Newsman: The U.S. will start reviewing all the asylum cases that were approved during the Biden administration, the Department of Homeland Security announced Thursday. The move follows the shooting of two National Guard members by an Afghan national.
The Department of Homeland Security announced it had stopped processing immigration requests relating to Afghan nationals “indefinitely pending further review of security and Afghan refugees under microscope.”
The ambush of two National Guard members near the White House on Nov. 26 is igniting a new round of criticism towards a Biden-era program that brought the suspected shooter to the country after the United States’ 20-year war in Afghanistan.
President Donald Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem have confirmed that he arrived in the United States under a Biden-era program that allowed Afghan nationals fleeing the Taliban to enter the country. Lakanwal is accused of shooting the two guard members on Wednesday, not far from the White House, in what federal authorities described as a “targeted” attack.
Rahmanullah Lakanwal, 29, the suspect in the shooting, gained entry into the country through “Operation Allies Welcome,” a special visa program originally set up to evacuate vulnerable Afghans, and their families, who had cooperated with U.S. forces during the war as the Taliban took back control during the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.
There had been previous warnings in Department of Homeland Security reports that outlined how the Biden administration failed to track Afghan evacuees. Many Republican lawmakers had also expressed concern about the lack of transparency and the possible danger to communities.
Now the Trump administration is leveraging those fears to pause all immigration applications from Afghan nationals, arguing the previous administration allowed “unvetted foreigners” into the country. But supporters of the program argue Afghan nationals, who helped the U.S. during the war, have gone through the “most extensive security vetting of any population.” Read more here.
vetting protocols.”
“Effective immediately, processing of all immigration requests relating to Afghan nationals is stopped indefinitely pending further review of security and vetting protocols,” department spokesperson Tricia Mclaughlin said in a statement, according to Reuters.
In the wake of the U.S.’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021, the Biden administration was praised by many for offering to resettle around 200,000 Afghan nationals who supported the U.S. military and diplomatic mission in Afghanistan for a period of more than 20 years. The move also drew criticism. The Office of Inspector General released a report in May 2024 that concluded there were “vulnerabilities” in the way applicants for the program were vetted.
Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, gave a fiery response to a member of the media who asked about criticisms of President Donald Trump’s National Guard deployment.
“I don’t even want to talk about whether they should have been there,” Pirro said at a news conference on Thursday. “We ought to kiss the ground and thank God that the president said it’s time to bring in more law enforcement to make sure that a city that had the fourth-highest homicide rate in the country … that that violence was quelled. I’m not even going to go there.”
Trump deployed the National Guard to Washington in August to deter what he described as “violent, menacing street crime.” He ordered 500 more troops to the city after the Wednesday shooting of two National Guard members. The new order will bring the total deployment of National Guard members in the nation’s capital to roughly 2,700.
Pirro stressed that the investigation into the shooting suspect is fluid and ongoing.
“It’s too soon to say what the motive is, but there are definitely areas that we are looking into, but not ready to say,” Pirro said at a news conference on Thursday morning.
FBI Director Kash Patel said at a news conference that he spoke to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and CIA Director John Ratcliffe as part of what he described as an international terrorism investigation.
“There is confirmation now that the subject had a relationship in Afghanistan with partner forces. We are fully investigating that aspect of his background, as well, to include any known associates that are either overseas or here in the United States of America,” Patel said.
The suspect worked “with CIA-backed military units” during the war in Afghanistan, according to a Wall Street Journal report.
The suspect in the shooting was living in Bellingham with a wife and five children.
The Afghan national accused of shooting two West Virginia National Guard members in Washington worked with several U.S. government agencies in Afghanistan, including the CIA, according to multiple reports.
The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal reported that Rahmanullah Lakanwal worked with a CIA-backed military unit in Kandahar. Lakanwal, 29, came to the United States in September 2021 after the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan.
Lakanwal, the suspect in the shooting of two National Guard members in Washington, applied for asylum in 2024 and was granted that status last April under the Trump administration, multiple news outlets are reporting.
The Department of Homeland Security said in a news release that Lakanwal entered the country through Operation Allies Welcome on Sept. 8, 2021. The program was designed to allow Afghans who assisted the U.S. military and their families, who were potential targets of retribution by the Taliban, to enter the country after the United States pulled out. The CIA has confirmed that Lakanwal worked with American forces.
Early reporting on the day of the shooting stated that Lakanwal had overstayed a visa and was in the country illegally. An official told Reuters on Wednesday that he had entered as part of the asylum program but had overstayed his visa and was living in Washington illegally.
On Thursday, CBS, ABC, The Wall Street Journal, and Fox News reported that the Trump administration granted Lakanwal asylum in April, adding that he applied during the Biden administration.
The U.S. invaded Afghanistan in 2001 as part of its pursuit of Osama bin Laden, the leader of al-Qaeda, the militant group that carried out the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington. Then, like now, the Taliban, a hardline Islamist group, ran Afghanistan.
When the Taliban ultimately refused to hand bin Laden over, the U.S. military, with support from Britain and other allies, began a bombing campaign in October 2001 against the Taliban that evolved into a ground operation and a wider “war on terror.” The Taliban government fell within months, but al-Qaeda and other aligned militants waged a guerrilla-warfare campaign against U.S. forces and the growing number of international troops sent there for years.
By the time the U.S. fully withdrew its forces from Afghanistan in August 2021, during the Biden administration, tens of thousands of Afghan nationals had worked for the U.S. military as translators, guides, assisting in intelligence-gathering, and other logistical roles.
