GOP rep. blasts effort to resettle Afghan refugees in his state
“I strongly oppose the resettlement of these Afghan nationals in Montana,” Rosendale said in a Twitter thread, arguing that the Biden administration’s scramble to evacuate thousands of Afghans “has made proper vetting of these individuals near impossible.”
The Biden administration’s “incompetence” in its “disastrously mismanaged withdrawal” from Afghanistan, Rosendale argued, should not be used “to justify flooding our communities with unvetted refugees.” He also advocated that the US “should try and settle these individuals in other countries around Afghanistan that share their values and culture, especially if we can not ensure proper vetting.”
It’s unclear what, if anything, Rosendale can do as a member of Congress to stop the resettlement, which has the public support of the state’s Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte. A message left with Rosendale’s office was not immediately returned.
Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, the president and CEO of Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, a faith-based non-profit that helps resettle refugees, rejected Rosendale’s claims that the refugees are dangerous.
“These children and families are not terrorists — they feared terrorism and fled the Taliban,” O’Mara Vignarajah said in a statement. “These people faced danger precisely because they share our values, and to suggest otherwise is deeply disrespectful to those who risked their lives on our nation’s behalf.”
US national security adviser Jake Sullivan had previously said that background checks for Afghan evacuees arriving in the US include both biographic information and biometric vetting, such as voiceprints, iris scans, palm prints and facial photos.
A lengthy multi-step process also exists for Afghan SIV applicants to apply for visas to the US. To help with the backlog of applicants caused by the Taliban’s rapid takeover of the country, the Biden administration increased State Department personnel to process visas and had the Department of Homeland Security work overtime on security checks.
CNN’s Geneva Sands contributed to this report.
