The pregnant wife of Qismat Amin, who risked his life as a warzone interpreter for U.S. troops and became a U.S. citizen, is trapped with him in Afghanistan following President Trump’s orders to freeze refugee admissions and foreign aid.
“This is a president who is more interested in moving fast and breaking things than in the people whose lives are upended,” said Colorado Sen. Matthew Ball, a former U.S. Army Ranger who relied on Amin.
Shaista Shirzad’s due date is March 22.
Amin took time off from his job in Dallas to escort Shirzad, 25, a requirement under Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers. Although Shirzad isn’t a refugee and is cleared for a spousal visa pending final processing in Qatar, airline officials blocked them from boarding their Jan. 31 flight to Qatar due to forces “beyond our control.”
“We feel abandoned with no answers. She’s physically exhausted and emotionally drained,” Amin, 35, said in an email from Afghanistan. “The stress of waiting with no clarity has taken a toll on her and, as she nears the final stages of pregnancy, access to proper medical care is a growing concern.”
U.S. State Department staffers in the Office of the Coordinator for Afghan Relocation (CARE) on Wednesday conveyed a message through U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper’s office that Amin and Shirzad were put on a list for travel to Qatar but that all flights “have been paused due to the Executive Order.”
Amin has exhausted his paid time off and soon may hit his limit for unpaid personal leave, according to a letter from his employer, urging U.S. officials to act swiftly. On Friday, Amin decided he must fly home and save his job, leaving Shirzad to give birth in Afghanistan and then begin a more complicated process to unify their family.
“It feels hopeless because I feel like I’m so American, respecting the laws and appreciating everything America offered me. I look at myself, a person who worked for the U.S. Army and sacrificed so much. When you become a U.S. citizen, in the ceremony, they say now you can bring your wife. This is what the laws say,” Amin said. “Then you see someone is stopping you ….. because someone just doesn’t like you. You feel like being from Afghanistan is worth nothing in America. I feel sad and I am just so worried.”
Ball and Amin met when Ball was posted as an Army Ranger on a base near the Tora Bora mountain stronghold for al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters after the 9/11 attacks. Working as a U.S. Army interpreter between 2010 and 2013, Amin helped Ball’s hard-hit unit deal with villagers and tribal elders. They pressed through negotiations that included “moments of significant tension, tribal leaders yelling at each other and us, Qismat in the middle, a fantastic cultural ambassador,” Ball said.
Amin recalled Afghan villagers accusing U.S. soldiers of stealing jewels and objecting to a military checkpoint. He assured leaders any claims would be investigated, proposed a compromise to move the checkpoint farther from the village, and advised U.S. troops to present the checkpoint as village protection rather than control.
When Ball moved on for other deployments, Amin’s family received “night notes” — threats from Taliban affiliates that they’d be coming for Amin. Ball launched a letter-writing rescue campaign when he was a law student in 2013 and Amin received a special immigrant visa in 2017. Ball paid for a flight to California to expedite his arrival after Trump’s ban prohibiting people from Muslim-majority countries, which didn’t yet include Afghanistan. Ball and his wife housed Amin as he settled into jobs at Starbucks, Salesforce, and Tesla.
Amin moved to Dallas, where other Afghans who served as interpreters for U.S. soldiers had resettled and became a citizen in March 2023.
He and Shirzad married in Afghanistan last year.
U.S. Department of State officials declined to comment on the case.
When U.S. forces pulled out of Afghanistan and the Taliban took over in 2021, former Secretary of State Antony Blinken launched the CARE office, which has resettled 200,000 Afghans who stood with troops over two decades of war and their families. However, Trump’s orders froze foreign aid, encompassing government relocation flights, and halted refugee admissions.
That day, Amin had traveled to Colorado to recommend Ball for appointment to fill a vacancy in the state senate. Ball said he wanted Amin to attest to his character based on his military service on a seemingly impossible mission and saving Amin after death threats. “That’s the type of senator I want to be — somebody who has a strong moral compass and is here to do good.”
Amin “is somebody who risked his life to help the United States in Afghanistan. Now as a U.S. citizen bringing his wife to the United States to start their family should be easy. The fact that we have to fight to get them here is infuriating,” Ball said. “Put yourself in this family’s situation. You’re going to have your first kid in less than two months. Your wife is scared. She’s about to be a mom for the first time. You can feel the baby kicking.”
Blocking their travel at this moment feels “awful,” he said. “An executive order pressed the off switch on huge parts of our government. There are people who are being harmed and the people doing it don’t care. That is maddening.”
Trump’s orders are causing “unintended consequences,” trapping thousands of people, and “this is insane,” said Shawn Vandiver, a U.S. Navy war veteran who founded AfghanEvac.
“Now they’re affecting a U.S. citizen trying desperately to get out with his family. This baby should be born in the United States,” Vandiver said. “This will destroy our credibility. In a future war, potential partners are not going to help us. They may end up helping Russia or China or Iran. We’re going to have a hard time getting trustworthy people to work with us.”
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