Afghan Americans
The Afghan community in the United States was minimal until large numbers were admitted as refugees following the December 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.
[6] The states of California, Virginia and New York historically had the largest number of Afghan Americans.
[2][3] Thousands may also be found in the states of Arizona, Texas, Georgia, Colorado, Washington, Oklahoma, Nebraska,[13] Idaho, Missouri, North Carolina, Maryland and Illinois.
A World War I draft registration card for Wallie Dodd Fard from 1917 indicated he was living in Los Angeles, California, as an unmarried restaurant owner, and reported that he was born in Shinka, Afghanistan in 1893.
These Afghan refugees or asylum seekers found temporary shelter in neighboring Pakistan and Iran, and from there thousands made it to Europe, North America, Oceania, and elsewhere in the world.
Fremont, California, is home to the largest population of Afghan Americans followed by Northern Virginia and then Queens in New York City.
[2][4][14] Smaller Afghan American communities also exist in the states of Texas, Arizona, Oklahoma, Washington, Georgia, Michigan, Idaho, Missouri, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Florida, North Carolina, Massachusetts, Maryland, Connecticut, Colorado, Ohio, Utah, New Mexico, Oregon, Tennessee and so on.
The family reunification program brought in less affluent communities from rural Afghanistan, many of which were illiterate and maintained a more traditional village lifestyle.
The American Community Survey (ACS) estimated a total of 94,726 Afghan foreign-born immigrants were residing and working in the United States in 2016, which shows a 30% increase in the last ten years.
[29] Since 2005, thousands of Afghans have been admitted to the United States under the Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) program.
[35][36][37] Large numbers of Afghans, including those that worked with the United States, moved to the country following the Taliban take over of Kabul in August 2021.
Of the more than 100,000 Afghan nationals who have moved to the United States since August 2021, it has accepted more than 1,600 unaccompanied children, the Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Refugee Resettlement records show.
[38] As many as 150,000 Afghans who assisted the United States remained in Afghanistan, including individuals who worked closely with US military forces.
[40] Afghans still continue to flee from Afghanistan and still struggle to find refuge, most recently on July 15 Canada had closed its Special Immigration Measures Program.
A The Washington Post article from October 2001 claims that the Afghan-American community, "concentrated in the towns of Fremont and Hayward, is in many ways a microcosm of the country that's nearly a dozen time zones away."
[44] Afghan Americans are composed of the various ethnic groups that exist in Afghanistan, which include Pashtun, Tajik, Hazara, Uzbek, Turkmen, Baloch, and a number of others.
[48][49] In recent years the creation of a new census category called SWANA (which includes Afghan Americans) has been proposed in an effort for more accurate categorization.
Many Afghan Americans residing in Northern Virginia are members of the All Dulles Area Muslim Society, which has a number of local branches.
[53][54] After the September 11 attacks in 2001, a mosque run by Afghan-Americans in New York City donated blood, held a vigil for those who died inside the World Trade Center (WTC) and funded a memorial for the New York City fire fighters.
[10] Hussain Andaryas is an Afghan Christian televangelist who belongs to the Hazara ethnic group.
[18] In contrast, current immigrants have escaped from totalitarianism, genocide, torture, persecution, mistreatment, and military conflicts.
