Barr comments on Afghan refugees subject of attack ad. What’s the context?
Rep. Andy Barr’s past comments about bringing in certain refugees from Afghanistan have spread far and wide on the internet in the wake of a resettled Afghan national being charged with shooting two National Guard members in Washington, D.C.
The campaign for Nate Morris, a Lexington tech entrepreneur who is running against Barr for U.S. Senate in Kentucky in 2026, has used Barr’s 2021 interview with Kentucky Educational Television on the subject to attack him as too weak on the issue.
A new digital ad from Morris claims Barr “opened the door” for people like the accused shooter, who killed one National Guard member from West Virginia on Nov. 26.
“I voted for these special immigrant visas,” Barr says in the ad. “Many of these Afghans, we owe them to help them get into our country.”
Barr’s statement was not meant to apply to all Afghans, but it seems likely that it would have applied to the shooting suspect, a member of the extensively vetted “Zero Unit” group that worked closely with the CIA before the U.S. pulled out of Afghanistan in August 2021. The U.S. military had been present in the Middle East country for nearly 20 years.
The congressman, who is one of three leading GOP candidates to replace Sen. Mitch McConnell alongside Morris and former Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron, offered his thoughts in an interview with KET’s Renee Shaw on Aug. 26, 2021 as backlash over the U.S. withdrawal was starting to build.
“We have failed in our obligation to help many of these Afghans who risked their lives, in many cases died, for the cause of their own country in assistance to the United States, and we owe them to help them get into our country with these visas... I voted for these special immigrant visas because it would send a terrible message to our allies around the world, that we’re going to abandon you, if you help us, in your time of need,” Barr said.
His position wasn’t an unpopular one at the time, even in the Republican Party.
The U.S. military’s withdrawal from Afghanistan under former Democratic President Joe Biden was widely panned, particularly by the GOP, as rushed and conducive to a quick Taliban takeover. Most politicians expressed some obligation to try and resettle Afghans who aided America, potentially risking punishment under Taliban rule.
The vote Barr was referencing took place on a bill, H.R.3985, increasing visas available to “qualified Afghan nationals who worked for the U.S. government” or the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
It passed the U.S. House 407-16 on July 22, 2021, with the only 16 no votes coming from a handful of Republicans, but did not get a vote in the Senate.
Another later bill was less popular with Republicans. H.R.5305 included more than $6 billion to expand the Afghan refugee resettlement program.
That bill passed the House 254-175 and the Senate 65-35 in Sep. 30, 2021 votes. Barr voted against that bill. Kentucky Republicans Sen. Mitch McConnell and Rep. Hal Rogers, as well as Democratic Rep. John Yarmuth, were the three members of the state’s congressional delegation to vote for it.
President Donald Trump, less than a year after losing reelection, also expressed some support for helping Afghans who assisted the U.S. around the same time as Barr’s comments.
In an interview with FOX News Aug. 17, 2021, he said “we want to try and help” interpreters and others who aided U.S. military operations in Afghanistan, a sentiment widely shared due to the hostility members of Taliban
What they’re saying
Barr’s 2021 comments made the rounds late November when GOP operative Greg Price, who runs an account on X with more than a half-million followers, posted a video from the interview. He bolded the words “we owe them to help them get into our country” in the post, which was made two days after the Nov. 26 shooting.
Later that day, Donald Trump, Jr., who has given Morris friendly interviews on his podcast, quoted the post expressing shock. Laura Ingraham, who hosts a popular conservative show on FOX News, also quoted Price’s post and added “horrible.” Even the account of late conservative influencer Charlie Kirk, which has remained active promoting his organization Turning Point USA since he was assassinated earlier this year, quoted the post. Morris was the last politician endorsed by Kirk, who spoke at his campaign launch this summer.
Morris thinks Barr’s comments contrast with the attitude of people like Vice President JD Vance, a friend of Morris’. At the time, Vance encouraged helping “the Afghans that helped us,” but expressed caution about vetting them
Morris has derided Barr as too soft on the issue of immigration throughout the primary.
“Amnesty Andy told us in his own words he was helping Biden bring dangerous refugees to America. Just like Biden and McConnell, Andy Barr has blood on his hands. America needs Trump’s toughness on immigration, not Barr’s weakness,” Morris said in a statement.
In the scant polling that has been made publicly available, Cameron has led the field with Barr in second place and Morris in third.
In a statement responding to Morris, Barr spokesperson Alex Bellizzi said Morris was “lying” about his record, and it was because Morris is “spiraling” in the polls.
“Andy Barr and President Trump are united on this issue: stop unvetted Afghans from entering the country, and support the vetted warriors who helped America take out terrorists. President Trump said that’s America First. Nate Morris is lying about Andy’s record because he’s desperate — attacking another position where Andy Barr stood shoulder-to-shoulder with President Trump,” Bellizzi wrote.
Cameron, meanwhile, agrees with Morris’ criticisms of Barr and Barr’s criticisms of Morris.
In a statement, campaign manager Nathanael Hirt called Barr a “classic say whatever it takes Washington politician.” He also said Morris was “a fake on immigration” because “the dude has zero credibility as a conservative.”
“Daniel Cameron has by far the most conservative record on illegal immigration. As Attorney General, Cameron took real action to protect Kentuckians — suing the Biden administration for dismantling President Trump’s border policies, challenging Biden’s unlawful abuse of immigration parole, fighting the CBP One App that streamlines illegal entry, and supporting the designation of Mexican cartels as Foreign Terrorist Organizations,” Hirt wrote.
