Representative Malinowski Remarks at Press Conference on Developing Situation in Afghanistan

(Washington, DC) Today, Representative Tom Malinowski joined Representative Jason Crow (CO-06) for a press conference to discuss the developing situation in Afghanistan and call on the Administration to use all available assets to evacuate our partners and allies. Read Rep. Malinowski’s full remarks below or watch a video of them here.

“Thank you, Representative Crow, for your leadership on this over the last several months. Thank you, Representative Waltz, for being consistent on Afghanistan no matter who was in the White House.

We all agree here that we have a moral and strategic obligation to help the Afghans who helped us, and to help the Afghans who bet their lives on the future that America promised them.

The good news is that the Administration has accepted that in principle. They have committed themselves to the broadest possible evacuation of people in several categories.

First and foremost, obviously American citizens and those who worked for various missions in Afghanistan – that has to come first. We all acknowledge that. Second, those eligible for the SIV visas, the Afghans who directly aided our military effort in the country. And third, a broader category of Afghans who are at risk of retribution from the Taliban, everything from women’s rights and human rights leaders and journalists, and people who were students or faculty at the American University in Afghanistan, and many others.

Now that commitment has to be operational. It’s not enough just to make it on paper. And to operationalize it, as others have said, first and foremost we have to secure the airport. And second, we have to enable the Afghans who are on our list for evacuation to come to the airport as soon as possible so that they can stage there for as long as it takes before flights can come to pick them up. And if that requires having tents, if that requires MREs, if that requires having a very large number of people on the airport compound for days or weeks, then so be it.

It will certainly require American troops, more troops than we had before President Biden made this decision. Let the irony of that sink in. That is what is required right now. The reason for this – the reason why we need them at the airport now, is because with every passing hour it is going to become harder for Afghans on our list for evacuation to get to the airport safely.

This morning I heard about a group of Afghan women, including a woman who was on the government’s peace delegation in Doha, viciously beaten by the Taliban near the airport. As others have pointed out, these people are not going to be able to come to the airport with their passports, and their IDs, and their application documents for visas. We are going to have to identify them probably based on their telephone numbers. The good news is the State Department has their telephone numbers. They have a list of people who need to be evacuated. We need to start calling those people the moment the airport is secure and bring them there. And then as others have pointed out, make a clear public commitment that we will hold that airport for as long as it takes.

The question here is whether this is going to be Saigon or Dunkirk. Are we going to leave people behind, as we did in South Vietnam? Or are we going to hold the beach until everybody is taken off that beach? I hope that it’s the latter. And that from that moment, we can begin to rebuild some semblance of American support for the idea that Afghanistan can be a freer and better place and not a haven for people who wish to attack the United States of America.

Thank you.”