“As the U.S. resettles tens of thousands of Afghan refugees following a frenetic military withdrawal that Republicans condemned, their party is still struggling for a unified response. The Donald Trump-inspired right flank of the party is veering toward an anti-refugee message with nativist undertones, warning that assistance to Afghans fleeing their nation’s fall to the Taliban risks an influx of unvetted new arrivals. And the political oxygen that small but vocal number of Republicans consume is overshadowing colleagues with a more nuanced take on the impending refugee crisis. As a pool of potential refugees grows, ‘there’s always concerns that a terrorist organization can take advantage of a mass movement of people,’ Senate Intelligence Committee Vice Chair Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) said. ‘But I don’t know how that gets better by not providing funding for it.'”

“The House-passed funding bill includes $6.3 billion in emergency spending to assist Afghans seeking asylum in the U.S. It’s set to stall in the Senate as Democrats labor to avert a government shutdown later this month, raise the federal borrowing limit and fund disaster recovery efforts. Although Republicans opposed the funding bill regardless of the provisions on Afghan refugee resettlement, they still see the Biden administration’s rocky Afghanistan withdrawal as a winning issue and want to use its stumbles to raise questions about whether resettled allies can be properly vetted given the chaos of the U.S. military pullout. Yet some of that messaging is being undermined by echoes of xenophobia from Republicans who suggest that Afghan refugees should be settled in countries where they can be with people who share the same values” – Politico.