A lack of volunteers from the ranks of the Department of Homeland Security stifled its effort to resettle refugees in the wake of the United States' withdrawal from Afghanistan last year, The Hill reported.
In a new analysis from a government watchdog group, the department reached only a third of its volunteer recruitment goal in Operation Allies Welcome, the DHS's side of the wider Operation Allies Refuge established to evacuate thousands of U.S.-aligned Afghans.
The DHS campaign was ordered to run background checks for Afghan evacuees and then coordinate with foreign agencies and nongovernmental organizations once they arrived at U.S. military bases.
According to the watchdog group, a lack of funding, mismanagement and failure to advertise all contributed to the DHS not meeting its volunteer goals, which slowed the operation considerably.
"DHS advertised these detail opportunities to its employees but did not direct components to commit all necessary staff and did not initially receive funding. Therefore, DHS did not fill all the positions," the report noted.
"DHS could not reimburse components for the costs of travel and overtime, making some components reluctant to fund the volunteer deployments and further limiting the number of DHS employees at safe havens."
Although the DHS organized 1,500 volunteers just days after Kabul fell to the Taliban, the department reportedly waited almost two months to contact them. In some cases, the DHS allegedly asked volunteers to leave with only 48 to 72 hours' notice.
The result was the Defense Department, which supplied nearly 87% of volunteers, taking over much of the responsibility initially assigned to the DHS.
News of the bungled response comes the same day the United Kingdom's Foreign Office admitted to its own errors in leaving Afghanistan, according to The Guardian.
"So far, only 5,000 Afghans have been given permission to come to the U.K., in addition to the 15,000 evacuated at the time of the fall of Kabul last year," the outlet noted.
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