As the nation grapples with the fallout from the American exit from Afghanistan, 6th district Congressman Andy Barr says he has long opposed giving a fixed date for withdrawing United States troops. The Republican says he shared that view when former President Donald Trump last year announced his date for exiting Afghanistan, and again when President Joe Biden set his own date earlier this year.
“It denied the Biden Administration the flexibility that they needed over the course of the summer to adjust their strategy when it became totally obvious that their decision of unconditional retreat was failing,” says Barr.
Now as the Biden Administration struggles to maintain control of the Kabul airport long enough to remove remaining American civilians, allies, and Afghanis who helped the U.S. forces, Barr argues that historians will take a harsh view of President Biden’s decision.
“They’re going to say that this botched retreat, this unconditional and disastrous retreat was the most embarrassing, catastrophic, and avoidable foreign policy mistake in our lifetimes,” he says.
Beyond questioning the date-specific withdrawal, the Congressman also wants to know how intelligence officials failed to predict the Taliban’s swift takeover of Kabul and why the administration decided to abandon the Bagram Air Base and some $80 billion worth of U.S. military equipment, which has reportedly fallen into Taliban hands.
“As a member of the House Foreign Affairs committee, indeed I have called for the resignation of the entire national security team because they got all of this totally wrong,” says Barr.
When President Trump left office in January, America had about 2,500 service members in Afghanistan, which Barr says is fewer than the U.S. has in Spain. Yet he says that small number supplemented by 5,000 NATO coalition troops helped keep the Taliban at bay.
“It was that will to have a residual security force there at Bagram and in Kabul that was providing military assistance to the Afghan national army that gave the Afghan national army the will to continue to be in the fight,” says Barr, “and it gave them the capability of deterring the Taliban.”
The Congressman says the U.S. has an obligation to help the Afghani nationals who aided the American troops over the past 20 years. He says his office alone has some 70 open cases requesting special immigration visas for Afghanis who worked as translators and interpreters.
“We owe them to help them get into our country with these visas,” says Barr. “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.”
The Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill
Earlier this week the House approved a $3.5 trillion budget reconciliation package on a party-line vote. Barr calls that legislation “very partisan” and a “progressive wish list.” He says he also opposes that $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure deal the Senate passed earlier in August. Barr says he cannot in good conscience saddle American taxpayers with even more debt after the trillions Congress spent on COVID relief.
“Kentucky clearly has many infrastructure needs,” he says. “We need to do this, but we need to do it in a responsible manner.”
Even though his constituents are seeking major road extensions in Lexington, Georgetown, and Madison County, Barr says he’s uncertain if those projects would be funded through the current bill.
“I’d like to see the states have more discretion with how to use [the money] without federal strings attached,” says Barr.
He also says the Senate bill is unfair to the people in the rural parts of his district.
“The bipartisan bill proposes to spend more on mass transit and intercity infrastructure… than it would for basic roads and bridges that would benefit rural America,” Barr says.
Instead of raising taxes or taking on new debt to pay for infrastructure needs, Barr says Congress should rely more on private capital to help fund these projects through public-private partnerships. He also wants an easing of the permitting process required for infrastructure projects.
“On average in this country, because of so much red tape and bureaucracy from Washington, it takes seven to 10 years just to build a new road or a bridge,” says Barr. “If we just cut down on the permitting and the red tape… we could save $3.7 trillion in just truncating the timeline to approve these projects to about two years.”
Pandemic Politics
Barr lauds the partnership between the federal government and pharmaceutical companies that created the three COVID vaccines. He also credits the Trump Administration for cutting regulatory red tape with Operation Warp speed, which he says facilitated the vaccine development in record time without compromising safety. Barr says the data shows the vaccines help protect people from getting COVID and reduce hospitalizations if they do, but he also says vaccinations should not be mandatory.
“We do need to depoliticize it,” the Republican says. “This whole vaccine issue and frankly the pandemic generally has been politicized and regrettably I think Dr. Fauci has been part of that politicization.”
Barr says both administrations and both parties have struggled to handle the fast-evolving pandemic, but he argues that Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, has made many mistakes.
“He contradicted himself so often on the mask wearing and what was the right approach,” says Barr. “We do need to follow the science and I think using hyperbolic and contradictory messages has been one of the reasons why he’s invited criticism on himself.”
The Republican also blames the surge of Delta variant cases across the southern U.S. on the flow of illegal immigrants across the Mexican border. He says American citizens are justifiably frustrated by the requirement that they have a negative COVID test before they can return to the U.S. after international travel while record numbers of illegal immigrants are freely entering the country.
“These are people who have not had access to the vaccine and they’re not getting mandatory tests,” says the Congressman.
While Barr supported early pandemic relief packages, he says he was against the Biden Administration’s American Rescue Plan Act because it was not bipartisan. He says the legislation also spent too much money on non-COVID issues, such as what he describes as bailouts for state and local governments. He says upwards of $1 trillion from the five previous bipartisan packages hadn’t even been spent yet when Congressional Democrats approved ARPA.
“I think that was a very fiscally irresponsible bill and that’s why I voted against it,” he says.
Legislation to Honor his Late Wife
Last summer, Barr’s wife, Carol, died suddenly from a heart condition known as mitral valve prolapse. The Congressman says it’s a serious condition that effects young women more than others. In .2 percent of cases, it is fatal, he says. Now Barr is sponsoring legislation in honor of his late wife.
“The Carol Act… will provide more research dollars for the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute to investigate the risk factors for valvular heart disease,” he says. “The ultimate goal is to make a difference for families so they don’t have to face the same tragedy that me and my girls faced.”
H.R.1193, the Cardiovascular Advances in Research and Opportunities Legacy Act (CAROL), has 155 bipartisan cosponsors and is expected to be heard this fall. Barr says a companion bill in the Senate is sponsored by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, a Democrat from Arizona.
