#Biden going to Delaware amid Afghanistan chaos

President Biden is scheduled to spend at least part of Labor Day weekend at his home in Delaware despite the ongoing fallout from the chaotic evacuation of Afghanistan that has left dozens of American citizens and thousands of the US military’s Afghan allies in Taliban-controlled territory.

The White House says Biden will head to Wilmington after a full day of visiting Louisiana communities devastated by Hurricane Ida. Before he departs the executive mansion for New Orleans Friday morning, the president is scheduled to give remarks on the August jobs report.

Biden was supposed to go to Delaware two weekends ago, but his trip was initially pushed back and then scrapped due to the ongoing withdrawal from Afghanistan — which was then in its final phases — as well as the approach of Hurricane Henri toward the northeastern US.

Though the last US military flight from Kabul’s Hamid Karzai International Airport departed Monday, Biden and his administration’s top officials have come under fire for failing to remove approximately 100 US citizens, as well as an unknown number of legal permanent residents and thousands of Afghans who assisted US-led NATO forces during the two-decade war against the Taliban. Those Afghans and their families have been left to fend for themselves against the vengeful Islamic fundamentalists.

On Thursday, more than two dozen Senate Republicans accused the Biden administration of evacuating thousands of Afghans with no ties to the United States at the expense of the allies — who held or had applied for so-called Special Immigrant Visas (SIVs).

Meanwhile, three California school districts have said that some of their students remain in Afghanistan after traveling with their families to visit relatives there during summer vacation.

Last month, Biden was heavily criticized for remaining at Camp David as the Taliban completed its final assault against the Western-backed government of Afghanistan, which culminated in the taking of Kabul on Aug. 15 and the flight into exile of then-Afghan President Ashraf Ghani.

The president cut short his Camp David stay long enough to return to Washington the following day and give an address to the nation on Afghanistan — during which he admitted that the Taliban reconquest “did unfold more quickly than we had anticipated.” Biden then returned to Camp David before heading back to the White House for good the next evening.