Messaging Guidance:

Afghanistan Withdrawal

July 2024

 

Topline:

  • Donald Trump handed President Biden an impossible task by agreeing to a rushed withdrawal from Afghanistan – and failing to prepare any plan for how to safely end the war and evacuate Americans and our Afghan allies.

Talking Points:

  • When President Biden was elected, he believed the right thing for the country was to end the longest war in American history – which had lasted two decades, led to nearly 2,5000 servicemember deaths, and cost hundreds of billions of dollars.

  • However, when he took office, he was confronted with difficult realities left to him by the disastrous failures of the Trump Administration:

    • An Impossible Timeline: In 2020, the Trump Administration reached a deal with the Taliban under which the United States agreed to withdraw all U.S. forces from Afghanistan by May 2021 – just over three months after Joe Biden was to take office.

    • Abandoning Our Afghan Partners: The withdrawal agreement was brokered without any representatives of the Afghan government at the negotiating table – leaving the Taliban to dictate the terms of America’s withdrawal.

    • Strengthening the Taliban: As part of the deal, Trump also allowed for the release of 5,000 Taliban fighters from prison – many of whom were later involved in the final invasion of Kabul.

    • A Precarious Military Situation: Thanks to Trump’s failed dealmaking and reckless leadership, the Taliban were in the strongest military position they had been since the war began when President Biden took office. At the same time, the United States had the lowest number of troops in the country since 2001.

    • No Plans for Withdrawal: In the following months – including during the transition to the Biden Administration following the 2020 election – the Trump Administration did not draft or provide a single plan for how to conduct the final withdrawal or how to safely evacuate Americans or Afghan allies.

  • Thanks to Donald Trump’s unprecedented engagement with the Taliban and inexplicable mismanagement of the withdrawal process, Joe Biden was handed an impossible task – the complete and total withdrawal of American forces from a two-decade war in less than four months.

  • There’s no doubt – Donald Trump is largely responsible for the chaos of America’s withdrawal from Afghanistan.