Monday, August 23
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NOORANI'S NOTES

 

 

President Biden is considering extending the deadline for the withdrawal
of U.S. troops in Afghanistan past Aug.
31 amid the Taliban takeover, reports a team at The Washington Post
.
So far, the U.S. and its partners have evacuated an estimated 28,000
people from Afghanistan, Biden said in a news conference Sunday. He
added that U.S. forces have expanded the perimeter around and
"increased access" to Kabul's Hamid Karzai International Airport. 

These are important steps, and a report this morning
 of an
increase in evacuations represents progress.  

Moreover, "Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has ordered the Civil Reserve
Air Fleet to activate, requesting 18 aircraft from the U.S. airlines to
help in the evacuation of Afghans and Americans," report Marcus
Weisgerber and Tara Copp of Defense One
. While
military aircraft will continue to airlift passengers out of Kabul to
staging bases, from there commercial airlines will
help relocate Afghan allies to the U.S. or other
temporary housing sites. Meanwhile, Turkey has ramped up border
measures to block an anticipated Afghan migrant increase,
reports Ali Kucukgocmen of Reuters
. 

Speaking of blocks, a former aide to Vice President Mike Pence says
that President Donald Trump and Stephen Miller purposely obstructed
Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) processing for Afghan allies, Helen Elfer
of the Independent
 reports. "Trump
had FOUR years - while putting this plan in place - to evacuate
these Afghan allies who were the lifelines for many of us who spent
time in Afghanistan," Olivia Troye wrote on Twitter
. "The
process slowed to a trickle for reviews/other 'priorities' then
came to a halt."  

For more context on the Afghanistan situation, here are just a
few recommended reads: 

* "I'm very afraid for their
safety," says 'Freshta,' a U.S. resident, college
student, and Afghan asylee. "My family helped out the U.S. military,
and then they packed up and left them behind." (Camilo
Montoya-Galvez, CBS News
) 

* "We know how the Taliban will treat them. And the blood of those who
came alongside us will be on our hands if we fail to
act." (Evangelical Christian leader Daniel Darling, writing in USA
Today ) 

* TIME magazine  on
what Afghan women have to lose in this precarious situation. 

* World Relief Sacramento's resource page
 offers
a picture of how to help locally. Bigger-picture, The New York Times
 and The Washington
Post
 list
organizations that are helping - and need our help.

Welcome to Monday's edition of Noorani's Notes. I'm Dan
Gordon, the Forum's strategic communications VP, filling in for Ali
today. If you have a story to share from your own community, please
send it to me at [email protected]
.

[link removed]

COURT RULINGS - The Biden administration's immigration plans
continue to face court challenges. On Friday, Supreme Court Justice
Samuel Alito temporarily halted a federal judge's order to reinstate
the Trump administration's "Remain in Mexico" policy, giving the full
court until Tuesday night to consider the case, per Amy
B. Wang and Maria Sacchetti of The Washington Post
. Separately
on Thursday, U.S. District Judge Drew Tipton of Texas blocked the Biden
administration from limiting immigration arrests in the U.S.,
Sacchetti reports in the Post
. The
nationwide preliminary injunction applies to memos under which U.S.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement was to prioritize "national
security threats and felons or gang members who pose a risk to public
safety." "Today's decision upends meaningful efforts to move away
from a dragnet approach to immigration enforcement. If permitted to
stand, it will undermine one of the most basic principles of law
enforcement-the government's ability to determine who will and who
will not be subjected to enforcement activities," said Jorge Loweree,
policy director at the American Immigration Council, per Sandra Sanchez
of Border Report
. 

BORDER BAPTISTS - Southern Baptist Convention President Ed Litton
joined Californian and Mexican Baptists at the U.S.-Mexico
border last week to provide food and supplies to asylum-seekers
crossing the border, reports Timothy Cockes of the Baptist Press
. "In
this immigrant crisis, Southern Baptist churches are stepping up, and
the churches in San Diego are helping by putting the Gospel first and
foremost, and actually ministering to a reality in their very own
community," Litton said. "They are doing what the Gospel does; it
touches people in their brokenness and it transforms
lives ... "[these churches] are doing things here under less
favorable circumstances that we need to see. And we need to become a
part of it." 

[link removed]

MILITARY SERVICE - The Pentagon is still operating under a
Trump-era policy that blocks foreign-born service members from an
expedited path to citizenship, Ellen Mitchell reports for The Hill
. A
motion filed by the ACLU last week "claims the Defense Department is
defying an August 2020 court ruling
 that
said the policy - which requires new recruits to serve for six months
to a year before they could apply for naturalization - is unlawful,"
writes Mitchell. The court filing also alleges that the Pentagon is
taking longer than the 30-day period required to process military
service members' requests for certification. "Our clients are deeply
dismayed that the Pentagon continues to block military service
members' path to citizenship in direct defiance of the court's order
and in violation of federal law," said ACLU staff attorney Scarlet
Kim via statement
. 

FARM TO TABLE - Despite their job's risky conditions and low
wages, immigrant farmworkers feed America. As a team at Cronkite
News of Arizona PBS
 writes, "[f]rom the
Appalachian Trail in Georgia to the Central Valley in California,
immigrant farm work accounts for nearly 75%
 of the
country's agricultural production." From Los Angeles, California to
Boston and New York, immigrant farmworkers - an essential
workforce - felt the brunt of the impact of COVID-19: limited or no
overtime, a dwindling mask supply, and a downsized workforce. "I
hope the president sees the ... importance of giving immigration reform
now for all farmworkers," said Margarita Ortega, who spent eight years
as a grape picker in Delano, California. "Because, actually, they are
very valuable to the field." 

Thanks for reading,

Dan

 

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