A 32-year-old man, Ali, is currently sitting in an ICE detention facility in western Louisiana, contemplating whether he is about to die.
As soon as today, the United States could be shipping as many as 80 Afghans back to Afghanistan. But Ali’s wife, Hamida, said if he returns, he will be killed by the Taliban. He previously assisted the U.S. military forces in Kabul as a police officer, and the Taliban, who has ruled the country ever since the U.S. withdrawal in 2021, has a long documented history of persecuting Afghans perceived to have assisted the United States, including by subjecting them to beatings, starvation, and other forms of torture inside secret prisons.
“We are human,” Hamida told me. “We helped the U.S. government for a while, all of us, directly or indirectly.” She pleads that the U.S. government “believe and trust” that people like her and her husband have only “come here for a better life.” (I am using pseudonyms to identify Ali and his wife, who spoke to me under the condition of anonymity.)
On Monday, a group of 66 Democrats from both the House and the Senate signed a letter pleading with Secretary of State Marco Rubio to “cancel” any planned deportation flights to Afghanistan. “Our nation made a promise to stand by Afghans who risked their lives and their families’ safety to stand by U.S. service members,” the letter reads. “This mass deportation—potentially to their deaths—is a violation of that promise and our moral obligations to the Afghan community who stood alongside our troops.”
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