Press secretary criticizes Fox News host for depicting security footage as what he described as ‘peaceful chaos’
House Republicans convened their first hearing on what the committee chairman called the Biden’s administration’s “disastrous” withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021.
Opening the House foreign affairs committee hearing earlier, the Texas congressman Michael McCaul called for a moment of silence for 13 US service members killed in a terrorist attack near the Kabul airport during the evacuation. More than 100 Afghan civilians were also killed in the attack.
“What happened in Afghanistan was a systemic breakdown of the federal government at every level,” McCaul said, vowing to hold to account officials responsible for what he said was the “abdication of the most basic duties of the United States government to protect Americans and leave no one behind”.
For nearly two weeks in August 2021, the world watched as harrowing scenes played out live on television, including desperate Afghans clinging to the underside of a US transport plane, after the fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban.
In the chaos, McCaul said, the US left more than “1,000 American citizens” in Afghanistan as well as “almost 200,000” Afghan allies. To those “left behind,” the Republican chair said he was committed to getting them “the hell out of there”.
The ranking Democrat, Gregory Meeks of New York, said Joe Biden made the “right decision” to end a 20-year war which extracted a “great cost” on the nation.
Meeks acknowledged that “mistakes” were made during the evacuation but noted it was Biden’s predecessor, Donald Trump, who struck a deal with the Taliban for US forces to leave Afghanistan by May 2021.
To that end, Meeks urged the committee to use this opportunity to understand what went wrong, rather than to “score political points”.
Attorney General Merrick Garland has also announced that the Department of Justice (DoJ) will conduct a federal review of the Memphis police department in Tennessee, in particular its use of force, where resident Tyre Nichols died in hospital a few days after being brutally beaten and left for dead by a group of now ex-officers earlier this year.
In the wake of Tyre Nichols’s tragic death, the Justice Department has heard from police chiefs across the country who are assessing the use of specialized units and, where used, appropriate management, oversight and accountability for such units. The COPS Office [Community Oriented Policing Services] guide on specialized units will be a critical resource for law enforcement, mayors and community members committed to effective community policing that respects the dignity of community members and keeps people safe.”
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