Twenty-four students, a 3-year-old child and families from California are among those who are stranded in Afghanistan after the final military troops pulled out of the country.
The two-dozen students from the Sacramento-area have been confirmed to be of the hundred plus Americans who are trapped in Afghanistan, San Juan Unified school district officials shared with the Sacramento Bee in a piece published Tuesday. (RELATED: ‘Kill List’: US Gave Taliban Names Of American Citizens, Allies: REPORT)
“Our office has been in close contact with the San Juan Unified School District, and have urgently flagged the students’ information with the State Department and Department of Defense,” a statement to the outlet from Democratic California Rep. Ami Bera’s office read. “We have not received an update from the State Department or the DOD.” (RELATED: ‘I’m An American, Please Open The Gate’: American Woman Trapped In Afghanistan Says She Is Scared For Her Safety)
Sacramento area students confirmed trapped in Afghanistan | The Sacramento Bee https://t.co/0OAVophqDf
— Melanie Moon (@Moon_Melanie) August 31, 2021
ABC 7 News in San Francisco reported that among those Americans still in Kabul is a 3-year-old young boy born near Sacramento.
Veterans advocate James Brown told the outlet he was contacted by a friend “who’s an active duty Marine Corps officer stationed overseas” and he basically “felt like his hands were tied and he needed some help getting this family out.”
After getting the call, he reached out to California Democratic Rep. Jackie Speier to get help and said her office made “numerous phone calls to the White House, to the Secretary of Defense’s Office, and to the Secretary of State’s office escalating this family’s case all the way to the top for us.”
Biden left a 3-year-old California boy stranded in Afghanistan.
Despite making it to the airport, the child’s family was beaten by the Taliban, pushed back, & left behind.https://t.co/F6jOIOKRmf
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) August 31, 2021
Speir then wrote a letter for the family that explained how she believed “it is of particular and urgent concern that these individuals be allowed to pass through the gate and be given safe refuge at Hamid Karzai International Airport … so that they might be available for departure.”
Brown said that when the family showed up at the gate with the letter, they were beaten and all of them, including the 3-year-old child, had to retreat to a safe house.
“And they were stopped by a Taliban checkpoint, and they received physical beatings at the gate and they were pushed back where they had to flee and return to a safe house,” Brown explained.
The family is reportedly on the move to get out of the city after connecting with other Americans desperate to flee the country following the exit.
In southern California, school officials in the town of El Cajon have reported that six families that went to Afghanistan during the summer to visit family members before the Taliban took over, have made it safely out of the country, while two remain, CBS 2 News reported.
Six families from El Cajon were flown out, but the whereabouts of two others were unknown as of Monday. https://t.co/10X3uKkjhB
— CBS Los Angeles (@CBSLA) August 31, 2021
An update on the Cajon Valley Union School District Facebook page said school officials have “confirmed that three families have safely returned to Cajon Valley. Several children returned to school on Monday to the open arms of their teachers and classmates.”
“Three additional families are safely out of Afghanistan and on their way back to the United States,” the message from the school district said. “One family is in process at the Afghanistan airport and another family is still waiting for help.”
“We are still holding out hope” the families can get out, Howard Shen, a spokesman for the school District, shared with the outlet.