0 >> it does not. >> lprs also been qucontacted? >> yep. >> what about siv applicants? can we get numbers? >> it's okay. >> since this whole thing began there's been a lot of criticism of the administration over how it's handled. there's been a lot of push back about the hand that you were dealt by the previous administration in terms of the deal with the taliban and terms of the siv program and the broader refugee program. you have been in office for almost eight months. it's been five months since the president's decision was made. is there anything about the shortcomings that have been so readily identified by all sorts of people that you're willing to take spresponsibility for yourselves? >> regard to numbers in these different categories. as you've seen by how i've laid out how we get to the numbers of americans, this is both incredibly complicated and incredibly fluid. we will have numbers for all those different categories in the days ahead and after this initial phase of efforts to bring people out of afghanistan. with regard to the second part of the question about taking responsibility, i take responsibility. i know the president has said he takes responsibility i don't know all of my colleagues across government feel the same way. there will be plenty of time the look back at the last six or seven months. the look back at the last 20 years and to look to see what we might have done differently? what we might have done sooner? what we might have done effectively. i have to tell you right now my entire focus is on the mission at hand and there's going to be plenty of time to do an accounting of this when we get through that mission. >> could you speak today about the future of the u.s. embassy in kabul whether it will remain or american diplomats will remain in kabul after the military withdrawal in the 31st? we're already seeing women being repressed in afghanistan by the taliban. people being attacked, intimidated, people being kept from getting to the airport. i'm wonder ing if you can give concrete examples the united states will take to ensure high target, high risk afghans ta they will not be forgotten when the united states military leaves. >> we're look at a series of options. i'm sure we will have more on that in the coming days and weeks. as i said earlier, particularly because the effort to bring out of afghanistan those who want to leave does not end with military evacuation plan on the 31st. we are very focused on what we need to do. that will be a diplomatic effort and international effort because other countries feel exactly the same way. the second part of your question? >> any concrete steps that you can give to people worried about whether they will be forgotten, left behind, disappeared once the united states withdraws the military and can no longer protect their safe passage to the airport or other livelihoods? >> the short answer is no. they will not be forgotten. we will use every diplomatic, economic assistance tool at our disposal working hand in hand with the international community first and foremost to ensure that those who want to leave afghanistan after the 31st are able to do so. as well as deal with other issues that we need to be focused on including counter terrorism and expectations of future afghan government. i mentioned a few moments ago that we got 114 countries around the world to make clear to the taliban, the international expectation that people will continue to be able to lead the country after the military evacuation effort ends. we have points of incentive and points of leverage with a future afghan government to help make sure that that happens. from my perspective, from the president's perspective, this effort does not end on august 31st. it will continue for as long as it takes to get people out. >> they made their own commitments and that he had them publicly and privately. i think they have a very strong self-interest in acting with a modicum of responsibility going forward. they will make their own determinations. >> thank you. the taliban right now focusing on the mission right now are not living up to their commitments. people are being stopped trying to get into the airport. i'm talk about women, sivs, others, afghans. people with papers and being stopped outside the airport now. there are total bottlenecks. some people have private planes watsing for them with landing rights but can't get into the airport as well as beyond the sivs there are lawyers, judges, women. we told them for 20 years, you can live up to your potential and now they feel abandoned. i'd like to ask you about the local hires. we evacuated our embassy and there's been cables back that i know you must be familiar with or your teams are of people who feel completely betrayed. these are thousands of people that we rely on in embassies around the world. the message is going forward we will not be loyal. they were not told about the evacuation. they were not put on the ch choppers and fiend their way through the taliban. some got turned away once inside. what is the message to people working for the u.s. government? veterans groups are angry and the millions of afghan women who have told their daughters and then raised under this promise of a future which the taliban are denying. there's horrifying examples from provinces and inside kabul of people being targeted door to door. people in safe houses being sought out. all this promise of you will be safe, the taliban spokesman said, stay in your homes because we haven't told all of our people how to treat women, how to respect women. they also say you can go to school. you can work as long as you comply with sharia law which under their interpretation is the most extreme example of the islamic code that is seen anywhere in the world. >> a few things. first of the 82,000 plus people who have been evacuate d, about 45, 46% have been women and children. we have been intensely focused on making sure we can get women at risk out of harm's way. we will use, i will use every diplomatic, economic, prelim and assistance tool at my disposal working closely with allies and partners who feel very much the same way to do everybody pos -- everything possible to uphold their basic rights. they will be relentless focus f our actions going forward. nothing is more than secretary of state and do right by the people working side by side with american diplomatic in our embassy and i can tell you, we are relentlessly focussed on getting the employees out of afghanistan and out of harm's way. let me leave it at that for now. >> i want too ask a more fundamental question about the taliban. your spokesperson said the fact the taliban are in charge in kabul but there is no legal recognized government by the y united states at this moment. it kind of begs the question why does the united states have to pay attention to what the taliban wants. it's sanctioned by many organizations. it's already losing access to afghan government resources because of its past and current behavior. why should the united states care what the taliban wants to be done at the airport or frankly anywhere else in the country since they are not in the u.s.'s eyes a legally recognized government? thank you. >> thank you. our focus right now is on getting our citizens and getting other partners, afghan partners, third country partners working in afghanistan with us out of the country and to safety. for that purpose, first the taliban whether we like it or not is in control, largely in control of the country. certainly control of the city of kabul and it's been important to work with them to try to facilitate an ensure departure of those who want the leave. that has been something that we have been focused on from the beginning of this operation because as a practical matter, it advances our interest. second, we have been engaged with the taliban for some time diplomatically going back years in efforts to try to advance a peaceful settlement of the conflict in afghanistan. there's still talks and conversations under way with regard to a transfer of power and some exclusivity in the government. i think were it possible to support those efforts. going forward, we will judge our engagement of taliban led government in afghanistan based on one simple proposition, our interest and does it help us advance them or not. seeing the rights of all afghans, especially women and girls are upholds then we'll do it. the nature of that engagement and the nature of any relationship depends entirely on the actions and contact of the taliban. if a future government upholds the basic right of the afghan people. if it maybes good on its commitments to ensure that afghanistan cannot be used as a launching bad for terrorist attacks directed against us in our allies and partners and in the first instance if it makes good on the commitment for people who want to leave afghanistan to leave, that's a government we can work with. if it doesn't, we will make sure we will use every appropriate tool at our disposal to isolate that government and as i said before, afghanistan will be. sgla withdrawal with taliban on the airport. >> thanks. >> there are very active efforts on the way, under way on the part of regional countries to see whether they can play a role in keeping the airport open once our military mission leaves or as necessary reopening if it closes for some period of time. that's happening very actively right now. the taliban made clear they have a strong interest in having a functioning airport. we and the rest of the international community have a strong interest in that. primarily for the purpose of making sure anyone who wants to leave can leave past the 31st using an airport. with regard to our own potential presence going forward after the 31st, we're looking at a number of options. >> thank you very much. >> thank you all very much. >> okay. you've been listening to secretary of state tony blinken bring us updated numbers which i think we have all been waiting for to know exactly how many americans, roughly, how many americans are still in afghanistan and how many have gotten out. i found that helpful. he said on august 14th, their analysis was 6,000 u.s. citizens were still there who wanted to leave. since then 4500 have evacuated and are working aggressively to be in contact with the remaining 1500. >> 500 of those 4500 had been evacuated in the last 24 hours. of the 1500 still in the country, still trying to get in contact with those thousands they had of meamericans seekingo leave lafg. he said multiple times a day through multiple channels of communication. >> let's bring in our panel to help us understand everything you just heard. i watched you all listening to secretary of state blinken. it does seem like he was pressed to answer a lot of questions and he provided a lot of answers. >> this main question as to how many americans are still in the country who want to leave was key here. what we have learned is that the united states believes there are no more than 1500 americans who are in the country and want the leave. there are 500 of those that the state department has been in contact with, given them directions for evacuation and there's another 1,000 in that group who they tried desperately to get in contact with. they don't know if those are all americans, if all of those americans want to leave the country. they're still trying to figure out just how many in that group of 1,000 want to leave. we know that 500 americans are part of the system and need flights out of the country. he said what they hope is those afterghans who want to leave th country will be able to do so. we still don't know how that will be possible because he talked about the united states being in touch with rejgional countries to try to keep the airport open once the military leaves on august 31st. there is no agreement as of yet. those afghans can't get to the airport if the taliban doesn't let them. even if they do get to the airport, they can't get out of the country if there's no flights. the other thing that was said is i take responsibility. i think that was significant. he was asked about the criticism of this administration. what they should have done to prepare for this better. what they didn't do enough of. he said he does take responsibility for that. he said president biden has taken responsibility. i think we have seen a slightly different tone from the president and from the white house on this. he said he's focused on this effort at hand and there will be time to look back and say what more could they have done to have made this process better than this complete nightmare that we have seen. they are really digging in trying to get this evacuation up and running before that august 31st deadline. >> secretary plblinken said the had asursurances that americans third country citizens, afghans who want to leave, will be allowed safe passage. how much credence should the u.s. give that promise in. >> i think we had a lot of assurances that things will be okay. >> all right, i have to interrupt you here. here is jen psaki at the white house. >> i know you were interested in what our secretary of state had to say. i know all of you have been following this quite closely but to reiterate, a total of 19,000 people were evacuated from kabul over a period of 24 hours. that ended early this morning. this is the result of 42 u.s. military flights which carried approximately 11,200 evacuees and 48 coalition flights for a total of 990 flights out of kabul. that's a flight every #90 minutes. duoot two other items. today we have announced new actions to protect vulnerable tenants and landlords. for months the administration has worked to speed up the delivery of emergency rental assistance as we talked about quite a bit and help keep americans safe and in their homes. no state or locality should delay in distributing resources that have been provided by congress to meet families of critical needs want to continue to take steps to make that easier. they are providing permission for grantees to use. in order to speed the delivery of assistance to households in need during the public health emergency. there are also a number of steps that are being taken by usda, hud, the va and hhs, including usda is working with owners of 400,000 rental units to mitigate all evictions. the va will expand rental support to at risk veterans from seven states to all 50 states. this is some of the examples of steps we're taking. go ahead. >> afghans with visas are risk death and facing beatings at the airport. if i'm framing this right but there's been since i heard from you and others in the administration that the taliban has met its commitment to allow people with the right papers onto the airport. can you help americans that are seeing and what seems to be a disconnect between these two different statements? what is happening? >> first, let me say i wouldn't see it as a disconnect. that does mean that a great number of people are making their way into the airport and onto flights to evacuate from the country. there are certainly cases and incidents. individuals are gnot getting through that should be getting through. 19,000 people in a period of time. the vast majority are afghans. siv applicants and individual who is have the appropriate paper work to evacuate. >> give us an update on where the president stands. >> he did not just receive a copy. he received a briefing yesterday on the 90-day origin. that's not information we would provide publicly because of the prioritization of this. i don't have a time line on when that will be provided. they have been working to prepare that. we have been doing classified briefings. >> without getting into details. is there a better understanding of what was the ultimate origin? >> i can't speak to a classified briefing. as soon as that is available, it will be put out from the intelligence community and we will ensure you have access to it. go ahead. >> secretary blinken just said and jake sullivan said the other day after august 31st, that the u.s. government the committed to helping after gaps afghans get safely. how do you do that if the military is gone? how do you safeguard the people without the u.s. military in the country? >> well, nancy, as you mentioned that the secretary was asked that. he didn't go into detail for reason. we having those discussions. what he assured the public of and i can reiterate from here is we are looking at range of options for how we can continue fro vied support, facilitate departure for those who wish to leave after august 31st. >> it sountds like there's 70,00 afghan who is have been evacuated. how do you vet all of those people in a timely fashion when th e -- working 24 hours a day to do the vetting necessary and reviews necessary to move people into the united states. now, i would remind you that there are a number of people, tens of thousands of people departing on afghanistan who are going to third countries. they only proceeded through serp steps of the immigrant visa process or the vetting process has not yet been completed. i can give you a bit more detail on the vetting process if that is helpful .