment to rescue and resettle tens of thousands of Afghan allies left behind in the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan are being undermined by “bureaucratic dysfunction and understaffing,” according to a government watchdog.
“The U.S. promised to resettle its allies in safety, but the United States is failing,” a stark assessment from the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) reads. SIGAR released its 2023 High-Risk List report Wednesday, which identifies the serious risks posed to more than $8 billion the U.S. has sent to the Afghan people since withdrawal in August 2021.
The report comes as Afghanistan faces a “humanitarian catastrophe” caused by the brutal Taliban regime that assumed control after U.S. withdrawal. Inspector General John Sopko and watchdogs for the Defense and State Departments, as well as the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) are testifying to Congress Wednesday in a hearing entitled, “The Biden Administration’s Disastrous Withdrawal from Afghanistan, Part I: Review by the Inspectors General.”
They are updating lawmakers on their respective reviews of the Biden administration’s handling of withdrawal, during which 13 American service members died and hundreds of Americans and thousands more Afghan allies were left behind.
President Joe Biden delivers remarks on the evacuation of American citizens and their families, SIV applicants and their families, and vulnerable Afghans from Afghanistan, in the East Room of the White House complex on Friday, Aug. 20, 2021 in Washington, DC. (Kent Nishimura / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
Republicans have long sought to hold Biden accountable for the crisis. “This Administration not only continues to provide excuses for the self-inflicted humanitarian and national security catastrophe, but senior officials are actively obstructing meaningful congressional oversight,” House Committee on Oversight and Accountability Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., said in a statement announcing Wednesday’s hearing.
The White House has called GOP-led attacks on its handling of Afghanistan “politically-motivated” and accused Congress of neglecting to advance legislation that would expand eligibility for special immigrant visas to resettle Afghan nationals.
“When President Biden made the decision to finally bring our troops home and end the 20-year war that cost us countless lives and tens of billions of dollars a year with no end in sight, he also committed to safely evacuating tens of thousands of Americans and to welcoming Afghan allies who worked alongside the U.S. throughout the war, including by surging resources to improve the processing of special visas that had been all but stopped by the Trump Administration,” White House spokesman Ian Sams said ahead of the Oversight hearing.
“Instead of supporting these successful efforts to evacuate Americans and give Afghan allies safe harbor, MAGA House Republicans are refusing to acknowledge their own history of opposing efforts to aid Afghan allies and are turning their backs on those who risked their lives alongside American servicemembers for two decades in Afghanistan by opposing and delaying legislation like the Afghan Adjustment Act, revealing that these hearings are nothing more than political stunts solely aimed at attacking the President,” he added.
The SIGAR report notes that just one month before the Afghan government collapsed, Biden assured U.S. allies that they would not be left behind. “There is a home for you in the United States if you so choose, and we will stand with you, just as you stood with us,” the president promised on July 8, 2021.
“However, the United States has left most of its allies behind, and it will take a year, on average, until each family reaches safety,” the report states.
The most up-to-date figures show there are still about 175,000 Afghahns waiting for the U.S. government to process their Special Immigration Visas (SIV) or refugee applications. As of late September 2022, the U.S. has only issued visas to approximately 20% of SIV applicants, according to SIGAR. The report estimates it could take more than three decades to relocate and resettle all SIV applicants.
SIGAR identified a host of problems with the SIV program including, “chronic understaffing, reliance on antiquated IT systems, and inadequate interagency coordination.”
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Earlier this month, the White House released its own assessment of the withdrawal from Afghanistan, which mostly blamed President Donald Trump’s administration for constraining the conditions of evacuation.
“President Biden’s choices for how to execute a withdrawal from Afghanistan were severely constrained by conditions created by his predecessor,” the White House review said.
The document accused Trump of emboldening the Taliban by engaging in peace talks without consulting U.S. allies and partners in the region. It also emphasized that at the same time, Trump was decreasing the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan with a series of drawdowns throughout 2020.
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By the time Biden assumed office, according to the White House, “the Taliban were in the strongest military position that they had been in since 2001, controlling or contesting nearly half of the country.”
“While it was always the president’s intent to end that war, it is also undeniable that decisions made and the lack of planning done by the previous administration significantly limited options available to him,” White House national security spokesman John Kirby said.
