CNN "CNN Newsroom" - Transcript: Interview with John Garamendi
Interview
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ACOSTA: Barbara Starr, your reporting at the Pentagon always greatly appreciated. Thank you so much.
Joining me now, Democratic Congressman John Garamendi. He's a senior member of the House Armed Services Committee and chair of the readiness subcommittee. It's an important subcommittee at the heart of all of this. His district includes Travis Air Force Base which has 300 airmen involved in the Kabul evacuation efforts. Congressman, I know you've been busy on the phone. I understand your office helped 145 Americans get out of Afghanistan just yesterday. Tell us about that effort, how everything played out.
REP. JOHN GARAMENDI, (D-CA): Well, this is really an extraordinary effort, not by my office specifically, but by other members of Congress, the State Department and the military. Here's how we've been working it. We get all kinds of requests. We process those through the State Department. And then we do have contacts on the ground. We had contacts at the gates. We still do, I believe, and we called those sergeants, really, and say, hey, we've got a couple of people. They have the proper documents. They're going to be there at this time. And then those soldiers very heroically in a very, very dangerous situation call out the names of the individuals.
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For the 145, there was a group that had been stuck outside quite a far distance from the gate. We got information that they were there. We then made those very same contact State Department and directly to the military at the gates, and they were escorted in.
This is a continuing effort. Just today, another group of people in contact with us -- actually, this was passed to us by one of my congressional colleagues. We were able to identify where they were. They had the right papers. The contacts were made. They were actually escorted to the gates, and they are now in Qatar.
ACOSTA: And what insight did you get about the security situation at the Kabul airport now and how much it's changed following the U.S. air strike, and as this military withdrawal begins? I suppose it could be changing moment by moment.
GARAMENDI: You're quite correct, Jim. It is changing moment by moment. We do know that the Taliban have moved more people away from the gates. They've expanded the security that they were involved in, and that's really some of the pressure at the gate. Nevertheless, it remains a very, very dangerous situation at the gates. There's still crowds. Not as much as before, but they're still there.
So what is going to happen, and I want to add to something that Barbara said, the president has been very clear. The American evacuations do not end when the military leaves. There will be other mechanisms being used to evacuate Americans that for one reason or another did not get to the airport before the American military left.
But nonetheless, those evacuations will continue, and efforts will continue to evacuate from Afghanistan, Afghans that are at risk for a variety of reasons. And we'll continue to work on that, as will other members of Congress and the State Department and the military where appropriate.
ACOSTA: And Congressman, the Taliban's cooperation is expected in all of that without U.S. troops there, the expectation is that they will continue to cooperate with that?
GARAMENDI: I think what we need to do here is to hope for the best and plan that it may not occur. The Taliban has been cooperating now. There's many, many reasons why they would continue to cooperate into the future, not the least of which is they now have 40 million people that they're responsible for. There's a serious economic crisis that existed before the Taliban took over the government. There will clearly be a humanitarian crisis as a result of the disruption of all of the services from food to medicine and beyond.
So the Taliban is going to need support. And clearly, the community of nations, the United Nations and other interested countries will be working with the Taliban where appropriate and in a way that creates a better security environment in that area. And of course, ISIS-K has not disappeared. The air strikes, perfectly appropriate.
If I were an ISIS-K member, I'd be looking up into the air for that Hellfire missile that's coming my way. And I suspect that right now, the ISIS-K is hunkering down because we know where many of them are, and I will guarantee you that there will be additional air strikes on various ISIS-K targets in the days ahead.
ACOSTA: And the whole point of this war was to make sure Afghanistan was no longer a harbor for terrorist groups like ISIS-K, but federal officials are on high alert for threats in the U.S. originating in Afghanistan. Twenty years later, how do we avoid being back where we started on 9/11, do you think?
GARAMENDI: With regard to Afghanistan, this is a continuation of a discussion I had a moment ago in that the Taliban government is faced with a choice. They could be the Taliban of 1990, or they could be a different government. If they choose to be a different government, then the community of nations will be working with them, and certainly the United States, dealing with terrorism.
I'm not in any way suggesting that we immediately or in the near future recognize them as the legitimate government, but they are there. We must deal with them, at least in the short-term, and I would suspect that we'll continue on into the days and months ahead.
But this is really a question for the Taliban. What kind of government will they be? Will they be a rational government caring for all their people, or are they going to return to the 1990 government that really terrorized Afghans, and particularly, women and children?
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It's their choice. We'll be working with them as long as they are willing to be a legitimate and worthy government.
ACOSTA: All right, Congressman John Garamendi, I know that's something you'll be focused on and keeping your eye on, as will. Congressman, thanks so much. We appreciate it.
GARAMENDI: Thank you.
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