Thursday | October 21st, 2021

It’s Thursday, October 21st, and this is your Morning Wire. Listen to the full podcast:

1) State Department Begins Reviewing Afghanistan Withdrawal 

The Topline: The State Department has reportedly opened several “reviews” of President Biden’s withdrawal from Afghanistan.

MARCUS YAM/Marcus Yam/Contributor/LOS ANGELES TIMES via Getty Images

Reviews

The State Department has launched a series of reviews – technically not “investigations” – looking into the department’s Special Immigrant Visa program, the Afghans who were processed for refugee admission into the U.S., the resettlement of those refugees and other visa recipients, as well the administration’s emergency evacuation of the U.S. Embassy in Kabul.

The reviews, announced in a memo last week by Secretary of State Antony Blinken, are similar to a preliminary investigation, or an informal investigation. The inspectors general will gather information and make a determination about whether they will open a formal investigation into the matters. 

The State Department’s inspector general, Diana Shaw, and her office are responsible for conducting the reviews. 

Pentagon Reviews

The Pentagon is also conducting its own reviews, including one into the drone strike that killed 10 civilians, one into the Department of Defense’s screening process for displaced Afghans, and another auditing the Pentagon’s support for relocating Afghan nationals.

Allies Left Behind 

One of the reviews being conducted by the State Department will include the evacuation of U.S. citizens and Afghan nationals.

Remember: There are still American citizens and allies trapped in Afghanistan. A group of American veterans and volunteers known as the Afghan Rescue Crew recently worked with officials from Qatar to evacuate 374 American citizens and foreign nationals from Afghanistan.

mikroman6 via Getty Images

2) Trust In Media Plummets

The Topline: New polling shows trust in establishment news media crumbling over the last few years, reaching near all-time lows.

Quote Of The Day: “Does it bother you that the news network you work for out and out lied?”

– Joe Rogan to Dr. Sanjay Gupta

The Drop

According to a recent Gallup poll, only 36% of Americans say they have a “Great deal/Fair amount” of trust and confidence in the mass media to report the news “fully, accurately, and fairly,” which means almost two-thirds of Americans do not trust the news media. 

This is the second lowest number Gallup has seen when it conducts these polls — in 2018, the