Despite President Joe Biden initially downplaying the possibility of a Taliban takeover, his administration’s disastrous pullout of Afghanistan led to massive importation of improperly vetted evacuees — many of whom were on terror watchlists, a federal watchdog found.
During the Biden administration’s military rollout of Afghanistan, 55 Afghan evacuees on the terrorist watchlist made it to a U.S. port of entry or were included on the watchlist during their evacuation and resettlement into the country, according to a report released Tuesday by the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Office of Inspector General. The FBI acknowledged in the report that “normal” vetting procedures were dropped in the wake of botched military pullout.
“As with any population entering the United States, it is the responsibility of the U.S. government to ensure those seeking entry do not pose a national security or public safety risk,” the watchdog report states.
“However, according to the FBI, during [Operation Allies Refuge] and [Operation Allies Welcome], the normal processes required to determine whether individuals posed a threat to national security and public safety were overtaken by the need to immediately evacuate and protect the lives of Afghans, increasing the potential that bad actors could try to exploit the expedited evacuation,” the report continued.
Then-FBI Director Christopher Wray refused to provide Congress with information about the vetting and screening procedures of both the Afghans who entered the U.S via Operation Allies Refuge and Operation Allies Welcome, according to a June 2024 letter by Iowa GOP Sen. Chuck Grassley.
The FBI declined to comment when reached by the Daily Caller News Foundation.
The DOJ inspector general investigation evaluated the effectiveness of the FBI’s coordination with federal partners to support Operation Allies Refuge and Operation Allies Welcome, and to assess the agency’s handling of evacuees on the watchlist. The report concluded the rushed rollout of Afghanistan — which resulted in the death of 13 U.S. service members — led to substandard vetting procedures for Afghan evacuees.
The report fell short of attributing blame to the FBI for the lapse in vetting, and offered no recommendations for the bureau to implement.
Biden initiated the complete military withdrawal from Afghanistan in the summer of 2021. While standing by the decision, he acknowledged in August 2021 that even he was taken by surprise by how quickly the Afghan government fell to Taliban forces, leading to a chaotic evacuation of thousands of Afghan nationals.
Around July 2021, Biden had deemed a Taliban takeover of the country to be highly unlikely. However, the Islamic group’s takeover was immediate, and in a media interview in the wake of the chaotic U.S. military rollout, the president said his administration didn’t anticipate that the 300,000 Afghan soldiers, trained and equipped by the American government, would collapse so rapidly.
The Biden administration launched Operation Allies Refuge, an initiative to help relocate Afghans eligible for U.S. special immigrant visas, and Operation Allies Welcome, a coordinated effort to facilitate the relocation of “vulnerable” Afghans into the U.S, according to the inspector general. Roughly 90,000 Afghan evacuees entered the U.S. from the beginning of the evacuation to March 2022 and were allowed to remain either through parole or through another immigration status.
Of the 55 Afghan evacuees with hits on the FBI’s terrorist screening database, 32 were on a flight bound for the U.S. or at a port of entry at the time of their encounter with U.S. officials, and another 23 were already in the U.S. at the time of their encounter, according to the inspector general.
Republican critics who’ve long warned about the risks of Biden’s botched military rollout highlighted the DOJ report.
“I’ve sounded the alarm about the need to thoroughly vet Afghan evacuee applicants since August 2021,” Grassley said in a public statement. “The Biden-Harris administration, my Democrat colleagues in Congress and many in the media were quick to dismiss glaring red flags that a nonpartisan national security analysis now confirms.”
“As if it wasn’t already obvious, the Biden-Harris administration endangered American lives by allowing suspected terrorists to enter the United States and roam free for years,” Grassley added. “My oversight of this matter will continue.”
Among the Afghan nationals evacuated into the U.S. in 2021 was Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi, whom the FBI in October 2024 arrested under the suspicion that he was planning an Election Day attack at the direction of ISIS. Revelation of this arrest led Grassley and other congressional Republicans to demand how vetting procedures allowed him to be released into the U.S.
As of July 2024, 46 of the Afghan evacuees suspected of terrorist affiliation were removed from the watchlist for a “variety of reasons” while nine of the other evacuees remained on the watchlist, according to the watchdog report.
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