Commentary: Will Congress really send 80,000 Afghans back to the Taliban? |

Before the United States made its chaotic exit from Afghanistan in August 2021, Congress had promised special immigrant visas to Afghans who worked with our military or civilians. Once our allies were without the protection of American forces, they would surely face Taliban revenge.

As U.S. troops left, about 80,000 Afghans did make it out of the country, most with the help of their U.S. military colleagues (although tens of thousands who were qualified were left behind). But there was no time for eligible escapees to complete the complex SIV visa process, so they were granted a two-year, temporary “humanitarian parole” status.

Now, unbelievably, Congress seems ready to kick out those who made it here when their status expires in 2023.

The Afghan Adjustment Act, a bipartisan bill that would give those refugees a path to permanent residency, is almost dead because political leaders from both parties have chosen to ignore it. If it doesn’t pass this year, there is virtually zero chance a Republican-led Congress will put it forward next year.

Do congressional leaders, Democrats and Republicans, really plan to stand by while tens of thousands of Afghan allies are loaded on planes and sent back to the Taliban? It seems so.

“People just want to forget about Afghanistan,” said Rye Barcott, a Marine veteran and cofounder of With Honor, a bipartisan organization dedicated to enlisting veterans in public service.

“Neither party wants to make it a top issue,” Barcott told me. “The Afghans have no one pushing for them except vets.”

I spoke with Barcott at a small dinner to honor Reps. Seth Moulton (D., Mass.) and Peter Meijer (R., Mich.) for their relentless efforts to help Afghans. Both are members of the House of Representatives’ For Country Caucus, comprised of veterans, a group that pressed the Biden administration to evacuate all of our Afghan allies before we withdrew.

That didn’t happen.

When tens of thousands of terrified Afghans rushed to the Kabul airport in 2021, there was no way to activate the cumbersome SIV process, which can take years. Thousands of Afghans were flown out on U.S. military planes and charters organized by U.S. veterans. Many of the evacuees had worked with Americans, many had not. Giving them temporary status was the easiest answer but left their future in limbo.

Meantime, tens of thousands of interpreters, democracy advocates, and women’s rights activists, who are entitled to those SIVs, are still in hiding in Afghanistan or neighboring countries, desperately waiting for their cases to be decided.

The Afghan Adjustment Act would move the process forward for both groups (although more must be done for those allies left behind).

Republicans such as Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley — a key opponent of the Afghan Adjustment Act — claim they oppose the measure for security reasons. But the Afghans here have already been vetted, and the act would require additional security checks. In other words, the act is a solution to the security problem, not the reverse.

Yet Grassley’s staunch opposition as a senior…