The Afghan interpreter who helped rescue Joe Biden from a remote valley in 2008 said he feels betrayed by America and pleaded with the president on Thursday to not forget him and his family as they fear retribution from the Taliban.
'Do you feel betrayed?' Fox & Friend First co-host Jillian Mele asked the interpreter, who goes only by his first name Mohammed – for safety reasons.
'Yes, yes, they exit their forces from Afghanistan,' Mohammed said in a phone interview. 'They left me and my family and like me, the other people left behind. But it's very scary, man, as we are under great risk.'
Mohammed, who is hiding from the Taliban with his wife and four children, said if the Taliban were to find him, they would kill him. According to a Tuesday report from The Wall Street Journal, Mohammed had been trying to get out of Afghanistan for years.
When asked Thursday what message he has for Biden, Mohammed said: 'Hello, President, do not leave – do not forget me and my family.'
'At the moment in Afghanistan, it is very hard and horrifying situation,' he added. 'There's no escape from here to another area. But I'm also wondering how I'm going to get out from my house to somewhere else.'
'Just give him my hello and tell him, if possible, tell him or send the message, to not let me and my family left (sic) behind,' Mohammed asked the Fox News host to relay to President Biden.
Mohammed, the Afghan interpreter who helped rescue Joe Biden in 2008, is pleading with the president to now help him get out of Afghanistan, claiming he feels betrayed by America
Then-Senators Joe Biden, John Kerry, and Chuck Hagel in Kunar Province rescued in eastern Afghanistan on February 20, 2008
The last U.S. military planes and service members left Afghanistan on Monday afternoon, leaving behind at least 100 Americans and scores of Afghani allies and interpreters. Biden lauded the end of the two-decades-long war in remarks Tuesday where he called the withdrawal and evacuation efforts an 'extraordinary success'.
Mohammed was one of the many left behind.
'Is your life in danger right now? What would happen to you and your family if the Taliban were to find you?' Mele asked Mohammed.
'If they find me, they will kill me. It's too easy,' he responded.
'I'm hiding in my house,' Mohammed continued. 'I haven't seen outside – what's going on outside.'
'How long can you live in hiding?' The host asked him, mentioning that his face is in a picture with Biden.
'There's no way, man. Depends, maybe die at home, there is no way,' he said.
Mohammed is just one of the hundreds – maybe thousands – of American allies and interpreters who helped U.S. forces and efforts in Afghanistan during the 20 year war, which Biden declared over in Tuesday remarks.
Senator Tom Cotton led 25 of his Republican colleagues in a letter demanding information regarding the humanitarian crisis caused by the president's handling of the Afghanistan withdrawal.
In particular, the group wants Biden to inform Congress in an unclassified manner about 'the safety and well-being of our fellow countrymen and allies who you left behind.'
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki vowed that the U.S. will evacuate him from Afghanistan.
Psaki, when asked during her press conference Tuesday, broadly thanked Mohammed for his service but wouldn't detail exactly how that service would be repaid.
'Our message to him is: thank you for fighting by our side for the last 20 years. Thank you for the role you played, and helping a number of my favorite people out of the snowstorm, and for all the work you did.
'And our commitment is enduring, not just to the American citizens but to our partners who have fought by our side.'
Psaki echoed other Biden officials' statements that evacuating U.S. citizens and allies from Taliban-controlled Afghanistan is not ending but moving into a 'diplomatic phase.'
'We will get you out, we will honor your service, and we're committed to doing exactly that,' she said.
The press secretary did not elaborate on how the Biden administration intends to see that through.
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki promised the US would get the Afghan interpreter who saved Joe Biden out but didn't indicate a plan to do it
Mohammed, while working for the U.S. Army, had a key role in a story often repeated - and embellished - by Biden during his 2008 run for vice president.
As a U.S. senator, Biden was on board one of two Blackhawk helicopters that made an emergency landing in a blinding snowstorm, alongside then-Senators John Kerry and Chuck Hagel.
Mohammed is one of the thousands of SIV applicants left behind. There were 88,000 SIV applicants and as of last week only 6,000 had gotten out.
A private security team with the former firm Blackwater and U.S. Army soldiers stood watch for Taliban fighters as the crew called Bagram Air Base for help, where Mohammed jumped in a Humvee along with a force from the 82nd Airborne Division and drove hours into the mountains to rescue them.
The three senators were driven back to the base with the convoy.
'Hello Mr. President: Save me and my family,' Mohammed told the Journal. 'Don't forget me here.'
'I can't leave my house,' he said on Tuesday. 'I'm very scared.'
Kerry, left, is seen with Biden, right, during their visiting to the governor's office in Asad Abad, the provincial capital of Kunar province east of Kabul, Afghanistan on Thursday, Feb. 21, 2008
Taliban Badri 313 units post for the cameras at Kabul airport today, carrying American-made rifles and wearing US military gear
Mohammed's visa application reportedly stalled when the defense contractor he worked for lost records needed for his visa application. As the Taliban seized control on Aug. 15, Mohammed tried his luck at the Kabul airport gates but was turned away by US forces. They told him he could go but he'd have to leave behind his wife and children.
U.S. soldiers say Mohammed was there alongside them for over 100 firefights.
The area of the rescue was not under Taliban control, but just one day before the three then-senators' choppers went down, Taliban had killed nearly two dozen Taliban insurgents just 10 miles away.
'We were going to send Biden out to fight the Taliban with snowballs, but we didn't have to do it,' Kerry joked after the senators' rescue.
The trip was one of many that Biden, then chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, took overseas with Kerry and Hagel, who went on to become secretaries of state and defense respectively under President Obama.
In a speech on the campaign trail, Biden said in 2008: 'If you want to know where Al Qaeda lives, you want to know where (Usama) bin Laden is, come back to Afghanistan with me. Come back to the area where my helicopter was forced down with a three-star general and three senators at 10,500 feet in the middle of those mountains. I can tell you where they are.'
'It's in the mountains between Afghanistan and Pakistan,' he said, 'where my helicopter was recently forced down.'
Army veterans have stepped in on Mohammed's behalf to call for help. 'If you can only help one Afghan, choose [Mohammed],' wrote Shawn O'Brien, an Army combat veteran who worked with him in Afghanistan in 2008. 'He earned it.'
The U.S. has evacuated over 120,000 from Taliban rule since Aug. 14, including 5,500 Americans, but left behind somewhere between 100 and 200 Americans and thousands of Afghan interpreters who worked with the U.S. military in its hasty exit.
The State Department has promised to use all diplomatic channels to continue evacuations without a troop or embassy presence.
A White House official declined to comment on Mohammed's case for confidentiality reasons.
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