WASHINGTON – The United States is officially out of Afghanistan, but the political debate at home over resettling Afghan refugees is just beginning.
With all U.S. troops withdrawn from Kabul, the White House is braced for intensifying scrutiny over permanently resettling tens of thousands of Afghan allies across the country which up until now had been set aside by the hurried mass evacuation from Afghanistan after 20 years of war.
Officials with the White House National Security Council have quietly been laying the groundwork with state and local governments for several weeks by presenting their Special Immigrant Visa program as a humanitarian imperative and a moral obligation to those who helped in the U.S. war effort.
