Welcome to Episode 96 of The Afghanistan Project, where we cover all topics related to two decades of war in Afghanistan, and the fallout of our Afghanistan withdrawal.

Today, my guest is Ben, an elder at Oklahoma Khorasan Church, which primarily serves Afghan Christians in the Oklahoma City area. Ben and his family came to the U.S. in 2020 and 2021 respectively, after the Taliban took over Afghanistan. In addition to his role as elder, he serves Afghan Christian families across the country.

We discuss the stigma against Christian Afghans inAfghanistan, and in the U.S., as well as the treacherous journey some Afghan Christians took to Brazil, through the deadly Darien Gap and Central America to make their way to the Mexican border and plead for asylum in the U.S.

Like many Afghans who entered the country using the CBP One App, a number of Christian Afghans are facing the revocation of parole, and fear imminent deportation.

About the host:

Beth Bailey worked in support of Afghanistan operations as acivilian intelligence analyst for the Department of the Army between 2010 and 2013. She is a freelance contributor to Fox News Digital and the Washington Examiner.

Follow Beth:

on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bwbailey85/

on X: https://x.com/BWBailey85

on Substack: https://substack.com/@bwbailey85

on the web: https://bethwbailey.com/

Welcome to Episode 95 of The Afghanistan Project, where we cover all topics related to two decades of war in Afghanistan, and the fallout of our Afghanistan withdrawal. Today, my guest is Chris Robinson, creator of The Last Deployment Project.Chris is a Marine Infantry veteran and Oral Historian. He served from 2016-2020 with the 2nd Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion (2nd LAR), 2nd Marine Division out of Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. Originally from Southeast Louisiana, he is a two-time graduate from Southeastern Louisiana University, getting a BA in English (with a concentration in Creative Writing) in 2016 and a MA in History in 2023. He started The Last Deployment Project while he was at university and conducted his first interview in October 2022. In April 2023, he published his 176-page thesis: The Last Deployment Project - Voices from HKIA. As of now, he has conducted 60 interviews totaling around 250 hours of recordings. In August 2024, he finalized a book deal with Casemate Publishers to have a book published for the fifth anniversary, August 2026.In this episode, we talked about Chris’ military experience, and about how he came to create The Last Deployment Project. We also discuss the important facts he’s gathered about our final days and months in Afghanistan, and the facts he still needs to gather about HKIA (2/1 Marines, Chris needs you!)Find The Last Deployment Project:On Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2NsCAm4XYhb00g6ggstwfZOn Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/the.last.deployment_project/About the host: Beth Bailey worked in support of Afghanistan operations as a civilian intelligence analyst for the Department of the Army between 2010 and 2013. She is a freelance contributor to Fox News Digital and the Washington Examiner. Follow Beth: on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bwbailey85/ on Twitter: https://x.com/BWBailey85 on Substack: https://substack.com/@bwbailey85 on the web: https://bethwbailey.com/

Welcome to Episode 94 of The Afghanistan Project, where we cover all topics related to two decades of war in Afghanistan, and the fallout of our Afghanistan withdrawal.

Today, my guests are Sonia Norton, Director of Advocacy atNo One Left Behind, and Daniel Salazar, a refugee and protection policy advisor at Global Refuge.

We discuss the revocation of Temporary Protected Status forAfghans, the rationales given for that revocation, and how Afghans can protect themselves stateside. We also talk about the possibility that Congress will allocate additional Special Immigrant Visas in the upcoming budget.

About the guests:

Sonia Norton is the Director of Advocacy at No One LeftBehind. Before joining No One Left Behind, she worked in the House of Representatives for five years with members of the House Committees on Armed Services, Judiciary, and Ways and Means. Most recently, she served as the Senior Legislative Assistant for Representative Earl Blumenauer (OR-03), where she led a policy portfolio including Afghan allies, foreign affairs, and judiciary issues. In that role, Sonia was the lead House Democratic staffer for the introduction of the Afghan Adjustment Act and was named one of the Top 10 Policy Staff to Watch. Sonia has also served as a Fulbright-Nehru English Teaching Assistant and was elected for three terms on the Women’s Congressional Staff Association Board.

Follow No One Left Behind:

Online: https://www.nooneleft.org/

On X: https://x.com/n1leftbehind

On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nooneleftbehindus/

On LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/no-one-left-behind

Daniel Salazar is a refugee and protection policy advisor atGlobal Refuge, the national refugee resettlement agency formerly known as Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service. He does policy and advocacy work on the U.S. refugee admissions program, Afghan and Ukrainian resettlement, and other topics. He has worked on Afghan-related legislation such as the Afghan Adjustment Act, the Afghan SIV program, and CARE authorization since July 2022, first at U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants and now at Global Refuge. He is also a coalition member of Evacuate Our Allies and has helped campaigns on Temporary Protected Status for Afghanistan and re-parole for Afghans. Before this work, he was a journalist in Kansas and Texas before moving to Washington, DC for his master’s in foreign service at Georgetown University.

Follow Global Refuge:

Online: https://www.globalrefuge.org/

On X: https://x.com/GlobalRefuge

On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/globalrefuge_/

On LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/globalrefuge/

About the host:

Beth Bailey worked in support of Afghanistan operations as acivilian intelligence analyst for the Department of the Army between 2010 and 2013. She is a freelance contributor to Fox News Digital and the Washington Examiner.

Follow Beth:

on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bwbailey85/

on X: https://x.com/BWBailey85on Substack: https://substack.com/@bwbailey85

on the web: https://bethwbailey.com

Welcome to Episode 93 of The Afghanistan Project, where we cover all topics related to two decades of war in Afghanistan, and the fallout of our Afghanistan withdrawal.

Today, my guest is Kreshma Fakhri of Zan Times. Kreshma hasa master’s degree in political science and a bachelor’s degree in Persian literature from Kabul University. She started her journalism career in 2009 and since then her work has been published in various local and international media. She has worked as investigative reporter on issues such as corruption, human rights abuses, and violence against women and children.

We talked about the threats Kreshma faced in Afghanistan asa reporter, and how she fled to Turkey and later became involved in efforts to create a media platform where Afghan women could report on the issues they faced under Taliban rule. We talk about the important work of recruitment underway and the issues still facing women in Afghanistan today.

Find Zan Times:

On the web: https://zantimes.com/

On X: https://x.com/ZanTimes

About the host:

Beth Bailey worked in support of Afghanistan operations as acivilian intelligence analyst for the Department of the Army between 2010 and 2013. She is a freelance contributor to Fox News Digital and the Washington Examiner.

Follow Beth:

on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bwbailey85/

on Twitter: https://x.com/BWBailey85

on Substack: https://substack.com/@bwbailey85

on the web: https://bethwbailey.com/

Today, #AfghanEvac president and founder Shawn VanDiver provides an update on the compliance order and timeline achieved in IRAP's Pacito v. Trump lawsuit, as well as an update on the figures of Afghan allies who remain in our Special Immigrant Visa and U.S. Refugee Admissions Program pipelines.

Follow Shawn VanDiver on Twitter: https://twitter.com/shawnjvandiver

Follow #AfghanEvac on

Twitter: https://twitter.com/afghanevac

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/afghanevac/

their website: https://afghanevac.org/

About the host:

Beth Bailey worked in support of Afghanistan operations as a civilian intelligence analyst for the Department of the Army between 2010 and 2013. She is a freelance contributor to Fox News Digital and the Washington Examiner.

Follow Beth:

on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bwbailey85/

on Twitter: https://x.com/BWBailey85

on Substack: https://substack.com/@bwbailey85

on the web: https://bethwbailey.com/

Welcome to Episode 92 of The Afghanistan Project, where we cover all topics related to two decades of war in Afghanistan, and the fallout of our Afghanistan withdrawal.

Today, my guest is U.S. Air Force veteran Tanner Yackley.Tanner has over a decade of expertise with the MQ-9 Reaper, including serving in combat capacity as a sensor operator. He is now a PhD candidate, and is focusing on the unique mental health challenges that drone operators and support personnel face as veterans.

Today, we’re discussing his combat experience with the MQ-9 Reaper, and how it differed from typical forward-deployed pilots’ and weapons system operators’ experiences. We discuss the mental health impact of the work pace and rotations and of replaying scenes of combat in order to become more adept at targeting.

We also talk about Tanner’s work into researching the mentalhealth of drone operators, which is not well understood in the health or veteran communities.

About the host:

Beth Bailey worked in support of Afghanistan operations as acivilian intelligence analyst for the Department of the Army between 2010 and 2013. She is a freelance contributor to Fox News Digital and the Washington Examiner.

Follow Beth:

on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bwbailey85/

on Twitter: https://x.com/BWBailey85

on Substack: https://substack.com/@bwbailey85

on the web: https://bethwbailey.com/

Welcome to Episode 91 of The Afghanistan Project, where we cover all topics related to two decades of war in Afghanistan, and the fallout of our Afghanistan withdrawal.

Today, my guests are James Seddon and Jillian Butler, whohave joined me to talk about a series of articles in the American Conservative by Center for Immigration Studies' Board Member Phillip Linderman that attack our Afghan allies’ deservingness for the programs they qualify for, and egregiously cast aspersions on the #AfghanEvac coalition of veterans and volunteers who have supported our allies for three and a half years against a callous bureaucracy.

James Seddon is a father, husband, writer, retired Navyveteran, Afghanistan veteran, speaker, activist for veterans and Afghan allies, recovering IT manager, and regularly unsuccessful fisherman living in Southern California.

Jillian Butler is a journalist, and earned her Master’sDegree in international relations from the University of San Diego.

We discuss Phillip Linderman’s articles, as well as the debate that The Afghanistan Project Podcast hosted between Linderman and #AfghanEvac founder Shawn VanDiver.

About the host:

Beth Bailey worked in support of Afghanistan operations as acivilian intelligence analyst for the Department of the Army between 2010 and 2013. She is a freelance contributor to Fox News Digital and the Washington Examiner.

Follow Beth:

on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bwbailey85/

on Twitter: https://x.com/BWBailey85

on Substack: https://substack.com/@bwbailey85

on the web: https://bethwbailey.com/

Welcome to Episode 90 of The Afghanistan Project, where we cover all topics related to two decades of war in Afghanistan, and the fallout of our Afghanistan withdrawal.

Today, my guest is Lori Butierries. Lori is a full-time caregiver to two children with disabilities. She uses her life experiences and the medical knowledge she gained from serving as a Hospital Corpsman in the United States Navy to help others facing similar hardships.

Lori has written for The Havok Journal, AwareNowMagazine, and The Mighty. Likewise, other news sites like MSN and Yahoo! News have also republished select articles Lori has written.

Lori's writing extends to children's literature. Her debutpicture book, GIFT FROM GOD, was self-published at the beginning of 2021 and placed as a finalist in two categories in the 2021 Next Generation Indie Book Awards.

Lori's long-term goals are to use her writing to educateothers about, advocate for, and dismantle negative stereotypes regarding disability, mental health, and the military/veterans community.

Lori and I discuss how she was voluntold to take part inearly efforts to acknowledge cultural sensitivities in Afghanistan by sending female searchers to look for intelligence, weapons, or ammo hidden on Afghan women while infantry units searched Afghan men and dealt with enemy forces.

We talk about the nature of her workup period, dealing withmenstruation in the field, being embedded within infantry units despite having limited understanding of how to react to combat situations, and how Lori transitioned into advocacy for Afghan women after the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021.

About Lori Butierries:

Follow Lori on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/lori_butierries/

Follow Lori on Twitter here: https://x.com/LButierries

Find Lori’s book, Gift of God, here: https://www.amazon.com/GIFT-GOD-Lori-Butierries/dp/0578838362/

About the host:

Beth Bailey worked in support of Afghanistan operations as acivilian intelligence analyst for the Department of the Army between 2010 and 2013. She is a freelance contributor to Fox News Digital and the Washington Examiner.

Follow Beth:

on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bwbailey85/

on Twitter: https://x.com/BWBailey85

on Substack: https://substack.com/@bwbailey85

on the web: https://bethwbailey.com/

Welcome to The Afghanistan Project, where we cover all topics related to two decades of war in Afghanistan, and the fallout of our Afghanistan withdrawal.

Today, Center for Immigration Studies’ Board Member Phillip Linderman, and #afghanevac coalition president Shawn VanDiver will be discussing a series of articles Phillip has authored in The American Conservative about the vetting of our Afghan allies and the allegations that the AfghanEvac coalition has ties with the open-border lobby.

Phillip discusses his articles and his belief that the Trump administration’s pause on Afghan arrivals is in the U.S. interest. Shawn provides the counter, examining why it is paramount for our national security to fulfill America’s promise to support the allies who qualify for the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program and the Special Immigrant Visa program.

We then go point-by-point through claims in each article (“The Afghan Refugee Program Is an Unfixable Mess – and May Bring the Next Terrorist Attack,” and “The Veterans Group Running Interference for Open-Border NGOs”) that contradict demonstrated fact, including by discussing the thorough interagency vetting our allies receive, the danger to our allies in the Taliban’s Afghanistan, the need to fulfill America’s promise to its allies, and the lack of political bias within the #AfghanEvac coalition.

About the guests:

Phillip Linderman is a retired State Department senior Foreign Service officer. Over a three-decade career, he served abroad in U.S. embassies and consulates in Belgium, Mexico, Ecuador, Germany, Cuba, Chile, and Trinidad. He also represented U.S. interests at the Organization of American States and the European Union. Linderman’s diplomatic duties often focused on U.S. border security, international travel, and migration policies, giving him wide experience in working with foreign governments, as well as U.S. law enforcement and intelligence partners, on matters such as visa and passport fraud, human trafficking, terrorist travel, watchlisting, and identity information collection and use.

Shawn VanDiver is the founder of #AfghanEvac. A vocal proponent of civic engagement at all levels, Shawn serves as Vice Chair of the San Diego Convention Center and is the founder of the San Diego Chapter of the Truman National Security Project. Additionally, he serves on the Board of Directors for Vets Community Connections and the Veterans Community Oversight and Engagement Board.

Shawn attended National University, the Naval Postgraduate School, and University of San Francisco and holds degrees and certifications related to homeland security, cybersecurity, emergency management, and public leadership. Shawn is a Navy veteran, proud father and avid sailor.

About the host:

Beth Bailey worked in support of Afghanistan operations as a civilian intelligence analyst for the Department of the Army between 2010 and 2013. She is a freelance contributor to Fox News Digital and the Washington Examiner.

Follow Beth:

on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bwbailey85/

on Twitter: https://x.com/BWBailey85

on Substack: https://substack.com/@bwbailey85

on the web: https://bethwbailey.com/

Welcome to Ep. 89 of The Afghanistan Project, where we cover all topics related to two decades of war in Afghanistan, and the fallout of our Afghanistan withdrawal.

Today, my guests are Sonia Norton, Director of Advocacy atNo One Left Behind, and Daniel Salazar, a refugee and protection policy advisor at Global Refuge.

We discuss Temporary Protected Status, and why it was usedfor our Afghan allies in the aftermath of Operation Allies Refuge. We talk about the continuation of a dangerous situation inside Afghanistan for our allies to return to, and what still remains unknown about developments.

About the guests:

Sonia Norton is the Director of Advocacy at No One LeftBehind. Before joining No One Left Behind, she worked in the House of Representatives for five years with members of the House Committees on Armed Services, Judiciary, and Ways and Means. Most recently, she served as the Senior Legislative Assistant for Representative Earl Blumenauer (OR-03), where she led a policy portfolio including Afghan allies, foreign affairs, and judiciary issues. In that role, Sonia was the lead House Democratic staffer for the introduction of the Afghan Adjustment Act and was named one of the Top 10 Policy Staff to Watch. Sonia has also served as a Fulbright-Nehru English Teaching Assistant and was elected for three terms on the Women’s Congressional Staff Association Board.

Daniel Salazar is a refugee and protection policy advisor atGlobal Refuge, the national refugee resettlement agency formerly known as Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service. He does policy and advocacy work on the U.S. refugee admissions program, Afghan and Ukrainian resettlement, and other topics. He has worked on Afghan-related legislation such as the Afghan Adjustment Act, the Afghan SIV program, and CARE authorization since July 2022, first at U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants and now at Global Refuge. He is also a coalition member of Evacuate Our Allies and has helped campaigns on Temporary Protected Status for Afghanistan and re-parole for Afghans. Before this work, he was a journalist in Kansas and Texas before moving to Washington, DC for his master’s in foreign service at Georgetown University.

About the host:

Beth Bailey worked in support of Afghanistan operations as acivilian intelligence analyst for the Department of the Army between 2010 and 2013. She is a freelance contributor to Fox News Digital and the Washington Examiner.

Follow Beth:

on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bwbailey85/

on Twitter: https://x.com/BWBailey85

on Substack: https://substack.com/@bwbailey85

on the web: https://bethwbailey.com