Veterans and Afghan allies walked together from the Lincoln Memorial to the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday, Nov. 11, pressing Congress to block deportation flights that could send thousands of Afghans back toward Taliban-controlled territory.

The two-mile Veterans Day march, organized by the nonprofit AfghanEvac, drew veterans, Afghan families, frontline civilians and faith communities. Participants planned to deliver a "Promise Letter" to members of Congress after a moment of silence and roll call at the Capitol.

The stakes are personal in Fairfax County. The county serves as the primary regional hub for Afghan resettlement in the Washington area, with over 30 percent of its 1.1 million residents foreign-born, according to the Connection Newspapers. Many Afghan evacuees arrived through nearby Dulles International Airport after the 2021 withdrawal.

The walk comes days after Reps. Sam Liccardo (D-Calif.) and Jason Crow (R-Colo.), an Afghanistan veteran, filed a discharge petition on Nov. 9 to force a House vote on the Afghanistan Temporary Protected Status (TPS) Act of 2026. The bill would restore TPS for more than 9,000 Afghans who lost protections after the Trump administration terminated the designation on May 12, 2025, according to a press release from Liccardo's office.

The petition needs 218 signatures to bypass House leadership and bring the bill to the floor. The Hill reported that Crow has bipartisan co-sponsors, including Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) and Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar (R-Fla.).

Liccardo said in a statement that the effort could not wait. Crow, in a separate statement, called protecting the Afghans "both a moral and national security imperative."

A federal judge temporarily blocked deportation plans on Nov. 5. Judge Valerie Caproni of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York ruled that Afghan nationals could not be sent to Afghanistan or Pakistan through at least Nov. 7, as first reported by RFE/RL. But The Hill reported that the Department of Homeland Security said in a court filing it planned to continue with deportation flights scheduled for Nov. 16.

Shawn VanDiver, a U.S. Navy veteran and president of AfghanEvac, said at a news conference after the Nov. 5 ruling: "This is a reprieve, not a resolution. We haven't stopped this fight forever. This is just a pause."

Advocates and more than 80 detained Afghans contacted attorneys after U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) notified them they could be deported via Pakistan, according to the Associated Press. Among those facing removal were women, a police officer, members of religious minorities and people whose family members served in the U.S. military, the AP reported.

The United States has no formal diplomatic relations with the Taliban government, so deportees would be flown to Pakistan and then sent across the border into Afghanistan. The United Nations has documented extrajudicial killings, detentions and abuses of people tied to the former Afghan government and security forces, according to Dawn. The U.S. State Department lists Afghanistan as a Level 4 "Do Not Travel" country.

ICE has not publicly commented on the deportation plans. The agency said in a statement, as reported by The Hill, that it does not comment on prospective removal operations.

At an Aug. 15 conference in Reston marking the fifth anniversary of the fall of Kabul, Kris Adkison, representing U.S. Rep. James Walkinshaw, said: "Five years later, our responsibility to the Afghan people continues. … I look forward to continuing to work alongside Virginia's Afghan American community."

The discharge petition remains open for signatures in the House. A similar effort earlier this year forced a vote to restore TPS for Haiti, but that bill has stalled in the Senate.