President Biden is getting twice as many people out of Afghanistan as national security officials set as their goal, and Republicans are saying nothing.
The White House provided new numbers on evacuations to PoliticusUSA:
From August 23 at 3:00 AM EDT to August 24 at 3:00 AM EDT, a total of approximately 21,600 people were evacuated from Kabul. This is the result of 37 US military flights (32 C-17s and 5 C-130s) which carried approximately 12,700 evacuees, and 57 coalition flights which carried 8,900 people.
Since August 14, the U.S. has evacuated and facilitated the evacuation of approximately 58,700 people. Since the end of July, we have re-located approximately 63,900 people.
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John Harwood noted that this is two to four times higher than the goal set by intelligence officials:
Biden national security officials last week set goal of evacuating 5K-9K per day from Afghanistan
this morning, WH says 21,600 were flown out of Kabul in last 24 hours – 12,700 on US military flights, 8,900 on allied coalition flights
total evacuees in last 10 days: 58,700
— John Harwood (@JohnJHarwood) August 24, 2021
Nearly 64,000 People Evacuated Without A Single Life Lost
It is not surprising that as the Biden airlift operation has ramped up, the only thing that Republicans and Fox News can do is absurdly claim that Americans are being stranded in Afghanistan.
The GOP was already planning an entire 2022 attack ad campaign around the airlift, but it those ads may backfire as, at the current pace, the US airlift will be a massive success.
Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
