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GOP lawmakers demand hearing on Afghanistan refugee vetting - YouTube
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joining me now Congressman Andy Beggs
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the Republican from Arizona and member
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of the House oversight and Judiciary
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committees Congressman you and 31 of
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your colleagues sent a letter to DHS
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secretary mayorkas demanding answers
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about this vetting process Jennifer
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Griffin was on the ground in Europe
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taking a look at how all of this is
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being done talking to the chairman of
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the Joint Chiefs what do you think about
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about that report does it put your mind
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at ease at all where this vetting
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process is concerned
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well Martha thanks for having me um you
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know we we knew that there was a vetting
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process going on uh with fingerprint and
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Biometrics Etc but what we don't know is
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what we don't know and that that is what
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were these folks doing in Afghanistan so
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right now the vast majority of people
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are coming in as refugees are coming in
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on a parole they're not sivs which is a
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special interest Visa the vast majority
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are coming in as a parole that secretary
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Homeland secretary mayorkas is able to
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to use we've asked for very specifics we
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think there's a lot of generalities
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being stated out there but we don't know
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what they did in in Afghanistan what
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were they doing in Afghanistan these
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individuals there are a lot of them that
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were helping U.S troops and soldiers and
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and deserve certainly to receive SIV
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status Etc but the reality is
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even with what uh General milley was
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describing to Jennifer it doesn't tell
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us what was going on in country per se
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it tells us what we know in our
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databases so when you have somebody
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cross our border and we we vet them for
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what we know about them in our databases
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we have no idea what they were doing in
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their Homeland and that's a big big
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concern to us yeah and what you touch on
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is that the majority of the sivs were
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left behind we heard that from the
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general in charge so a lot of these are
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refugees who wanted to get out for
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various reasons and we just heard about
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that that vetting process but you know
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what my mind always goes to in this
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conversation is why a lot of this wasn't
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done months ago as we looked at the exit
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plan for Afghanistan which was clear the
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president said he wanted to be out
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initially by September 11th then he
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moved it up to August 31st I think there
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were some concerns about having that day
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obviously with all of the weight that
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that carries and now even a lot of
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Democrats are very critical about the
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planning that went into this we know so
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many SIV applications went out months
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ago even years ago for some of these
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individuals that we could have been
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looking at all this carefully here's
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Senator Blumenthal listen to this
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oh it's a quote okay he says I've been
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deeply frustrated even furious at our
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government's delay in an action there
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will be plenty of time to seek
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accountability for the inexcusable
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bureaucratic red tape that stranded so
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many of our Afghan allies for now my
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focus remains on getting those planes in
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the air and safely out of our safely to
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our air base in Doha where they have
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already been cleared to land so you know
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obviously there's uh there's a lot of a
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lot of people very unhappy with how this
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whole thing was handled on both sides
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yeah Martha that's for sure and and
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don't forget we have Americans that are
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left behind we have we do have a lot of
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sivs left in there and this could have
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been uh prevented I mean all of this
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could have been prevented uh and done in
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a more orderly fashion and you know
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that's part of my problem with secretary
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blinken because it was his team that
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failed on this and has uh put this
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country and our allies in very serious
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Jeopardy you know it's interesting um
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he's going to testify before Congress uh
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early part of next week what would you
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what would you want to to ask him what
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do you think needs to be questioned for
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Anthony blinken who has the sort of
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unenviable task now of getting all of
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these people out uh this has been
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clearly pushed to the state department
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and it was their responsibility prior to
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all of this as you point out but
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President Biden wants to move on we know
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that
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yeah they want to leave this behind and
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I and but I think secretary blink is
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going to have to answer for uh what was
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their plans how why were they executed
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so poorly
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um was he listening to intelligence I
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mean the intelligence Community
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um from what I have understand from
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briefings that I've heard they were
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giving the correct information that is
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that the Taliban would come in and over
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overrun the country immediately why were
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they not listening to the intelligence
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Community what did they think was going
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to happen differently and then I would
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like to I think we need to get into the
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full vetting process and uh why they
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didn't start sooner and why we don't
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know what happened in country and why
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we're now going to parole these people
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instead of SIV status
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Carson Biggs thank you very much a lot
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of questions
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