In Washington DC, the early winter wind carved through the streets like a warning, carrying with it the uneasy hum of a nation on edge. Sirens pierced the evening calm, bouncing between the stone façades of federal buildings, signalling a tragedy that would soon unravel into one of the most consequential political storms of Trump’s second presidency. Hours earlier, two National Guard soldiers had been shot near a routine security post—a place considered so safe that soldiers sometimes joked it was the “quietest corner” of their duty hours. But that illusion shattered when bullets tore through the air, leaving one soldier dead, another clinging to life, and a shaken city searching for answers.
As first responders swarmed the scene, news cameras flickered to life. What initially seemed like a localised, criminal incident soon spiralled into a national earthquake when federal officials identified the suspect: Rahmanullah Lakanwal, an Afghan national who had once worked with the CIA’s elite Zero Unit. That revelation ignited a fierce political blaze—one that President Donald Trump would seize as a catalyst for sweeping, immediate action.
Inside the White House, the tension was palpable. Amid flickering screens showing breaking news banners, President Trump appeared before reporters, delivering a televised address that resembled the opening act of a political thriller. His voice was stern, measured, and unyielding as he spoke of “social dysfunction,” “security failures,” and a need to “permanently pause migration from all Third World Countries.” Within hours, that phrase echoed across networks and social platforms, triggering shockwaves at home and abroad.
Then came the next hammer blow.
At the Department of Homeland Security, USCIS director Joseph Edlow stepped before cameras and announced what would become one of the most controversial immigration decisions in modern US history:
All asylum decisions—approvals, denials, closures—were halted.
Every case, regardless of nationality, was frozen in time.
It was as if a giant hand had slammed the brakes on the lives of thousands.
For officers inside USCIS, the directive felt surreal. They could work through files, review documents, assemble reports. But they could not decide anything. Asylum seekers from every corner of the world—families, dissidents, war survivors—were suddenly suspended in limbo.
The official justification was clear enough: “until we can ensure that every alien is vetted and screened to the maximum degree possible.” But the silence behind what this meant in practice—how long it would last, who would be affected, how cases would restart—left the country in a haze of uncertainty. Even seasoned immigration lawyers admitted they had never encountered a freeze this broad, this fast, and this indefinite.
In the days leading up to this decree, smaller tremors had already signalled the coming quake. Immediately after the shooting, the administration shut down visa processing for Afghans who had entered under the same programme as the suspect. Soon after, all Afghan immigration requests were suspended pending review. Then, in a move that rippled with political undertones, USCIS announced it would re-examine green cards from individuals of 19 countries—an expansive list that included Afghanistan, Iran, Somalia, Haiti, Cuba, and Venezuela.
For many, these rapid-fire decisions felt less like policy-making and more like wartime command shifts—swift, sweeping, unpredictable.
Trump’s political allies applauded. Critics warned of constitutional challenges. Human rights organisations sounded alarms. And yet, the administration pressed forward with the momentum of a story accelerating toward its climax.
Back in Afghanistan, the story of Rahmanullah Lakanwal took on a haunting tone. He had once served in Zero Units—covert Afghan forces trained, funded, and partnered with the CIA. By all accounts, they were considered among the most skilled and reliable Afghan operatives. A senior US official confirmed that Lakanwal had gone through multiple layers of vetting before ever setting foot on American soil. A childhood friend told reporters that he had long struggled with psychological wounds from his wartime service—shadows that had followed him across continents.
He applied for asylum in 2024 and was granted it after Trump returned to office. His green card request was still pending. Until Wednesday, he was another immigrant trying to start over, carrying memories that would never fully leave him.
But now his actions—his violence, his instability—were standing trial before the entire nation.
As reporters pieced together fragments of his past, Trump used the moment to push for even broader changes. On Thursday, he vowed to “end all federal benefits and subsidies to non-citizens,” urging Americans to see migration as an economic drain. The rhetoric sharpened. The language hardened. The political theatre intensified.
Opposing voices challenged the narrative. Jeremy McKinney, president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, cautioned on BBC World Service that the tragedy was being weaponised. “Mental illness and radicalisation can affect anyone,” he said. “These issues don’t know skin colour, they don’t know nationality.”
But his words struggled to compete with the rising tide of fear, grief, and political momentum.
Even as the UN urged the United States to uphold international asylum obligations, the White House doubled down. Every statement, every proclamation, every policy that followed pointed in one direction: a dramatic tightening of America’s immigration system.
A freeze on asylum decisions was only the latest, and perhaps the most dramatic, act in this unfolding saga.
In immigrant communities across the US—Somali parents in Minnesota, Venezuelan families in Miami, Afghan evacuees in Virginia—the mood shifted overnight. Conversations in living rooms, mosques, and community centres reflected a growing worry:
Would they be next? Would their documents be reviewed? Delayed? Rejected? Would they still belong?
Inside USCIS offices, the atmosphere resembled a machine forced into standby mode. Case officers who had spent months reviewing testimonies, documents, interviews, trauma histories now found their work paused in place—files open but frozen, lives suspended mid-sentence.
Meanwhile, pundits on every major network dissected the legal path ahead. Some predicted federal courts would intervene. Others said the administration had the authority to implement such pauses under national security grounds. Law professors described the situation as “uncharted territory.”
But beyond the legal debates, one truth hovered like a shadow:
The shooting in Washington DC had become more than a crime. It was now the catalyst for one of the most sweeping immigration shifts in years.
Across the country, people waited.
Asylum seekers waited for decisions that would not come.
USCIS agents waited for orders that had not been fully explained.
Lawyers waited for guidelines that remained vague.
And America waited to see what this pause would eventually give way to—whether it was a temporary precaution, or the beginning of a new era in US immigration.
In the quiet wake of the storm, as flags fluttered over federal buildings and vigils were held for the slain National Guard soldier, one question remained unanswered—not by officials, not by reporters, not even by the President:
Was this pause a moment of necessity… or the opening scene of a much larger story still unfolding?
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