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I'm Isabella Roya, intern at Lawfare, with an episode from the Lawfare archive for October 19, 2025 early in its second term, the Trump administration suspended the admission of refugees to the United states under the U.S. refugee Admissions Program, dismantled the State Department's Office of the Coordinator for Afghan Relocation Efforts and published a budget announcing the termination by the end of fiscal year 2025 of Operation Enduring Welcome, a long term program that helped resettle security, vetted Afghans through pathways including refugee admissions, immigrant visas, and Afghan Special Immigrant Visas, the last of which are issued to Afghans who served as partners to the US Military during the war in Afghanistan. In August, a bipartisan group in Congress introduced the Enduring welcome act, which aims to expedite family reunification for Afghan allies, codified the Office of the Coordinator for Afghan Relocation Efforts and and more. This push for an Enduring welcome act recalls elements of the push for an Afghan Adjustment act, another piece of bipartisan legislation proposed to help resettle Afghans fleeing the Taliban after the 2021American withdrawal and the fall of Kabul. For today's archive, I picked an episode from August 31, 2023, in which Bryce Clem, Shala Ghaffari, and Jennifer Quigley discuss the potential for an Afghan Adjustment act, immigration challenges facing Afghan arrivals, useful avenues for congressional action, and more.
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I'm Bryce Clem and this is the Lawfare Podcast. August 31, 2023 Yesterday marked the two year anniversary of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan. Around 80,000 Afghans were relocated during the withdrawal, and many do not have a pathway to permanent citizenship here in the United States. To get a sense of those immigration challenges and the potential for congressional action on those issues, I sat down with Shaula Ghaffari, the Managing Attorney of Project Afghan Legal Assistance at Human Rights first, and Jennifer Quigley, the Senior Director of Government affairs at Human Rights First. We talked about the current legal status of those relocated persons in the United States, the challenges faced by those still in Afghanistan, and the potential passage of the Afghan Adjustment Act, a bill that could help alleviate some of those legal obstacles. It's The Lawfare Podcast, August 31st. The potential for an Afghan Adjustment Act. Before we get into the meat of the Afghan Adjustment Act, I want to talk about the current legal status of someone from Afghanistan who left during the 2021 withdrawal. It's hard to believe that we've come up on two years since the withdrawal. Shaula, the last time we spoke, you noted that asylum was the main mechanism for the roughly 80,000 evacuees with, you know, I think at the time you said there was about a 99% approval rate. I assume that's still the case. And, you know, what's, what's the status of those grants of asylum and how have processing times either improved or gotten worse since then?
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C
Bryce, you know, sadly, we're pretty much in the same situation that we were in the last time we spoke. There are still many thousands of individuals who are waiting for asylum decisions. According to the latest numbers by USCIS, there are 14,000 pending asylum applications for Afghan evacuees. This is in addition to the 12,400 green card applications, primarily filed by individuals that were eligible through the Special Immigrant Visa Program. So in terms of asylum and the finality that asylum, an asylum grant would bring individuals, we're sadly not very far from where we were when we last spoke.
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E
So what's life like for someone who is trying to apply for asylum?
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C
I would imagine that life is pretty difficult. Not only does one now find themselves in a country that still adjusting to and getting acclimated to, but having no asylum finality means that you never know when you're going to see your spouse and children that you may have left behind. Of course, we all know the way that the evacuations happen. They were very haphazard and folks oftentimes didn't have opportunities to go back home and retrieve their families when they boarded those planes. And so I would imagine that every day without a Decision on that asylum application just feels like a never ending sort of wait. In addition to that, folks parole authorizations have now expired. Parole was the lawful status that Afghans were given when they first arrived to this country. It's a temporary status. Afghans were given two years parole, which means that they're lawfully here during the duration of that parole. Now those paroles have expired. Some individuals have been automatically granted an extension of that reperl. By automatic, I don't mean it's necessarily automatic. There is a case by case determination made, but they don't have to apply for anything on top of their asylum application. So for those folks who have already filed for asylum or filed for a green card, the US Government has said that they don't need to file for anything else, that they'll review their applications and decide whether or not to grant the extension to that parole. For those folks who haven't yet filed for asylum or a green card, they have to affirmatively file for a parole application. And we are finding actually now that there are many thousands of individuals who have not done so. And so for those folks, for a variety of reasons, they haven't been able to find legal counsel. Perhaps they found legal counsel and somewhere along the line that relationship broke down. But we now have have many thousands of individuals who basically lost status. And so, you know, again, according to the latest numbers, over 19,000 Afghans who are evacuated here have applied for no immigration benefit. You know, it's our sincere Hope that those 19,000 individuals went ahead and filed for reproal affirmatively. But oftentimes, you know, those circles overlap. Right? Individuals that have the resources and the language knowledge and perhaps the connections and family ties early on enough to file for asylum or a green card were also those same individuals who would have filed for a parole application should they have needed to. And so, you know, once again we're finding that the weakest members of this population perhaps may have fallen through the cracks.
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E
Shala, you referenced this re parole program. How has that been going and what sort of challenges or obstacles are people facing?
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C
So obviously when folks were first brought to this country, starting In August of 2021, the US government knew that the lawful status that was given to these individuals was only valid for a period of two years. So we have now hit that two year deadline and the very first folks that were brought to this country have now experienced the unfortunate situation of having their paroles expired or expiring. This was of course known to the US Government and we had been speaking with individuals at Every level, to try to have them rectify or remedy the expiry of parole before folks found themselves in a situation where they would lose their jobs or they would lose other government benefits. That parole program was launched in June of 2023. So just a little over two months ago, legal service providers around the country and other folks have been really clamoring to make sure that everyone that needs to file for reperral has filed for reperral. But we've been given a really short window. And of course, as you know, that entire window was in the summer months, a time where typically a lot of folks may not be in the office as much or perhaps have taken extended vacations. And so, you know, it's been going, I think, as best as it can. But, you know, there have been a lot of frustrations, I would say, shared by members of the coalition as to the fact that the US Government could have rolled out this parole program a lot sooner than it did, and we could have been prepared as a legal community to deal with it in a more orderly fashion. Just today, for example, I was made aware of an asylum applicant who or a future applicant, an individual who needs to file for asylum. His wife and five children are still in Afghanistan in hiding. He himself worked for the US Government, but not in the category of folks who'd be eligible for a special immigrant visa. He has not yet filed for asylum, and he has not yet filed for reperral. So we're really clamoring to make sure that that gentleman files for that reperl program before his parole expires later this week. And I would imagine that human rights first is not unique in that situation. The kinds of response we've gotten with respect to filing primary applications has been extraordinary. We still have a lot of work to do, but these kinds of secondary applications that may not be top of mind, but are as important for the day to day. The day to day of an individual Afghan just, we believe, has not been a priority as much as it. As much as it should have been for the US Government. So we're hoping that it all turns out well, but we're waiting to see what kind of impact it may have on this community. Sadly, we may have a number of folks who will lose status, at least temporarily, until they're able to have someone assist them with their parole applications. I think it's also worth noting again, that Afghanistan has been, sadly, over the past five decades, among the most at risk populations in the world. Right? Not simply because of warned conflict, but because of the kinds of impact that that has on the fabric of that society. So we're talking about one of the least literate populations in the world, one of the highest birth rate populations in the world, one of the highest infant mortality population in the world. Now they're suffering through a drought and famine and have been for the past few years. So this is a population that just needs a lot more assistance than say, a population somewhere in Europe or somewhere else in the world. They're not used to the kinds of bureaucratic red tape, the kinds of form filling, the kinds of processes that we have here in the US and let alone sort of the really complicated and sometimes even contradictory information that they've received over the past couple of years with respect to their legal status and their legal avenues. So, like I said, we're hopeful and the coalition has come together to really meet the need, but it oftentimes is a bit frustrating with respect to things that US Government could have done in a more timely fashion to avoid some of these results.
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E
When somebody loses status, what sort of effect does that have on something like their ability to work or their ability to find housing?
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C
Yeah, that's a great question. And that's really top of mind for all the attorneys we work with. Well, number one, their work authorization is directly tied to their status. So their EADS or their employment authorization documents will expire. There's an expiry date, and that date will come and go, and they won't be able to prove to their employer that they're lawfully entitled to work here. On top of that, a lot of states, their DMVs, their local DMVs, the authorization or the validity of that person's driver's license is directly tied to their work authorization document. And so not only are folks now at risk of losing their jobs, they're at risk of losing their driver's licenses, at risk of the implication that that has when one needs to drive. And sort of the kind of legal trouble they could find themselves in, financial trouble they could find themselves in, should they not get that parole extension, should they not have finality in their immigration application?
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And who's left to sort of fill that void? Is it advocacy groups? Is it nonprofits? Is there really any sort of recourse for them?
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C
There have been a number of individual organizations, sort of coalitions that have come together in these last two years to meet the need, the legal need specifically of this population. You know, I can speak on end for about the variety of organizations that have stepped up to serve these populations, starting from resettlement Agencies who have legal departments within their organizations, to organizations like ours, Human Rights first, who have taken on many hundreds, if not thousands of cases to assist in that need. But ultimately, what it comes down to is the ability to connect with those individual Afghans who have been brought here, to be able to communicate with them in their language, to be able to serve them, perhaps sometimes in a remote fashion. As we know, Afghans were resettled in 46 states, oftentimes in very remote and disconnected communities. And so it's not very easy to make sure that every single individual person who was brought here has been able to find the help that they need, find that. That. That help in the language that best serves them, and be able to see it through until the end.
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E
So I want to move to those who are still in Afghanistan. The last time we spoke, you mentioned that Pakistan was sort of the main. The main artery out of the country. Is that still the case? And also the last time we spoke, you mentioned that UNHCR had sort of stopped processing and registering Afghans. I was wondering if you could speak to sort of the current. Current status of that.
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C
From what we're hearing from our partners on the ground, it does seem like cases in Pakistan are moving. You know, that's to say that individuals who are. That have legal immigration pathways to the US they are slowly trickling in. You know, I would add to that sort of the caveat of the fact that many thousands of applications are still backlogged in that country. We have folks that are waiting now coming upon two years for interviews and decisions on applications that have been pending for that long. On top of that, we're hearing of really grotesque shakedowns by local Pakistani police and other individuals who are taking advantage of the Afghan population that now temporarily resides in that country. We're hearing just of a lot of sort of abuse across the board, both by government officials and by individual civilians, you know, who oftentimes know that these Afghans come with connections to the United States, and so they're sort of ripe for that kind of exploitation.
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E
There was a Time magazine article from late June, I believe, that described the legal status of some Afghans who have come over the southern border of the United States. I was wondering if you could maybe talk about sort of the lengths that people are going to, but also then their legal status after they do something like that and enter the United States.
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C
Yeah, I'd be happy to. So that article, in addition to a number of other ones that highlighted the plight of Afghans who could not make it onto evacuation planes or do not have primary family members in the US who could later petition for them. Folks that were left behind perhaps because they maybe didn't live in Kabul, they were living in provinces where it made it really difficult to reach the airport and get on a plane or perhaps thought they could somehow go under the radar even after the Taliban came, but were targeted. In fact, those individuals have left. Many of them have left. Of course, there are many unknown numbers still that are still in Afghanistan in hiding. But those individuals who have left made it to countries like Pakistan, Iran, Turkey and other neighboring countries. Brazil has actually opened up a humanitarian visa avenue for Afghans to emigrate to Brazil and to seek safety, some degree of safety in that country. Many Afghans have chosen to remain in Brazil and to pursue their lives there. And a number have actually taken the a really treacherous journey up north by land from Brazil through all of the South American countries that one needs to cross through the entire Central American sort of isthmus, as it were, up to through the Darien Pass, through of course the treacherous jungle that one has to cross up to the United States border with Mexico. There individuals affirmatively, a Sikh, U. S Border officials, they're, they're not, you know, individuals who want to cross without making themselves known to the US Government. They're very actively seeking protection and assistance from the US Government in crossing and they assert that they would wish to apply for asylum. A certain percentage of that population have been detained. Some have been released before their immigration court hearings, some of have not. They've had to go through their immigration, immigration court hearings in detention. A large number are actually released and enabled to resettle in communities across, across the country. Those individuals do not benefit from the expedited timeline that Afghans who are evacuated here benefit from. They have to go through the regular immigration court system, as it were, with over. I believe the number is 1.6 million active immigration court cases as of today and have to wait, wait their turn to hear, to have their case heard before an immigration court judge. Oftentimes, of course, those folks who can make that journey is usually healthy young people. Oftentimes, for example, the husband of a family, he chooses to make that journey alone and not bring his wife and small children over again. It adds to the separation time between that priority primary applicant and his family. And the long wait period only sort of adds to that trauma. Not only the trauma that happened in Afghanistan, but the additional trauma of the journey.
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E
So Jennifer, I want to move to you. Shah's just described a real mountain of problems with this entire system. But the Afghan Adjustment act is something that people have been talking about for a couple years now. And I was wondering if you could just sort of lay out for our listeners in a very basic sense, when people hear Afghan Adjustment act act, what does that mean? What are they talking about? How many bills are we talking about, and what are the potential for those bills?
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Yeah, so at the moment, Congress, there, there are two bills for the last congressional session, the 117th Congress, which ran in 2021 and 2022, there was just one bill. There was the Afghan Adjustment Act. This was introduced in August of 2022, and it's in July of 2023, just last month that there was an additional bill that was introduced by Senator Cotton. So the Afghan Adjustment act, you know, a bill that we've been pursuing and trying to get Congress to pass now for just about a year. I mean, of course, we've advocated since. Since the evacuation, but the Afghan Adjustment act itself was introduced last August, has several components of what it's trying to accomplish. So, of course, first and foremost, adjustment. Right. The ability for Afghans who came during the evacuation or Afghans who were here in the United States and couldn't return because of the change of circumstances in the country would be eligible to move from a temporary status to apply for lawful permanent residence, and then within a few years apply for citizenship. Now, we're hopeful that we can sort of get. Get adjustment passed, but there are other provisions in the bill as well. First and foremost is ensuring that we can push the administration a bit more on not taking years to address the SIV backlog or the P1 and P2 backlog. Through that, we're trying to. The bill is trying to create an interagency task force, which is something that has been done in many previous situations, as well as what's called an office in lieu of an embassy. Right. Since we're no longer physically present within Afghanistan. Right. You need to be able to process applications from afar. Right. Virtually. And so that's something we're sort of trying to push the administration to do through congressional action because they haven't demonstrated that they will take these actions without that pressure from Congress. And then the last piece of the bill is to provide pathway to people who currently don't have a pathway to the United States. And so in particular, it sort of falls into those who we consider US Allies who were not US Government employees. So the current Afghan Special Immigrant Visa Program that's been in existence for many years only applies to those who worked for the U.S. government. Right. Whether that be the military or the State Department or USAID. And the Afghan P2 program that the administration created in the summer of 2021 applies to those who are employees of U.S. entities and not those who necessarily were U.S. allies but didn't receive a paycheck from either the U.S. government or a U.S. entity. Right. So that's say the female tactical platoons, the Afghan Air Force judges, prosecutors, and others who were US Allies but didn't receive a US paycheck. And so in the Afghan Adjustment act, there is a new SIV program to give them a pathway to the United States. And so we're sort of trying to accomplish three things with the Afghan Adjustment act, right. Change the way the administration works to make it more efficient for those who we need to bring here to adjustment. Right. For those who are here, you know, the ability to bypass the asylum system and for those who wouldn't have what they need for asylum. Right. This, offer this opportunity for lawful permanent residents. And then thirdly, creating a pathway here for those who currently don't have a pathway to the US who would you could broadly define as US Allies, but not US employees. The new bill that came up this year that Senator Cotton introduced, which is a bill that is about addressing adjustment but in a different way, Senator Cotton's bill is very much about offering adjustment, but only on a longer timeline, to offer them conditional lawful permanent residence for a few years and then lawful permanent residents after. After a few years. And then in addition, it does have the office in Leuven Embassy and the interagency task force. But instead of a new SIV program for U.S. allies, it would create a P2 program. And for those not familiar when I'm using P2 and P1, these are categories within the U.S. refugee Admissions Program. And a P2 category is a population of special humanitarian concern. Right. So you don't actually have to register with unhcr. UNHCR doesn't have to refer you. You can apply directly with the US Government for resettlement through the refugee admissions program. And so that's sort of a key distinction. In addition, Senator Cotton also sort of goes outside the parameters of the Afghan population and wants to limit the President's parole authority, which is a non starter. And it's sort of why there's two bills as opposed to one bill that had changed over time into the new Congress with Senator Cotton, because they wanted to politicize this issue and make it so that, you know, there's wide bipartisan support for the Afghan Adjustment act and they want to use that to try and achieve a partisan political aim of limiting the President's parole authority.
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E
So Jennifer, the Afghan Adjustment act had been up for passage, as you mentioned in the previous Congress. What happened? Why did it fall apart and at what stage in the process did it fall apart? Did it fall apart in committee or afterwards?
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B
So most bills are it's very difficult to get what we call a standalone bill through Congress, right. To get them a vote on the floor floor. In both the House and the Senate, the pathway typically for for a bill is to be attached to must pass legislation. And that normally means the National Defense Authorization act, which we call ndaa, or one of the appropriations bills, which commonly get referred to as the omnibus because the 12 subcommittee appropriation bills get lumped together for passage and then that gets called the omnibus. And so in the last Congress, the push was to see whether or not it could be attached to the omnibus, right. The appropriations package, which funds the government for the fiscal year. Now, that was the major push in the last Congress. But if you're going to do that, you still need the approval of the chair and ranking members of the committee of jurisdiction. And so this bill was referred, of course, to Judiciary because it's primarily dealing with immigration, even though this is very much also a foreign policy and national security bill. And so that meant that in the Senate, Senator Durbin and Senator Grassley and then in the House, Nadler and Jordan, and so Senator Grassley, because a lot of the focus is on the Senate, Senator Grassley objected. And that puts a major obstacle in the ability to pass it. Senator Grassley is notoriously known for being anti immigration. He has tried over many, many years to curtail, limit, do whatever he can to prevent Afghans from coming through the Special Immigrant Visa Program. And so it really wasn't a surprise to us. We tried a tremendous amount of advocacy targeted at Senator Grassley, knowing that he would be an opponent to this. And unfortunately, in the last Congress, we weren't able to overcome Senator Grassley's objection to this being included in the omnibus. And so Senator Grassley, though termed out of his ability to be the ranking member for Judiciary, and so now he is no longer the obstacle because he can't be. Senator Graham, who is actually the lead Republican for the Afghan Adjustment act, is now the ranking member for Senate Judiciary. And so that opens up a new opportunity for us and getting the Afghan Adjustment act passed this year.
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E
And if it were to be passed this year, do you again envision it being attached to a larger bill?
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B
Yes. Yes. And so the push is still to attach it to either the National Defense Authorization act or to an appropriations bill that comes up sometime this fall.
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E
And Shaula, I want to move to you. Jennifer described, you know, sort of the three main things that the Afghan Adjustment act is trying to accomplish. How does that square with some of your wish list of, you know, if you could see something happen in this.
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C
Space, I think it squares away very nicely with the needs of the Afghan population in the US as it relates to their permanent status. Of course, we talked earlier about the need for folks to not fall through the cracks. Of course, an Afghan Adjustment act would serve just those people. There wouldn't be a timeline, as it were, for them to file for a green card. We would have more time as a legal community to reach out to folks in those remote parts of the country and folks who are disconnected. And when we do make contact with them, we would know that they would have a fairly easy way to get permanent status. So that first piece, we would say, is the most critical for those folks who are already here with respect to expanding the Special Immigrant Visa Program. I think it would meet the demand right now of those individuals who are frantically trying to make it to safety and perhaps not necessitate sort of the migration to the US from our southern border for those folks who would qualify under this expanded version of the Special Immigrant Visa Program. And so we're really hopeful as a legal community, obviously, for many reasons, that this bill passes because we would see our legal needs changing and it being a lot easier for everyone involved, from attorneys to advocates to the Afghans themselves, to get that finality that they need for themselves and their families.
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E
Jennifer, I want to ask you a little bit about sort of the advocacy community's relationship with the, the Biden administration since the withdrawal. As a lot of people reported during the withdrawal, a lot of nonprofits and different groups sort of filled in a lot of the gap in sort of helping people get out of the country. And since then there's been some reporting of cooperations between things like the Afghan evac coalition and the Biden administration, State Department. How has that relationship evolved since the withdrawal?
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B
Maybe, maybe the best term would be frenemy, right? Or a love hate relationship. Because what you're looking at is there's a tremendous amount of frustration, right? We're two years out from the Taliban takeover of the government and we're still not seeing the level of relocations. That's the sort of the new terminology as opposed to evacuations out of Afghanistan or out of the third countries that they've made their way to. Right. For safety. And so there's just a, there's still a level of frustration at the, the pace in which they have devoted the time and energy and resources to getting people here to the United States and to safety. But there is a recognition that if it's going to happen, it's going to be this administration who does it. Right. So you have to work with the administration on those relocations and processing people and getting them here. There's no way around that. Right. We can't serve as refugee corps officers or consular officers. Right. The administration is, is going to have to do that work. They're going to do the ones who are negotiating with these third countries about ensuring that we can do processing on their soil. Right. And so there is a recognition by the Afghan evac coalition that that's the case. There's a recognition by the evacuator allies coalition that that's the case. But that doesn't mean that we don't have that level of frustration as to what they haven't done. And that's where the Afghan Adjustment act comes in for us, is that it's like, well, if we make it law, then they'll be forced to do what it is that we need them to do. And so, you know, we understand working with them, but at the same time, like this is what Congress is for, right? This Congress can provide adjustment. They're the only ones who can provide adjustment. But they can also ensure that this administration is doing a better job in a more efficient and quick job at bringing people here to safety.
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E
I want to ask both of you, and maybe Shala, we'll start with you. You know, two years since the withdrawal, have you sensed sort of a public fatigue with Afghanistan related issues, especially within the advocacy community. And you look at, you know, how Ukrainian refugees are, are being treated, has there been sort of the spotlight has really turned away from Afghanistan.
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C
I wouldn't call it fatigue. I would call it more. What you said about the spotlight shifting for now, it seems that people's attentions have been shifted into other parts of the world. The Ukraine war is still raging on. That's what folks see on the local news and the national news every night. And so I think Afghanistan has just kind of fallen to the wayside that the country doesn't make headlines in the way that it used to. Used to. And naturally, I think folks are moving on to the next, the next hot topic. You know, to put it sort of really plainly, I just think people have forgotten about Afghanistan again. And I think that's very sad for a country who's been forgotten about over and over again over the last five decades. The needs of Afghans haven't decreased just because another, another war, another conflict has sprouted somewhere else in the the world. And I think that necessarily then translates into the kind of mobilization that we have with respect to volunteers, with respect to donors, with respect to advocates. Advocates obviously have the best of intentions. They want to, they want to help folks. They want to help the people that, that they feel are deserving of their assistance and their, and their time and their money. And I think when they're not, when folks are not constantly reminded of that continuing need, I think it's very reasonable then to assume perhaps that those populations don't then need our help anymore. And that couldn't be further from the truth with respect to Afghans, not only that are here, but those that are stuck in Afghanistan still and those that are in third countries with very tenuous legal statuses there.
- [39:20]
E
And Jennifer, is there anything you'd like to add?
- [39:23]
B
Yeah, I'd say we actually had a shift in the opposite direction when it comes to congressional advocacy for the Afghan Adjustment act in particular. There, you know, there was the sense of at the beginning we've got to focus on getting them shelter and jobs and get set up in their communities. And the, and with, with Congress, it was like, oh, they've, they're good for two years, right? We don't have to worry about this population. They've got humanitarian parole and administrations love to just, you know, like allow people temporary status to go on and on. But there really has been a recognition in the past year that it's like, no, you know, employers are upset that Congress hasn't passed the Afghan Adjustment act to give their new employees a permanent status. Right? Communities are, you know, it's like they're now their neighbors and their friends and their family members. And it's like, but these people have a temporary status that's going to expire. And so, like, why hasn't Congress acted? Right? Veterans groups are angry. We're like, they've, they've spoken over and over again about the fact that it's just like we owe a debt to this population and why haven't we honored that right? Like, no other community in other countries is going to help us if they see how we treated Afghans. And so we haven't seen a drop in, in advocacy. If anything, we've seen people sort of be like, you know, Congress, you have to do your part. Like, you can no longer sort of say, like, oh, it's fine for them to have a temporary status. And we feel as if there is that recognition by many members of Congress. And so, for instance, when we introduced the Afghan Adjustment act in August of last year versus July of this year, the number of co sponsors on both sides of the aisle doubled in the House. And we're seeing that grow and grow as there is this recognition that this is a population that they have a responsibility to. And so for us, you know, we're thankfully right. Like, everybody who is connected with this community recognizes that there's still work to be done and is sort of demanding that of Congress. And we see an increased recognition in Congress that there is a role that they must play and they can't rely upon the administration solely to deal with this population.
- [41:40]
E
This is another question for both of you. When you look back on your professional experience during the past two years, what sticks out and what are some either heartening or disheartening moments that you've had?
- [41:55]
C
I think with respect to the legal community, it's been incredibly heartening to see the turnout that we have over the last two years. We have some really wonderful members of, of the legal community who have stepped up and taken on very huge families, oftentimes of Afghan asylum seekers. You know, they may get connected to one, one individual and then learn about the need of a, of a brother or a cousin or parents that also need to file for asylum, and they'll take the whole family on without question, see their case through all the way to the end. We've had individual lawyers pay out of their own pocket for things such as baby supplies by the meals. We had an attorney that bought a laptop computer for one of our clients who needed it for work. We just had an incredible amount of turnout with respect to them providing not just legal support, but also the kind of social support that folks need in order to try to make up, I think, for some of the things that were lost from that route, that really difficult transition from Afghanistan here. So for me, during the course of my work over the past two years, it's been just really so uplifting and such a blessing to be able to witness that and work with these attorneys hand in hand to make sure that those asylum applications are filed and seen to finality. Likewise, you know, there hasn't been a single attorney who, once they win their asylum case, who has just walked away from it. Right. They're at that point, they're all in, and they're really committed to making sure that that applicant's spouse and children are brought here, that that applicant walks away from that experience with a green card in their hand. So they'll. They'll see it all the way through. And so what initially starts as a relationship that we tell folks, you know, will take just a perhaps limited number of months, considering the expedited timeline has now lasted for many years and we anticipate for many years longer.
- [43:55]
B
I will say what the most heartening for me in this work is how incredibly diverse and broad our coalition is. You have the veterans organizations, faith groups, legal service providers, human rights organizations, local community groups, Afghan American organizations, business community. Right. You just. Across the political spectrum, every type of organization out there, consider this an American imperative, right. This wasn't about partisan politics. This was about, like, the right thing to do. And that's been so helpful considering how long the journey is. Right. And how this is not. You know, the evacuation was a few weeks, but the mission, the work, the responsibility is years and years, and people recognize that and are committed to what we need to accomplish. Right. For those Afghans who are here, as well as those Afghans who are not here yet, but should be here, I will say with Congress, even though it took us a long road to get the bill and it's taking us a longer road to get it passed, it's always been a bipartisan effort. And that has been incredibly necessary and also, like, a relief to know that we've had that, because you really can't get things through Congress, particularly the Senate, if you don't have that. And so that has been really helpful. Even with the stumbling blocks that we've had, that's never been one of them. And that's been really, really, really good to see. And when we get this accomplished, it'll be because we've had that all along.
- [45:41]
E
So if one of our listeners would like to help out, where can they go? What sort of things can they do?
- [45:49]
B
Well, for us on the advocacy side, the Evacuate Our Allies coalition evacuate our allies.org we have a page with all the materials that you need to help us with reaching out to members of Congress to ensure their support for the Afghan Adjustment Act. We actually have a page under our Take Action section where there's sample social media that you can do. There's an action alert information you need to be able to call or email your member of Congress. And so we appreciate anybody who's willing to sort of help us this this fall as we make this push to make sure it's attached to either the National Defense Authorization act or one of the appropriations bills.
- [46:24]
C
And if I can speak to the legal side, the Human Rights First Project Afghan Legal Assistance is always looking for dedicated attorneys who are willing to take on asylum applications and green card applications for Afghans here in the US So you can learn more about our opportunities at our website, human rightsfirst.org look for the project Afghan Legal Assistance page and reach out to us. We would love to have you join us and our cohort of attorneys to make sure that Afghans here in the US have final statements status, permanent status here, and they're able to bring their families here to safety.
- [47:02]
E
Shalon Jennifer, thank you so much for joining me.
- [47:05]
B
Thanks for having us.
- [47:06]
C
Thank you.
- [47:10]
E
The Lawfare podcast is produced in cooperation with the Brookings Institution. You can get ad free versions of this and other Lawfare podcasts by becoming a Lawfare material supporter throughout website lawfaremedia.org support. You'll also get access to special events and other content available to only our supporters. Podcast is edited by Jen Patia Howell and your audio engineer. This episode was Kara Shillin of Goat Rodeo. Our music is performed by Sophia Yan. As always, thank you for listening.
- [47:57]
F
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