How the National Guard shooting accelerated Trump’s immigration crackdown

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0:30No bouncing between tabs. And best of all, no spreadsheets. Stop managing software and start managing your business with one unified system. Try for free today at odoo.com. That's O-D-O-O dot com. With the new Schwab Teen Investor Account, teens can gain hands-on investing experience and build positive money habits. It's an account co-owned by you and your teen, so you can monitor and engage with the account while your teen learns how to invest and manage money. Learn more at schwab.com. Just before Thanksgiving, two U.S. National Guard members were shot in Washington, D.C. After the attack, President Donald Trump promised to, quote, permanently pause migration from all third world countries.

1:15Asma:Since then, there's been an immigration crackdown that has turned up the White House's anti-immigration policies to a new level. Afghan refugees in the United States are at the center of all of this because the suspect in the Washington shooting is an Afghan. And some Afghan refugees are in a particularly precarious position. Those who arrived in the U.S. after working for the U.S. military during the 20-year war in their home country. Many were promised safety in America when U.S. troops withdrew, and that promise is now in doubt. I'm Asma Khalid in Washington, D.C. And I'm Tristan Redman in London.

1:56Today on The Global Story, how huge changes to U.S. immigration policy happened so fast, and why Afghans who helped the United States might now be at risk.

2:14Asma:Coming up later in the show, we're going to hear from our colleague Mahfouz Zoubaidi. He's a journalist with the BBC in London, originally from Afghanistan. He's bringing us his own reporting on the stories of some Afghans in America who are caught up in these sudden sweeping immigration changes. But before we get to Mahfouz's reporting, Tristan and I wanted to sit down and talk through everything that has happened here in Washington around immigration policy since that National Guard shooting. Okay, Asma, it feels like a lot of things have happened in a very short space of time. Can you run us through them, please?

2:49Yeah.

2:50Asma:I mean, Tristan, I would say a monumental number of changes happened to the U.S. immigration system, I will say, in a very, very quick order. Since this Afghan national by the name of Rahmanullah Lock and Wall was accused of shooting two members of the National Guard here in Washington, D.C., just blocks from the White House. One of those National Guard members has died as a result of that attack. And what we've seen from the Trump administration is an effort to draw a direct line between that attack here in Washington and the prior administration, the Biden administration's vetting or what they would say lack of vetting of Afghan migrants.

3:30The suspect in custody is a foreigner who entered our country from Afghanistan, a hellhole on earth. He was flown in by the Biden administration in September 2021.

3:42Asma:They argue that over the last couple of years, there's been this free flow of dangerous migrants coming into the country. The last administration let in 20 million unknown and unvetted foreigners from all over the world, from places that you don't want to even know about. Donald Trump campaigned on being tough on immigration. That is something that his supporters very much endorsed. He said he was going to crack down on the southern border, that he was going to carry out the largest deportation force in modern history. He was elected on a wave of anti-immigrant sentiment. I will also say, though, that to Donald Trump's critics, these changes we've seen over the last several days are being viewed as collective punishment for the crime of one individual.

4:27Asma:And some of Trump's critics see this as an opportunistic move to enact the president's broad immigration agenda in ways that they feel does not actually reflect the reality of this one individual crime. Just for context, do we know how many people of Afghan origin there are in the United States? The total number, Tristan, I would have to look that up. But what I can say is that in 2021, after that chaotic withdrawal that we saw of the United States from Afghanistan, there was this program that the Department of Homeland Security under the Biden administration created. It was called Operation Allies Welcome.

5:04Asma:There was that program, then a subsequent initiative that brought in many, many Afghans to the United States. The numbers I've seen through a State Department report said that more than 190 ,000 Afghans have moved to the U.S. since 2021. OK, I mean, that's a huge amount. It is a large number. And the Biden folks at the time, certainly allies of this program, say that the Afghans were well vetted. I recall the Department of Homeland Security at the time spoke of a process that involved biometric and biographic screenings. But some Republicans have questioned the speed with which this vetting process was carried out.

5:40Asma:And they point to an inspector general report that found some flaws in the process. Well, since the shooting on November 26th and the revelation that the chief suspect is a person of Afghan origin who used to work with American forces in Afghanistan, what's happened exactly? Oh, gosh, a lot has happened. Why don't we start with what we saw on the 27th, which was Thanksgiving Day. This was the day after the shooting. President Trump posted a Thanksgiving greeting in which he also said that he intends to, quote, permanently pause migration from all third world countries. And he spoke of deporting immigrants that he saw as, quote, noncompatible with Western civilization.

6:29Asma:He also closed his message by saying, Happy Thanksgiving to all except those that hate, steal, murder, and destroy everything that America stands for. I mean, it seems like a very rapid expansion of an issue. There's a shooting one day and very quickly afterwards, the ban is extended to an immigration crackdown on people from lots of different countries, not just from Afghanistan. And one of the things, Tristan, I will say, is that over the last few days, we've had to parse what the president has said on social media, perhaps what some of his supporters have also said, and what we've actually seen change in policy.

7:07Asma:And we have seen a number of policy changes. So what we saw from the president was this pause in migration from third world countries threat. We saw those words. And then what we saw was the director of USCIS, which is the main government agency responsible for lawful immigration. It is under the Department of Homeland Security. And the director of USCIS wrote on social media that the protection of this country, the protection of American people is paramount. And the American people will not bear the cost of the prior administration's reckless resettlement policies. And so the administration said very quickly after that shooting that it is going to begin reviewing all asylum cases approved under the prior Biden administration.

7:54OK, and how quickly do we see these measures actually being applied?

7:58Asma:Well, on Friday, day after Thanksgiving, we get word that the Trump administration has halted asylum decisions for all migrants in the United States. This new change presumably affects people who are already in the process of claiming asylum here in the U.S. And that process can can take a long time. And then the other major move we saw from the Trump administration was the State Department saying that would bar Afghans from entering the country. And I think some listeners might be confused thinking, well, hey, isn't Afghanistan already on this travel ban list that the Trump administration issued back in June?

8:38Asma:You might remember this. There was this list of countries for whom the Trump administration issued a travel ban over the summer. Afghanistan was on that list, but there had been an exception for SIVs, special immigrant visas. These are Afghans who helped the U.S. military. They were given a carve out because, frankly, there's been bipartisan support amongst lawmakers for a long time to say, hey, these people helped the United States over its war effort in Afghanistan and that the U.S. government owes them something in return. OK, well, just so I so I fully understand the suspect in the shooting in D.C., Mr.

9:15Lackenwald, did he enter the United States on this special visa program?

9:19Asma:Tristan, I've been in touch with this NGO called Afghan Evac that has assisted a number of Afghans to resettle here in the United States. And what the founder of that organization, Afghan Evac, says is that Rahmanullah Lackenwald, the suspect, worked with this CIA backed unit in Afghanistan. on. He came to the United States in 2021 through that program I mentioned, through the Operation Allies Welcome Program. He then went on to obtain asylum in April of this year under the Trump administration. And, you know, later on Sunday on Air Force One, the president was also pressed on how long the administration intends to pause asylum.

9:58Asma:The president did not give a time frame. He just said a long time and that the U.S., he said, doesn't want those people in the country. All of this stuff has been happening during the Thanksgiving weekend. What happens when America goes back to work on Monday? Well, on Monday, we see the Secretary of Homeland Security, Kristi Noem, issue this rather scathing statement on social media, calling on President Trump to enact a, quote, full travel ban on every damn country that's been flooding our nation with killers, leeches, and entitlement junkies. She goes on to say, Our forefathers built this nation on blood, sweat and the unyielding love of freedom, not for foreign invaders to slaughter our heroes, suck dry our hard earned tax dollars or snatch the benefits owed to, all caps, Americans.

10:49Asma:We don't want them. Not one. Strong words there from the woman who is the head of the Department of Homeland Security. I mean, that is quite a social media post. What is a response when she posts this? Well, I will say that one response we saw, Tristan, is that President Trump shared that message on his own social media platform. And, you know, I will say, regardless of what people may say, I think retweets are generally considered endorsements. And building on that social media post, the Secretary of Homeland Security then went on Fox News and gave some more details on what this expanded travel ban might include.

11:31I won't be specific on the number, but it's over 30. And the president is continuing to evaluate countries. Listen, if they don't have a stable government there, if they don't have a country that can sustain itself and tell us who those individuals are and help us vet them, why should we allow people from that country to come here to the United States? So are these measures backed by legal mandates? Or at this stage, are they just kind of living in the social media world or in declarations on Air Force One?

11:57Asma:It's not just rhetoric. On Tuesday, we saw the Department of Homeland Security issue a policy memo to take effect immediately with some major changes to legal immigration. One key change we saw is a pause and review of all pending asylum applications. And in this memo, they point to Rahmanullah Lakinwal, the suspect in that National Guard attack in Washington, D.C. But what you hear from the Trump administration Their justification is that this is not one isolated incident. They also point to another Afghan national who they say was planning an attack in the U.S. on Election Day in 2024. They say pled guilty in federal court to conspiring and attempting to provide material support and resources to ISIS.

12:47Asma:And also in this memo that was issued, another major change is a pause on all immigration applications from people from 19 countries that the Trump administration has deemed high risk. Those countries don't just include Afghanistan. Also on the list are countries like Somalia, Iran, Haiti, just to name a few. And it seems that could affect people who have green card applications, who are on a legal pathway to citizenship. I wanted to ask you about Somalia because I saw on Tuesday that Somalia had been kind of cited by Trump as a place of particular interest. Why Somalia all of a sudden? Can you explain that to me?

13:29Asma:It's an excellent question and one that a lot of journalists here have been wondering, because since that National Guard attack, we have seen multiple instances in which the president has cited Somalia. Sometimes he's spoken about Afghanistan and then sort of in the next breath, the next paragraph, talked about Somalia. You know, the moment that really, really caught a lot of people's attention was a cabinet meeting here at the White House last week. Nice to be with you. Welcome to the final cabinet meeting of 2025. a year that will go down as the most consequential and successful first year of any administration.

14:05They're saying that, not me.

14:07Asma:When President Trump was asked a question about the Democratic governor of Minnesota, and he went on a rant about Somali immigrants, he cited specifically a sitting congresswoman by the name of Ilhan Omar, who is a U.S. citizen of Somali heritage. Ilhan Omar is garbage. She's garbage. Her friends are garbage. These aren't people that work. These aren't people that say, let's go. Come on, let's make this place great. You referred to her as garbage, her friends being garbage. We don't want them in our country. Let them go back to where they came from and fix it. Thank you very much, everybody. The words he has used, the derogatory language he has used to refer to Somali immigrants caught a lot of people's attention.

14:56Asma:And look, Somalia is on that travel ban list that the president has issued. But the context for this also is this large-scale criminal investigation in Minnesota.

15:12Asma:According to the reporting of our colleagues here at the BBC, dozens of people have been charged over a scheme that federal prosecutors say involved a charity that was fraudulently billing the Minnesota government for meals during the COVID-19 pandemic. A number of Somali immigrants were implicated in that alleged scheme, which ultimately cost the state tens of millions of dollars, according to a former investigator in Minnesota's attorney general's office. We've also heard news from our reporting partner, CBS News, that ICE is going after Somali immigrants in the Twin Cities, in the Minneapolis-St.

15:48Asma:Paul area of Minnesota. Mm-hmm. And so the criticism of the president's comments is that he is using at times the act of an individual or the act of a few to enact some sort of collective punishment.

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17:17Well, Asma, I mean, it seems like it really did escalate fast. And Asma, while you've been looking into all of this for us in DC, I've been speaking to an Afghan journalist who's been covering this story. And as you know, the BBC has journalists from all over the world. And for this episode, I've spoken to Mahfuz Zabeda, who's our colleague who comes from Kabul and Afghanistan and he's been doing some important reporting on this story. He's based in London and he's been talking to Afghan migrants in the United States who are caught up in all of this. And when I sat down with him, I asked him how it was that he came to be working for the BBC in London when he's originally from Kabul.

18:01Well, I have a long story about how did I join the BBC. I was a shoeshiner. A shoeshiner? shoeshine. Wow, where? In Kabul. So I was on the street where the BBC office was. Wow. When was this? Well, I started working when I was six, seven years old. So my father got paralyzed and my mother was a housewife. So I decided to go out and work for the family. Okay. So at this point you are working on the street where the BBC has its office. And then when the Taliban's government collapsed in 2001, I was still continuing doing shoe shining and going to school. And one night, Elise Doucette was my customer.

18:53Elise Doucette, the BBC's chief international correspondent and friend of the Global Story podcast. Yeah. Yeah, and so I used to polish her. There's one thing special about her that even if she's busy, she kind of observing the areas and people around her. So one night she came out of the car and I was sitting there and I was doing my homework on the street. You know, for the next day I was going to school and it was about 11 o 'clock in the evening or something and she came to me and she said, Mahfouz, it's late night. What are you doing here? She took me inside the BBC because it was November, it was cold a little bit So I polished her shoes and she gave me money which was enough for two, three months of food for my family Wow, how old are you at this point?

19:44I was in high school Okay, so 13, 14, something like that? Yeah

19:53so Lisa arranges for Mafuz to work an admin job in the BBC cardboard bureau you know doing small jobs like buying the newspapers and booking tickets for the team and Mafuz is really good at it and one day he's called in for a conversation with the bureau chief I said what is it said from now on, you're a BBC employee. I have been doing this job for, I don't know, God knows, for two years or three years. I said, no, no, no. Up to now, it was Liz used to pay your salary. What Liz had kept from Mafuz was that he wasn't technically employed by the BBC at all. She was paying his wages and he'd had no idea.

20:35From her own pocket. For how long? It was for two years or more than two years. Wow. Yeah.

20:44And so then you became the BBC office manager in Kabul and then a BBC producer in Kabul. Yeah, I was covering stories in Afghanistan for the BBC. So at this point, Mafuz is a journalist and he covers Afghanistan for more than 15 years until the moment in August 2021 when the government collapses and the Taliban returns to power. and that of course is the moment when lots of afghans leave the country and mafuz was covering all of this and he was living it at the same time i was covering the story for bbc for seven days after the labs and then i moved to pakistan with my four years old daughter and two months old son we had a really tough journey but you know we went to pakistan and I was there for 18 months and then came to London in March 2023.