While appearing before the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Monday afternoon, Secretary of State Antony Blinken failed to answer how many of the 60,000 Afghans brought to the United States do not have SIV status.
The State Secretary testimony happened for the first time since Biden’s failed Afghanistan withdrawal that lost 13 US service members.
Blinken was grilled over the White House’s handling of the evacuation from Taliban-controlled Afghanistan following the complete withdrawal of US troops.
Blinken confirmed the estimated number of green card holders while testifying before the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Monday.
“What is the number of Americans who are in Afghanistan as of the last update you received?” Republican New York Rep. Lee Zeldin asked.
“Congressman, going back to this weekend we had about 100 American citizens in contact with us who seek to leave Afghanistan. Those are the Americans we’re working with,” Blinken responded, adding that he could not offer an exact number.
“How many green card holders?” Zeldin pressed.
Blinken said, “some” have been through the process and added, “Green card holders is something we don’t track directly,” Blinken said. “So what we’ve done is we’ve solicited people, if they are green card holders, to let us know. I think the best estimates are that there are several thousand green card holders in Afghanistan.”
Rep. Scott Perry: “How many Afghans not meeting the qualifications of SIV have been brought to the United States?”
Sec. Blinken: “Approximately 60,000, some of those will have been through the SIV process. All of them will have gone through rigorous security checks.” pic.twitter.com/dSU4rWJjmX
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) September 13, 2021
Many of the Afghans the Biden administration did evacuate to the U.S. have not undergone enough vetting to obtain even an SIV, much less a green card, according to Blinken.
Sources: The Gateway Pundit, The Post Millennial, Daily Caller