The public is far more supportive of resettling Afghan allies of the United States as opposed to resettling refugees without a history of assisting the U.S. in conflicts, according to a recent national poll.
Seventy-two percent said that they were in favor of resettling Afghan allies of the U.S. or Afghan government during the war. Only 42% of respondents supported resettling Afghan refugees regardless of their past relationship with the U.S., according to the Associated Press-NORC survey conducted between Sept. 23 and 27.
According to the poll, 76% of Democrats, 74% of Republicans, and 59% of independents were in favor of specifically accepting Afghan allies of the U.S., compared to only 57% of Democrats, 27% of Republicans, and 37% of independents who supported blanket acceptance of refugees regardless of service to the nation.
STATE DEPARTMENT DISCOURAGES AFGHAN REFUGEES FROM RESETTLING IN CALIFORNIA
Only about 3% of Afghan citizens who were evacuated held special immigrant visas, a status available to those who have worked with the U.S. military as an interpreter or translator in Iraq or Afghanistan. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in a press conference on Sept. 21 that only about 1,800 out of the approximately 60,000 Afghan citizens who had been evacuated actually held the visas.
The majority of Afghans who had worked with the military and applied for the visa were unsuccessfully evacuated from Afghanistan, a senior State Department official admitted at the end of August, according to NBC.
“I don’t have an estimate for you on the numbers of SIVs and family members who are still there,” said the senior official, who was in Kabul for the evacuation. “But I would say it’s the majority of them, just based on anecdotal information about the populations we were able to support.”
Initially, the Biden administration celebrated the evacuation of more than 120,000 individuals from Afghanistan, while ignoring the amount of U.S. citizens and Afghan allies who had special immigrant visas who were left behind in Afghanistan.
During efforts to evacuate U.S. citizens and Afghans trying to flee the country, 13 U.S. service members and dozens of civilians were killed by two explosions at the airport in Kabul.
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Recently, at least 700 Afghan refugees who had been housed at U.S. military bases left without receiving their resettlement notices. A spokesperson from the Department of Homeland Security stated that “generally,” the Afghan refugees leaving the bases had ties to the U.S., such as having family or friends or a way to support themselves financially.
