President Trump’s administration is planning to deport Afghans detained in the U.S. back to their home country via Pakistan, according to court documents obtained by the Associated Press — a move advocacy groups say could put their lives at risk.
Immigrant rights organizations say those deported could face retaliation from the Taliban. Thousands fled persecution and feared for their lives after helping the U.S. military and aid groups in Afghanistan.
“This is absolutely unconscionable,” said Shawn VanDiver, a U.S. Navy veteran and president of the advocacy group #AfghanEvac. “It seems like there’s no end to their willingness to break the law and violate people’s human rights.”
The U.S. intends to initially deport Afghan immigrants as early as Monday on flights from Louisiana, where the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency has immigrant detention and processing facilities, to Pakistan, according to court documents.
The plan to deport Afghans to Pakistan was first reported by Bloomberg on Monday. On Friday, the New York Times reported that the immigrants were going to be sent to Afghanistan after arriving in Pakistan.
A spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said in an email to the AP on Saturday that ICE does not comment on future immigrant removal operations, citing operational security and personnel safety. Officials at the Pakistani Embassy in Washington did not immediately return email messages.
Afghans caught up in Trump’s immigration crackdown
U.S. officials confirmed the Afghan deportations in sealed court documents obtained by the AP.
In a document filed in federal court in Virginia on Friday, a senior ICE official acknowledged that an Afghan immigrant had been scheduled to be on an upcoming charter flight from Alexandria, La., to Pakistan, “with further transport onward to Afghanistan.” The document was filed in the case of an immigrant who is not in custody and is challenging efforts to deport him.
In another federal court case in Oklahoma, federal prosecutors filed a document on Monday disclosing that another Afghan immigrant was scheduled to be deported to Afghanistan sometime next week.
The Trump administration has deported thousands of immigrants to countries other than their own. It has done this in some instances when it is unable to send them to their home countries because the U.S. does not have formal relations, as with the Taliban government in Afghanistan. In other instances, it has been used as a deterrent.
In many cases, a U.S. immigration judge has determined their lives would be in jeopardy if sent to their home countries. It was not immediately clear if any designated for return to Afghanistan have protective orders against being sent there.
Immigrant groups decry deportation plan
Human Rights First, an advocacy group for refugees and asylum seekers that tracks U.S. deportation flights, said Saturday that it had confirmed a scheduled flight from Louisiana to Pakistan on Tuesday carrying Afghan immigrants.
“It is beyond egregious that this administration plans to carry out an unprecedented mass deportation flight of Afghans, forcibly sending them through Pakistan and into the hands of the Taliban,” Savitri Arvey, director of policy, refugee and immigrant rights for Human Rights First, said in an email to the AP.
“This follows previous unconscionable deportation flights we have tracked under this administration, including Iranian Christian converts and political dissidents removed via Qatar and Kuwait to Iran, as well as a Russian political dissident removed via Egypt to Russia,” Arvey said.
Some Democratic members of Congress went on social media to criticize the Afghan deportations after seeing the New York Times story on Friday.
“It is reprehensible that the Trump Administration plans to deport hundreds of Afghans, including women, children and those who supported U.S. forces, to Pakistan — who then risk being sent back into the hands of the Taliban. Congress must stand against this,” Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire posted on X.
Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut added in his own X post, “We made a promise to our Afghan allies — that after aiding & protecting our troops during the conflict in Afghanistan, America would not abandon them. This Administration is betraying that promise, deporting them to potential torture & death.”
Thousands fled war and persecution
In September, Trump’s administration finalized a last-minute reprieve to avoid the closure of a camp in Qatar that houses more than 1,000 Afghans who assisted the U.S. war effort or are the relatives of U.S. service members. The administration extended for nine months the life of Camp As Sayliyah, which had been due to close Sept. 30 at the end of the U.S. budget year.
Upon entering his second term, Trump paused former President Biden’s Afghan resettlement program as part of a series of executive orders cracking down on immigration, including dramatically altering refugee admissions to favor white South Africans.
The refugee changes left thousands of people who fled war and persecution — and had gone through years-long vetting processes to start new lives in America — stranded at places worldwide, including the base in Qatar.
Collins writes for the Associated Press.
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