washington us president joe biden is battling a serious loss of personal credibility and political capital after some of his assertions on afghanistan have been contradicted by his own administration by the us military and by ground realities bumbling through a white house press conference on friday biden claimed that the us mission in afghanistan was essentially over since osama bin laden had been killed and alqaida was gone from the country but pentagon officials said soon after that alqaida as well as isis remain a presence in afghanistan in a report released in june the united nations too said taliban and alqaida remain closely aligned and show no indication of breaking tiesmember states report no material change to this relationship which has grown deeper as a consequence of personal bonds of marriage and shared partnership in struggle now cemented through second generational ties the un report had said administration officials later finessed the presidents remarks saying he meant alqaida had been degraded to the point where it longer presented a threat to the homeland but critics pilloried the president for a verbal overreach to justify the hasty us withdrawal that his supporters pin on commitments made by his predecessor donald trump biden also suggested that americans stranded in afghanistan could get to the kabul airport for evacuation without much difficulty and taliban was being cooperative in letting them through but ground reports spoke of a hurdles on this front with sporadic attacks on americans trying to reach the airport in fact the us embassy on friday explicitly asked its citizens to avoid traveling to the airport because of potential security threats outside the gates unless you receive individual instructions from a us government representative to do somid the chaos on the afghanistan front the president was panned for planning to resume his vacation although aides say he remains on top of the situation pointing to his return to the white house on friday and the fact that his home state delaware is barely an hour away from the capital biden cancelled his vacation following the criticismon saturday the president convened a online national security meeting and was joined by among others vicepresident kamala harris who is also being criticized for embarking on a trip to south east asia amid the crisis in afghanistan a political brawl is also brewing at home over the refugee issue with some rightwing commentators stoking nativists fears over the influx of afghan refugees even though many moderate republicans support giving asylum to afghans who helped us forces during its mission fox news pundit tucker carlson was among those who suggested the biden administration was opening the flood gates to refugees to change the demographic balance of the country the us state department has approved 34500 special immigrant visas or sivs for afghans who assisted the us military over two decades and another 20000 were in the pipeline waiting for approval but the process of evacuating them has been slow amid demands at home