Updated October 7, 2026 at 5:57 AM PDT
FREMONT, Calif. — Every other Thursday, a dozen or so men and women — young and old, with mixed immigration statuses — gather around a conference table at the Afghan Coalition, a nonprofit organization that helps immigrants and refugees from Afghanistan settle into life in America.
Some have lived in the U.S. for years and are American citizens. Others are more recent arrivals waiting on green cards. All of them have gathered to hear how to stay safe — not from hate groups or Islamophobia, but from U.S. immigration enforcement.
Freshte Ahrar, a caseworker with the Council on American-Islamic Relations giving the "know-your-rights" training, explains to them how search warrants work, when to remain silent and takes questions on whether immigration agents can legally ask for phone passcodes. She then offers the group a warning.
"No one is safe," cautions Ahrar. "Not U.S. citizens, not green-card holders, no one."
Immigration policies stoke fears in U.S. Afghan community
Immigration policies have tightened since President Trump returned to office and many Afghan refugees who've settled in the U.S. are on edge. Just hours after his inauguration, Trump signed an executive order for more rigorous immigrant and refugee vetting procedures. Months later, the administration unveiled a travel ban that restricted entry and visa issuance for nationals from several countries, including Afghanistan, and also ended temporary protected status for Afghans. That program allowed many of those who fled the country during the 2021 U.S. troop withdrawal — and the chaotic evacuations from Kabul that followed — to live and work legally in the U.S. without fear of deportation. But it was an attack last year that closed virtually all pathways for Afghans to enter the U.S. while putting those already in America under greater scrutiny.
Rahmanullah Lakanwal — a 29-year-old Afghan man who was evacuated in 2021 for his work as a CIA-backed counterterrorism soldier — was named the suspect in the Nov. 26 shooting of two National Guard members just blocks from the White House.
The Trump administration's response was swift and severe.
Hours after the shooting, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced the immediate pause of "all immigration requests relating to Afghan nationals" in a post on X. Trump announced that his administration would "re-examine every single alien who has entered our country from Afghanistan under Biden."
While the administration says it is complying with a federal court order to resume frozen cases, it has not assuaged fears among Afghans that they could be swept up in immigration enforcement operations, which have increased sharply under Trump. Since his return to office, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detentions have shot up more than 70%, from roughly 39,000 in ICE custody in January 2025 to about 67,000 in July 2026, according to a report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office. Immigration lawyers and advocates say they're working with a growing number of Afghan immigrants who've had their visas revoked, immigration applications suspended and family reunifications denied in recent months.
It is against this backdrop that Ahrar, the caseworker, has been regularly meeting with Afghans in Fremont, a city in the San Francisco Bay Area known as "Little Kabul." With a mild climate and rolling hills that conjure their homeland, the city and its surroundings have drawn some 100,000 Afghans over several decades, becoming home to one of the largest concentrations of Afghan immigrants in the U.S. who have established restaurants, food markets and clothing boutiques across a couple of blocks of the city.
While many resettled Afghans still stop by the bakeries for fresh bread and attend group prayers at the mosque, there's a quiet unease that runs through the community. That's prompted people to attend Ahrar's biweekly sessions on how to safely navigate everything from traffic stops to airport screenings.
"If they ask you about your political or religious views or your social media, don't answer," says Ahrar. "In a worst-case scenario [of arrest], don't resist; say you want to contact my attorney and call us."
This immigration angst cuts especially deep for one group in particular: the Afghans who spent years helping the U.S. fight its war in Afghanistan. The America that freed them from Taliban rule 25 years ago is now an America they say they're increasingly frustrated with and fearful of.
"Safe, but not safe"
Ahmad was forced to abruptly start his life over in America in 2021.
The life he left behind was one he was proud of. The 32-year-old says he spent years working for the U.S. Embassy's Public Affairs Office in Kabul promoting free and fair elections, girls' education and women's rights across the country.
"Seeing a young lady making a difference in the society was rewarding," says Ahmad, who says he turned down opportunities to leave Afghanistan for the U.S. early in his career through special immigration programs. "I wanted to stay because of the passion I had for my work."
That work — and his desire to stay — came to a sudden end when the Taliban returned to power.
Along with his wife and 3-year-old son, Ahmad, who asked NPR not to use his full name to protect family he still has in Afghanistan, evacuated the country, afraid he'd face severe consequences for his work for the U.S. government. Weeks after he fled he says the Taliban searched his family's home, looking for him.
In the years since, Ahmad has found a new home in Concord, Calif. He works at a local community organization that regularly offers its own "know-your-rights" trainings while also helping immigrants and refugees from all over the world navigate everything from housing to healthcare. He and his wife welcomed two more children and say they are grateful that they're piecing their lives back together and — as he is eager to point out — "contributing to the economy, paying taxes, aligned with the rules to be good residents."
But Ahmad's immigration status keeps him up at night. He says he's been waiting years for lawful permanent residency and worries that remaining in immigration limbo for too long could put him at greater risk of drawing ICE's attention.
"What's going to happen if my current status isn't approved? What's going to happen if somebody knocks on the door?" he says, aware that the fear of being pursued has in some ways followed him from Afghanistan to America.
"We are safe, but not safe."
NPR asked the Department of Homeland Security about the widespread fear among former Afghan allies who've resettled in the U.S. A spokesperson said, "Those who are here legally and are not breaking other laws have nothing to fear," adding that "Biden-era parole programs let in 190,000 Afghan nationals with a vetting process that was demonstrably inadequate. No overseas criminal background checks were performed, social media accounts were not screened, and there was no systematic cross-referencing of information."
The administration's pursuit of new immigration policies and procedures has created a climate of confusion, fear and uncertainty. The only thing Ahmad knows for sure is that he's among the lucky ones. He managed to flee Afghanistan with his family. Others haven't been so fortunate.
A heartbroken mother
When Afghanistan fell back into the hands of the Taliban in 2021, 33-year-old S. was among the first to be evacuated. But the relief of escaping and resettling in California was almost immediately eclipsed by regret.
S. has three kids, but only one of them made it out of Afghanistan with her, which is why she asked NPR to use only her first initial — to protect them and other relatives still living in Afghanistan.
For five years now, mornings and evenings have been bittersweet for this heartbroken mother. She starts and ends every day calling her daughter, 14, and her son, 9, who still live in Kabul with their grandmother. S. lights up when she hears their voices, but agonizes that her son is recovering from cleft foot surgery without her while her daughter has spent another day at home, no longer allowed to go to school — or even be outside without a male chaperone — under Taliban rule.
S.'s kids got left behind during the chaotic evacuations of 2021 in what she says was a sudden, frantic crowd swell at an airport entrance, where she got separated from her older children and then hustled onto an evacuation plane with her newborn, who just happened to be strapped to her chest in a baby carrier that day. That baby boy is now a kindergartner who has seen his siblings only through the cracked screen of his mother's phone.
S.'s story embodies so much of what went right and wrong in the U.S. war in Afghanistan. Her family welcomed the invasion. She says as a child she'd chase the American Humvees and tanks that rolled down her street patrolling the neighborhoods. One of her earliest memories is of a U.S. soldier who got out of his Humvee to introduce himself.
"He came out of the car, he asked my name, he shaked my hands, and then he encouraged me to go to school, earn your degrees and 'I hope to see you one day in the U.S.,'" she recalls. "I didn't see that soldier again. I hope he's alive."
S. thrived in the years after the U.S. invasion. She and other girls were finally allowed to go to school. She mastered English, traveled, got married and had kids. There were some dark times along the way. She says her husband grew sympathetic toward the Taliban and then abusive toward her. He walked out on the family just a few months before the Taliban returned to power in 2021. But S.'s education meant she alone could always support her family.
NPR reviewed documents that show in the years leading up to the 2021 U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and return of the Taliban, S. worked as a linguist for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, which was at the time combating Afghanistan's drug trade, a lifeline for the Taliban that enabled its comeback.
"I was so proud to be involved in that, helping my community get rid of those drug dealers," she said. "Our job was to identify those people, find them, arrest them, and it wasn't only drug dealers, it was human trafficking, people planning explosions and killing U.S. military."
S. now looks back on her work for the U.S. government with a sense of regret and betrayal.
For the last five years, with the help of a lawyer, she's met with numerous lawmakers and written countless letters to officials spanning the Biden and Trump administrations pleading to grant her kids the visas needed to join her in the U.S.
There was a moment last winter when a lawsuit against the Trump administration cleared a path for family reunifications. After weeks of interviews and vetting, S. says her kids got clearance to come to the U.S. But the shooting of the two National Guard troops and Trump's subsequent announcement of a permanent pause from "third world countries" derailed their reunification.
NPR asked the State Department about S.'s kids. A spokesperson said they couldn't comment on specific cases, adding "there's no absolute right to bring alien friends or relatives to the United States."
Under the Trump administration's tightened immigration policies, S., who's been waiting more than two years for her green card, has no idea when she'll hold her two kids again. She feels farther away from them than ever. But she's determined to keep fighting.
"I'm not going to give up under any circumstances. I promised my kids, I promised myself," she says, through tears. "But these missing moments, nothing will replace it. Money, time, attention, love, anything. It's unreplaceable."
The U.S. war in Afghanistan unlocked many doors for S., and in many ways, it led to her freedom.
But 25 years later, that freedom has come at an enormous cost — for her, for her children and for the faith she once had in the U.S. government she once supported.
"I'll never trust them again."
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