OAN’s Brooke Mallory
5:35 PM – Monday, January 1, 2024
President Joe Biden has a history of abandoning Americans in the midst of emergencies and natural catastrophes, with little chance of enough assistance arriving. Here are four instances in which Americans were left on their own.
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During Afghanistan’s bloody and chaotic retreat, the Biden administration claimed to have rescued over 120,000 individuals. However, the administration also left over 800 Americans behind enemy lines. Republicans on the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s initial analysis of the withdrawal revealed that, in contrast to Biden’s claim that there were only 100–200 Americans remaining in Afghanistan, by the time he withdrew all U.S. forces, there were over 800 Americans who had been left behind.
Those who were evacuated by private citizens and non-governmental organizations are not included in that figure.
“The State Department has evacuated more than 800 American citizens from the country since August 31, 2022. That does not include the AMCITS evacuated by outside groups. And it is clearly dramatically more than the number of “about 100” that we were repeatedly told after the NEO [non-combat evacuation operation] ended. For perspective, the Iran hostage situation in 1979 saw 52 Americans left in the country,” according to the committee report.
Furthermore, at least thirteen American service personnel lost their lives in the withdrawal.
In Sudan, as a violent war continued in April, the Biden administration abandoned an estimated 16,000 individual American residents there and expected them to find their own way out. The White House maintained that there were no preparations to assist the thousands of Americans who were left there at the time, even though the government carried out measures to help U.S. Embassy workers escape.
“It’s absolutely imperative that U.S. citizens in Sudan make their own arrangements to stay safe in these difficult circumstances,” said White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby at the time. “Americans should have no expectation of a U.S. government-coordinated evacuation at this time. And we expect that that’s going to remain the case,” he added.
United States officials came under fire for helicoptering out around 70 embassy employees on one weekend while threatening to withhold a comparable evacuation for thousands of private American citizens in Sudan. However, other nations, including France, dispatched vessels to assist in the evacuation of their population in the interim.
Following a train disaster in February that resulted in a hazardous chemical leak in East Palestine, Ohio, which killed wildlife and contaminated the local water and air, Biden announced that he would visit the site. Jessica Conard, a local resident in East Palestine who saw the incident unfold from her backyard, told The New York Times that she was relieved to hear Biden’s announcement, since she assumed that his presence would announce to the world that a calamity had occurred and that it would help get the town some funding. However, Biden went back on his promise and never made the visit to East Palestine.
“I feel like I don’t matter,” said Conard, who said that she voted for Biden in 2020, adding that she was “aghast” when she heard that the president flew over East Palestine in September to meet union workers in another state that is a key swing state.
Additionally, Biden issued an executive order directing federal agencies to carry out evaluations in order to hold Norfolk Southern accountable, rather than signing a disaster declaration, which would have permitted the state to access federal resources.
“I haven’t had the occasion to go to East Palestine. There is a lot going on here and I haven’t been able to break,” Biden said. “I figured I would go to East Palestine this week, but I was then reminded that I have to go around the world. I’m going from Washington to India to Vietnam and so it is going to be a while. But, we are making sure that East Palestine has what they need materially in order to deal with the problems.”
“But where do you go?” Conard continued. “Where do you go when your community is repeatedly ignored by the president of the United States? That’s where I want to go. I want to go where I feel like an American worth saving.”
On Saturday, October 7th, Hamas carried out a large terrorist strike in southern Israel. At the time, Americans who were in the country were unable to contact the U.S. Embassy and initially had to find other means of returning home. However, Biden decided to let off some steam by throwing a barbecue at the White House one day following the attack that resulted in the deaths of Israelis and Americans, as well as the kidnapping of hundreds.
Silver Prout, one American who was visiting Israel with a church group, said that because the embassy was closed on Monday, October 9th, in observance of Columbus Day, they were unable to get in touch with anybody there for several days.
“They need to start getting Americans out,” said Prout, who was among the 46 U.S. citizens stuck in Israel. “Where is the State Department?”
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