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Before I became an immigration specialist, I was an immigrant. Before I advocated for Afghan wartime partners, I worked alongside them.
Between 2011 and 2012 I worked in Kabul, Afghanistan as a Senior Business Development Manager and Lawyer at the Northgate compound — a fortified facility operated by C3PO International, a private defense contractor providing accommodation, logistics, and secure base operations for U.S. and international personnel, NGOs, and major defense contractors operating in Afghanistan. The compound was self-contained by necessity. In a city where movement outside the perimeter walls carried serious risk, the compound operated as its own world — and Afghan partners were indispensable to everything that happened there.
I worked alongside them every day. The drivers who knew every street in Kabul and navigated a city few others could safely move through. The interpreters whose language skills made communication — and therefore everything else — possible. The logistics staff whose knowledge kept complex international operations running. These were not peripheral workers, they were essential. And it was obvious the risk they took just by showing up to work every day.
On July 31, 2016, a suicide bomber detonated a massive truck bomb at the compound’s outer perimeter wall. The blast shook windows across Kabul. Two armed gunmen followed, attempting to storm the breach. Afghan police commandos engaged them in a firefight that lasted through the night. By morning, the attackers were dead — but much of the compound’s physical infrastructure was also in ruins. The company’s own files were among what was lost: the records showing who worked at the compound, in what capacity, and for how long, records Afghan staff would later be asked to produce to prove their service.
A colleague who had been there during the attack reached out afterward. She told me I was lucky I left years before. I may have been lucky, but so many others were not.
That experience showed me how quickly an employer’s records can disappear in a conflict zone. But a missing employer file does not have to mean a missing record. The U.S. government screened, contracted (directly or through private companies), and paid these workers, and its own records often hold the proof.
This is not hypothetical. DoD built Project Rabbit, now the DoD Afghan SIV Support Team, specifically to match SIV applicants against contractor data. Using information the government already holds, instead of asking applicants to rebuild their own paper trail, is a fairer and faster process.
But records are only part of the problem. Even where the proof exists, and even where the government has already accepted it, Afghan allies are being blocked: processing is suspended, approvals are being re-opened, and entry is closed.
The following is a summary of where things stand today, and what Congress can do about it.
How the SIV Program Works
The Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) program, created in 2009, protects Afghans who served the U.S. government’s mission and face threats because of that service (State Department). Applicants must show faithful and valuable service, and an ongoing serious threat because of it. The process has several stages. An applicant first obtains a Chief of Mission (COM) approval, a determination by a senior U.S. diplomatic official that the applicant meets the eligibility requirements. Without it, the case cannot move forward. After COM approval, the applicant undergoes security and background checks, submits an immigrant visa application to the National Visa Center, and, if outside the United States, completes a medical exam and consular interview. Employment records matter at the COM stage, where the government decides whether an applicant’s service qualifies. That decision generally suffices for the rest of the process and should not be re-adjudicated later. For more, see IRAP’s Afghan SIV resources and the 2020 SIV Reform Report.
IRAP has represented Afghan SIV applicants at every stage, including through the class action Afghan & Iraqi Allies v. Blinken (originally v. Pompeo), which challenges delays beyond Congress’s nine-month timeline. In June 2025, a federal court ordered the administration to follow a plan for timely adjudication. All class members have waited more than 4.5 years, and counting, for their applications to be processed, and many others have waited even longer, up to 12 years.
Even before 2025, applicants faced too few authorized visas, long delays, and a process that put much of the burden of proving employment on them. IRAP’s 2020 report details many of these problems, and the State Department’s Inspector General has found that State struggled to verify employment for DoD contractors because of limited coordination with DoD (OIG AUD-MERO-23-01).
The Government Already Has the Records
Applicants are often asked to produce employment records that only the government can verify. Many employers’ files are unavailable, and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee minority report (SFRC Report) notes that reconstructing old employment records is often the biggest hurdle applicants face. But a missing employer file does not always mean a missing record. The government often holds screening, badging, and contracting information about these workers, and DoD’s Project Rabbit, now the DoD Afghan SIV Support Team, has matched applicants against contractor data to support verification (Duckworth release). IRAP has documented limits of that effort, including how little it was resourced.
Instead of making applicants rebuild what the government holds, the government should expand support for agency efforts to verify SIV applications based on the records it has or can obtain. And a lost record does not have to end an application. Applicant-gathered documentation can play a role where other routes exist, such as new letters from employers or contractors.
Where Things Stand
Afghan SIVs were exempt from the administration’s first entry ban (Proclamation 10949, June 2025). Proclamation 10998, signed December 16, 2025, ended that exception, and effective January 1, 2026 the State Department fully suspended Afghan SIV issuance. In May 2025, State notified Congress it would eliminate the Coordinator for Afghan Relocation Efforts (CARE) office, which coordinated SIV cases, flights, and family reunification, by July 1 (AP, Military Times).
According to the State Department’s January 2026 SIV report, approximately 5,970 Congressionally allocated visa numbers remain for principal applicants, against a pipeline of more than 155,000 principal applicants, each with eligible family members. About 23,000 hold COM approval. The SFRC Report found that only three Afghan SIVs were issued between January and March 2026.
Many of these applicants have already been approved, and the U.S. government has already determined they are eligible. In recent years, the State Department, Department of Homeland Security, and Department of Defense Offices of Inspector General have each found that the SIV vetting process was functioning effectively. Therefore, the processing pause has nothing to do with security concerns. It is the result of an unlawful political agenda to close off legal pathways for Afghans regardless of their individual eligibility or service record.
The government is also walking back approvals it already granted. NPR reports that hundreds of SIV holders with green cards have received notices withdrawing the basis for their visas. Such notices began near the end of the previous administration and have since become more frequent, and advocates say the letters give little explanation. Because an SIV green card rests on the underlying COM approval, a withdrawal can put the holder’s status at risk and lead to removal proceedings. Recipients have a 120-day window to appeal.
Policy Solutions
Congress has the tools to address this that would make a measurable difference.
1. Pass the ARCH Act — S. 5375, 119th Congress
On August 7, 2026, a bipartisan group of senators — Mike Rounds (R-SD), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Chris Coons (D-DE), and Thom Tillis (R-NC) — introduced the Afghan Ally Records and Credential Heritage Act, known as the ARCH Act. The ARCH Act directs the Department of Defense to verify and preserve the service records and biometric data of at-risk Afghan allies within 180 days of enactment, and to establish a secure online portal through which an individual, a designee, or a representative can apply from anywhere — including inside Afghanistan — to have that service documented and protected. After reviewing available military, contractor, and biometric records, the Department would preserve verified records for future use. The ARCH Act is also included as Section 1080 of the FY2027 National Defense Authorization Act
2. Authorize More Visas and Urge the Administration to Resume SIV Processing
In 2026, the administration abruptly stopped the issuance of Afghan SIVs. SIV processing should be resumed and the travel ban lifted so visa beneficiaries can actually be admitted into the U.S. In addition, Congress should authorize substantially more Afghan SIVs. The existing visa allocation is insufficient to meet the needs of applicants already approved by the U.S. government.
Congress should also use oversight hearings, the appropriations process, and pass legislation establishing clear processing requirements to ensure that SIV cases can be processed. Every day of delay is another day that Afghan allies, many of whom have already waited years and cleared a critical stage of the eligibility process, remain in uncertainty and danger.
3. End the Re-Adjudication and Revocation of Approved SIV Cases
Chief of Mission (COM) approval is a critical component of the Afghan Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) process. It represents an affirmative finding by U.S. government officials, based on the applicant’s documentation and the government’s verification, that the applicant provided faithful and valuable service to the United States and meets the program’s eligibility requirements.
Increasingly, the State Department has been issuing Withdrawals of Support that reopen these findings years after approval. Rather than identifying genuinely new evidence, the Department has reassessed documentation it previously accepted, including company employment records and recommendations verified through the Department of Defense’s Project Rabbit/DAS-T process, without adequately explaining why that evidence is no longer sufficient. This is particularly concerning given the government’s previous reliance on DAS-T employment verification. IRAP’s S.A.M. v. State litigation likewise highlights the problem of inadequately explained COM decisions.
These withdrawals are not merely procedural setbacks. For applicants still in the SIV pipeline, they can derail years of processing and jeopardize their pathway to safety. For individuals who have already obtained lawful permanent residence, withdrawal of COM approval can trigger efforts by DHS to rescind their green cards, expose them to immigration proceedings, and ultimately place them at risk of removal. It effectively puts people who relied on the U.S. government’s own approval back in legal jeopardy.
Congress should require the State Department to provide notice and a specific explanation for every withdrawal of support, ensure that previously approved cases cannot be reopened without an individualized basis, and report regularly on the number of withdrawals issued and the grounds for each. Congress should also conduct oversight of this practice and advance legislation protecting applicants from arbitrary reconsideration of settled approvals.
4. Pass the Afghan Adjustment Act
The Afghan Adjustment Act (H.R. 4895), introduced by Representatives Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R-IA) and Jason Crow (D-CO) alongside a bipartisan coalition of cosponsors on August 5, 2025, would provide a pathway to lawful permanent residence for eligible Afghans currently in the United States, including SIV holders and applicants, humanitarian parolees, and others who served alongside U.S. forces. Rather than requiring Afghans already in the United States to navigate an overwhelmed and increasingly uncertain immigration system, the Afghan Adjustment Act would provide the stability and security they need to rebuild their lives, contribute to their communities, and establish permanent roots in the United States.
The legislation builds on a longstanding bipartisan congressional precedent. Across previous decades, Congress has enacted similar adjustment legislation to provide permanent status to groups admitted to the United States in the aftermath of humanitarian crises and U.S. foreign-policy engagements, including Hungarian refugees in 1958, Cubans in 1966, and Vietnamese, Laotian, and Cambodian refugees in 1977. These measures recognized that people brought to the United States under extraordinary circumstances should not be left indefinitely in temporary or uncertain immigration status. The Afghan Adjustment Act follows this established approach and continues a bipartisan effort reflected in earlier versions of the legislation, including the 2022 proposal and the 2023 House and Senate bills. This bill would also provide an additional safeguard by creating an independent pathway to permanent status that does not depend on a COM approval remaining undisturbed.
Conclusion
Afghan allies stood with us in one of the most dangerous places on earth. They did — at enormous personal risk, with their families’ lives on the line, and with the understanding that the United States would honor its commitment to them if they needed protection.
Afghan allies stood with us in one of the most dangerous places on earth. They did, at enormous personal risk, with their families’ lives on the line, and with the understanding that the United States would honor its commitment to them if they needed protection.
Congress can help. It can preserve the proof of service through the ARCH Act, press the administration to resume processing and authorize more visas, demand an accounting when approved cases are reopened, and lift the entry bans. Without that last step, no Afghan can arrive, apart from very narrow exceptions.
The senators behind the SFRC Report say it directly: “This matters well beyond Afghanistan. American troops and diplomats depend on local partners around the world.” If the United States fails to keep its word, they warn, “we weaken the trust of partners and allies who may be asked to take those same risks for us in the future.” This is not a partisan ask. It is the fulfillment of a promise the United States already made.