OREGON, USA — The future is now uncertain for thousands of refugees who have already been vetted and approved to come to the U.S.
This comes after President Donald Trump signed an executive order suspending the Refugee Resettlement Program this week. Many are Afghans who assisted U.S. troops during the decades-long war in the Middle Eastern country.
“The concern is for personal safety for them and their families. You have a lot of people who are hiding in Afghanistan and other countries that fear for their lives and rightfully so,” says Alex Waller, a U.S. Army veteran, who was deployed to Afghanistan in 2017.
Waller now volunteers with a network of former military and civil servants working to get Afghans safely out of the country and away from the Taliban.
“It’s well documented that the Taliban went on a campaign of retribution against those who previously supported the old government or US forces when they took over,” Waller said.
Waller told KGW that many hoping to immigrate from Afghanistan were given assurances from the Biden administration they would be accepted in the country after going through the vetting process, which can take a year or longer to complete.
“To have those suddenly halted has been difficult to explain to those people who are being supported,” explained Waller.
Republicans who support the President’s order question the extensiveness of the vetting process. Waller said in response that “People that I know who have been doing this a long time — since the withdrawal — so, multiple years, they claim that the vetting process is the gold standard.”
Roughly 1,600 Afghans are currently going through the immigration process to resettle in the United States.