Nowhere to Go: Bay Area Afghans, Allies Condemn Trump’s End of Protections

Updated 12:30 p.m. Monday

More than four years after the Taliban took control of Kabul, thousands of fragmented Afghan families are still waiting for the U.S. to fulfill promises it made to take them in for helping the American war effort. But now, the Trump administration appears set to kick thousands of recently arrived refugees out of the country.

Ever since the Soviet Union’s 1979 invasion of Afghanistan turned the South Asian country into a war zone, waves of Afghan refugees have landed in California looking to build new lives and reunite with family members.

“Every Afghan has their own journey,” said Fouzia Azizi, who left Afghanistan in 1994. She now directs refugee services at Jewish Family and Community Services East Bay, a local office of one of the nation’s largest resettlement agencies. “But one thing they all have in common is, in one way or another, they have all faced some level of persecution. There is no hope to go back.”

That’s especially true, she added, for children, women, religious and ethnic minorities, LGBTQ+ people and any Afghan who helped the U.S. military in the 20 years after Americans invaded in 2001 in response to the Sept. 11 attacks.

“You’re living in a limbo,” Azizi said. “There is a sense of trauma. There is a sense of anxiety. Mental health is to the next level.”

Since the chaotic withdrawal of American troops in 2021, roughly 198,000 Afghans have come to the U.S., according to internal government documents reviewed by KQED.

More than half of them came with official refugee status or were granted special visas for working for the U.S. mission as lawyers, interpreters and drivers. They have a path to permanent residence and eventual citizenship. But tens of thousands more are in limbo, with only temporary humanitarian protection.

Now, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has terminated one of those protections, known as Temporary Protected Status, for an estimated 11,700 Afghans. While some of them have obtained green cards, as the program ends on July 14, roughly 8,000 Afghans with TPS are now vulnerable to deportation. Some refugees have also sought temporary protection through humanitarian parole and are applying for asylum, but the Trump administration has deported people with pending asylum applications and could also revoke parole.

TPS has historically allowed people already in the U.S. to stay and work legally if their countries are deemed unsafe. This includes countries experiencing armed conflict, natural disasters or other extraordinary conditions. The U.S. State Department still lists Afghanistan as “Level 4: Do Not Travel” because of the risk of terrorism, unlawful detention, civil unrest and kidnapping.

The filing of the notice in the Federal Register rescinding TPS for Afghan refugees asserted conditions in Afghanistan are improving, noting that Chinese tourism there has increased, as the rates of kidnappings have dropped. In that same notice, Noem noted the number of those in need of humanitarian assistance in Afghanistan has dropped to 23.7 million this year, compared to 29 million last year.

As former governor of South Dakota, Noem criticized the Biden administration programs taking in Afghan refugees during and after the fall of Kabul, doubting the adequacy of the vetting process. In recent days, Matthew Tragesser, chief of public affairs at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, echoed that partisan language in a post on social media platform X announcing the end of TPS: “Bad actors are taking advantage of this humanitarian program.”

Many who fled Afghanistan under the auspices of Operation Allies Welcome and Operation Enduring Welcome waited for years in third countries like Pakistan, Turkey and Qatar, often at U.S. military bases, as U.S. immigration authorities adjudicated their claims. Hundreds of thousands of people who have qualified to be in the pipeline for some kind of U.S. visa, including roughly 211,000 still in Afghanistan, now presumably have no hope of reuniting with family members in the U.S.

On Jan. 20, 2025, the Trump administration’s attack on immigration to the U.S. began with a “no work” order for resettlement services like JFCS East Bay. Since then, an unknown number of Afghans in the U.S. received emails telling them to self-deport.

Afghan refugees in the U.S. have been trying to lay low since President Donald Trump’s inauguration. “They’re so afraid. They’re terrified,” said Harris Mojadedi, a child of refugees born and raised in the Bay Area.

“These are people who are really ‘enemy number one’ for the Taliban, and so to send them back, to deport them, would really be a death sentence,” Mojadedi said.

“Our federal representatives, I know, are advocating and supporting us, but the actions this government is taking are just so out of the realm of how, you know, the government typically operates,” Mojadedi said.

Congressman Eric Swalwell represents most of eastern Alameda County and its Afghan community. In a statement, he condemned the decision to end TPS and called upon the administration to reverse course. He also called attention to the administration’s recent choice to extend refugee status to white South Africans.

“I know many of my Republican colleagues feel the same, but it is time for them to grow a spine and stand up to Trump,” he wrote. “Trump is apparently more concerned with protecting white South Africans who have done nothing to protect American troops than he is with our Afghan Allies. It is unconscionable.”

Mojadedi said he understands there’s a limit to what California’s predominantly Democratic representatives can do in a G.O.P.-dominated Washington D.C., but the cause of the Afghans is not politically partisan, any more than it was for Vietnamese refugees following the Vietnam War. Vietnamese refugees were offered permanent status under three congressional acts, but Congress has yet to offer something similar for Afghans.

“We thought that President Trump was going to be a champion for the Afghans,” said Shawn VanDiver, a Navy veteran and president of the San Diego-based non-profit #AfghanEvac.

“If we hearken back, he is the one who negotiated the Doha agreement. He brought the Taliban to Camp David. He brought Afghans to the White House in the first administration and lauded them during Medal of Honor ceremonies. We thought that, for sure, they would be supportive. And then on day one, they shut down the ongoing relocation program,” VanDiver said.

VanDiver said he’s been unable to meet with anybody in the second Trump Administration. It’s possible that other groups that are more politically conservative and not specifically nonpartisan, like #AfghanEvac, might have a better chance of getting an audience with the president. VanDiver said he hopes someone can convince President Trump he has an opportunity to “be a hero” and reverse the policies targeting Afghan immigrants.

“I think veterans and frontline civilians and everybody who’s involved in this are shocked at how it seems like these folks are just being thrown away,” VanDiver said.

If appeals to the president’s ego — or moral decency — don’t work, a lawsuit might force the current administration to at least hit the pause button on the decision to end TPS for Afghans.

After Noem signaled last month that she would terminate the TPS designation for Afghans, a Maryland-based immigrant rights organization filed a federal lawsuit. The suit argues for a stay and alleges the Trump administration’s decision was influenced by racial animus, violating the equal protection guarantees of the Fifth Amendment.

The presiding judge denied CASA’s request to keep the protections in place during the litigation.

This story was originally published on May 15, 2025.