Atlanta’s Afghan community is bracing for deportations as the Trump administration allows a Biden-era protection to expire this week.
Nearly 2,000 Afghans moved to metro Atlanta in the aftermath of the U.S. military pulling out of Afghanistan in 2021. They received something called Temporary Protected Status, which provides status and work authorization to nationals from countries experiencing armed conflict, natural disasters, or other extraordinary conditions.
Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem terminated TPS for the Taliban-controlled Afghanistan because she said the country’s security situation has improved and the economy is stabilizing. The country’s TPS expires on May 20 and will fully be terminated on July 14.
“People are disappearing, they are being tortured. They are being killed,” said Hogai Nassery, who helped found the Afghan American Alliance of Georgia. “There’s no free press in Afghanistan now. How would you know if something’s safe or not?”
When people first fled Afghanistan to Atlanta, Nassery said there was an overwhelming need for resettlement help.
“A lot of them were being housed in these extended stay hotels, and when we went to visit one of them in Duluth we were amazed at how many families were there, how big the families were, and how little they had,” Nassery said.
AAAG formed to organize resources and get them to families that needed help. Nassery said the refugee resettlement agencies were flooded with higher than normal volumes of people all at once.
“The community in Atlanta…it was actually mainly non-Afghans who helped,” she said.
“People saw the images from the airport. They knew that this was a very dark period in American history.”
TPS was a starting point for Afghans, but they had to pursue an asylum claim or other pathway to permanent legal status. Over the years, some of these families applied for asylum and green cards, got work permits and restarted their lives.
But not everyone was able to get more permanent legal status, said Serene Hawasli-Kashlan, the legal director for Asian Americans Advancing Justice Atlanta. She worked with the Georgia Asylum and Immigration Network to help families apply for asylum.
“Maybe they applied for a special immigrant visa, which is for Afghans who worked with the U.S. government,” she said. “Maybe they were denied that and they had TPS as well, but the TPS was the only default status. They’re also at risk of being removed.”
Hawasli-Kashlan said Afghans seeking asylum were placed in a fast track for a decision, because asylum cases can take years to move through the U.S. immigration system.
She said many people she helped get asylum worked either with the now-fallen Afghan government that was supported by the U.S. or worked directly with the U.S.
“You have to understand that the Taliban was actually targeting these individuals and trying to kill people even before they were in power,” she said.
Mona Megahed helped found Ethaar, a nonprofit that helps refugees and immigrants make metro Atlanta home. She said in her decade of this work, the fear of deportation has never been this tangible.
“Families are afraid to even seek legal assistance out of fear of being identified and then eventually deported,” Megahed said.
Ethaar is focusing on helping people know their rights, whether if Immigration and Customs Enforcement shows up at a house, a workplace or a child’s school. Megahed said many families have needed a listening ear above all.
“It’s incredibly scary if you are someone who sought refuge, sought safety here in the United States, and then you kick them out,” she said. “Not just that, but you send them to where they were initially in danger. I don’t know what kind of message that sends.”
