After Deadly National Guard Attack, Media Fret About Afghan Refugees

At least two media outlets responded to an Afghan national’s attack on two National Guardsmen by fretting over how President Donald Trump’s reaction might hurt refugees.

The suspect in the shooting, 29-year-old Rahmanullah Lakanwal, is an Afghan national admitted to the United States in 2021, in the aftermath of former President Joe Biden’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan. On Wednesday, he opened fire on two National Guardsmen just blocks from the White House, killing one, Sarah Beckstrom and leaving the other, Andrew Wolfe, fighting for his life with critical injuries.

Trump, a vocal critic of the Biden administration’s Afghanistan failures, quickly promised to “fix” the problems created when Biden allowed “hundreds of thousands of people” to come into the United States from Afghanistan, “totally unvetted and unchecked.”

The president also vowed to “permanently pause migration from all Third World Countries” and said that he planned to “deport any Foreign National who is a public charge, security risk, or non-compatible with Western Civilization.”

Rather than cover the story straight or report on the risk that Biden’s refugee policies pose to American citizens, the Associated Press telegraphed concern for Afghan refugees in the United States.

“Trump administration plan to review Biden-era refugees sparks worry and uncertainty,” one AP headline read.

The Trump administration’s plan to review all refugees admitted to the United States under the Biden administration is weighing heavily on people who could be affected by the evaluation, fueling uncertainty and worry among people who believed their status was secured.

Another headline reported that “Refugee groups worry about backlash after shooting of National Guard soldiers in DC.”

Many Afghans living in the U.S. are afraid to leave their houses, fearing they’ll be swept up by immigration officials or attacked with hate speech, said Shawn VanDiver, president of the San Diego-based group #AfghanEvac, a group that helps resettle Afghans who assisted the U.S. during the two-decade war.

“They’re terrified. It’s insane,” VanDiver told The Associated Press Thursday. “People are acting xenophobic because of one deranged man. He doesn’t represent all Afghans. He represents himself.”

Yet another piece suggested that Trump was in the wrong for criticizing the Biden administration for bringing unvetted Afghans into the United States in the first place. “Trump criticizes the program that brought Afghan refugees to the US who fought the Taliban,” it read.

The program, called Operation Allies Welcome, was created after the 2021 decision to leave Afghanistan following 20 years of American intervention and billions of dollars of aid.

Democratic President Joe Biden, who oversaw the withdrawal started by his predecessor — Republican President Donald Trump — said the U.S. owed it to the interpreters and translators, the fighters and drivers and others who opposed the Taliban to give them a safe place outside of Afghanistan.

The New York Times was slightly more overt in its adoption of the “Trump pounces” theme, with one headline asserting “Trump Uses National Guard Shooting to Cast Suspicion on Refugees.”

President Trump claimed there were “a lot of problems with Afghans,” without providing evidence, as his administration announced that it was implementing new immigration guidelines.

But as those outlets and others have chosen to ignore, Army Ranger veteran and Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell warned the Biden administration in real time, telling anyone who would listen that bringing unvetted Afghans into the United States was a recipe for disaster.

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At the time, he told the story of an Afghan interpreter who had been working with his platoon for more than a year before betraying them, putting them on a path where a land mine injured several and killed one of Parnell’s men.

“After that mission was over, during our After Action Report (AAR), we found out that our interpreter — who had been with us every step of the way, someone who we thought was our friend — we learned that he was working with an Iranian IED cell in Pakistan, and coordinated the placement of that mine,” Parnell explained.

But Parnell’s warning fell on deaf ears. Just one day before the deadly shooting cast a pall over a nation preparing to celebrate Thanksgiving, another Afghan national was arrested for making a terroristic threat” and posting it on TikTok.

Fox News national correspondent Brooke Taylor reported that Mohammad Dawood Alokozay made it clear in the video that he was building a bomb and had intended to target the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Like the shooting suspect in custody in D.C., Alokozay was brought into the United States in the aftermath of the Afghanistan withdrawal under Biden’s Operation Allies Welcome. He was granted legal permanent resident status in September 2022.