Afghans in US told to attend government check-ins on Christmas, New Year's Day

At least two Afghans who had arrived in the US because of their assistance to American personnel during the two-decade war have now been notified that they must appear in-person at an immigration office with their documents on Christmas Day (25 December) and New Year's Day (1 January), an advocate group revealed on Monday.

Both days are federal holidays, and are arguably two of the quietest days of the year.

Given the Trump administration's crackdown on Afghan immigrants, as well as immigration across the board, there is a fear is that the check-ins will be used to arrest the indviduals and detain them for deportation.

"Scheduling immigration enforcement actions on major federal and religious holidays - when legal counsel, courts, advocacy organisations, and oversight resources are expected to be limited or unavailable - is highly unusual," the group #AfghanEvac said in a statement.

"At minimum, it places individuals in a coercive position. At worst, it appears designed to reduce access to due process protections."

For nearly a year, it has become increasingly common for immigrants in the US who show up for routine check-ins with their documents to be taken away by masked federal agents to locations that are sometimes not disclosed until days or weeks later.

#AfghanEvac said it is "gathering additional information now to determine the scope of this practice, and we have launched an intake to track cases as they emerge".

The group's president, Shawn VanDiver, is urging Afghans who have received check-in notices for federal holidays to contact his team, so that resources can be mobilised for in-person support at these check-ins where possible.

Immigration agents, however, have the discretion to take someone away even if they are accompanied by lawyers or other support systems.

"They're trying to generate fear," VanDiver told Middle East Eye on Monday.

Lawyers have, on the whole, advised all impacted immigrants to always attend their check-ins, because missing one can be cause for immediate deportation.

"Afghan parolees and evacuees remain in legal limbo because Congress has failed to provide durable status, not because they have violated the law," #AfghanEvac's statement said.

"Against that backdrop, the decision to schedule ICE check-ins on Christmas and New Year's Day is difficult to interpret as routine administration."

Limbo

In May, the Trump administration eliminated the Operation Enduring Welcome programme - an interagency pipeline built to continue relocating vetted Afghan wartime allies after the initial evacuation - as well as the Office of the Coordinator for Afghan Relocation Efforts, which supported the Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) for Afghans.

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While the Trump administration has not officially ended SIV processing, the moves have drastically slowed processing for tens of thousands of applicants.

A federal court ordered the government to expedite the processing of the longest-delayed SIV applications, but the Trump administration has indicated its intent to appeal.

The administration also stripped Afghans of so-called Temporary Protected Status earlier this summer, leaving more than 11,000 Afghans who are in the US stuck in legal limbo.

Last month, within hours of a shooting of two National Guard soldiers in Washington, President Donald Trump said in a televised address that immigrants will no longer be welcome "if they can't love our country". An Afghan man vetted by the CIA has been charged for the shooting, and has since plead not guilty.

"We must now re-examine every single alien who has entered our country from Afghanistan under [former President Joe] Biden, and we must take all necessary measures to ensure the removal of any alien from any country who does not belong here, or add benefit to our country," he said.

Some 70,000 Afghans have come to the US since the chaotic and deadly August 2021 US withdrawal, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

Another 180,000 people are waiting to come to the US through the SIV programme alone, and there are estimated to be another 65,000 refugees and 15,000 Afghans just waiting on family reunification, according to #AfghanEvac.

US Citizenship and Immigration Services is already backlogged because of the administration's previously declared intent to re-screen the applications of refugees from the last four years, as well as things like the social media accounts of those on student or working visas, legal experts previously told MEE.

Report card

In an end-of-year statement touting its 2025 accomplishments, the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement on Monday that it has put "asylum processing on hold for aliens from every country, implemented a full-scale reexamination of every Green Card for aliens from every presidentially designated high-risk country, and placed a hold on the processing of immigration applications and petitions for all Afghan nationals and aliens from those countries of concern".

On 5 December, Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem announced the creation of a new vetting centre "to enhance screening and vetting of immigration applications, with a focus on identifying terrorists, criminal aliens and other threats to public safety".

VanDiver had previously told MEE that the vetting of immigrants in general and Afghans in particular has long been thorough, lengthy, and comprehensive - and that new moves by the Trump administration suggest that immigrants are simply unwelcome. 

So far, US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), which is where immigrant check-ins are conducted, has referred over 14,400 immigrants to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) since 20 January, when Trump took office.

USCIS also said that there have been at least 2,400 arrests carried out at its offices since then.