THE BURNED OVER DISTRICT

Loyalty, a variant of fealty, must be given Trump but don't expect any to be returned. So it has become with people in the country we invaded and just can't figure out how to get out. Afghans who have loyally worked for the US for 5 years at great risk of their lives were promised a special visa for entry into the US, until Trump.

It has been two months since the flight landed at Newark Liberty International Airport, delivering Abdul to a country that had promised him safety.

But the 25-year-old Afghan, holding a visa that allowed him to move to the United States after five years of serving the U.S. government in Afghanistan, has never officially set foot on U.S. soil. Instead, he stepped off the plane into a bewildering journey through U.S. immigration detention, during which he was stripped of his visa and placed in a holding facility for illegal immigrants without ever being told why.

Advocates say Abdul is the first known person to have his Afghan Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) revoked upon arrival to the United States but is among a few recipients of that visa to face a heightened level of scrutiny — and to be held in detention — since President Trump promised to tighten the nation’s borders.

Because the special visas are reserved for those who have risked their lives to help the U.S. war effort in Afghanistan, program advocates say Abdul’s detention sends a troubling message to others who might consider helping the U.S. military at a time when the Trump administration is weighing an expanded military role in Afghanistan.

“I don’t understand why I’m being held here as a prisoner when I served the American government,” Abdul said in a recent interview through an interpreter at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center just outside the airport here.

After Abdul’s trip from Kabul on March 13, U.S. border officials denied him entry, kept him in an airport hallway for nearly two days, initially denied him access to a lawyer and had him sign a document that he couldn’t understand, he said. The document stated that Abdul had been stripped of his visa.

U.S. officials have provided no reason for denying Abdul entry. A rough transcript of his interview, as prepared by border officials, includes no questions or answers pertaining to a national security threat or criminality, instead hinting at a miscommunication about bureaucratic aspects of his visa.

This is the kind of nasty ingratitude reflects from the top. And the idea that we can look forward to dependable service from our future employees in Afghanistan has disappeared like Trump's honesty. And turned Abdul from a good friend to a disposable item to be thrown away.