I'm John Batchel with my colleague Bill Rajo, Senior Fellow Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

I recommend Generation Jihad podcast, his conversation with his colleagues about the Taliban

and their relationship to al-Qaeda.

Here in the eve of an election, the two campaigns, one will be the new president

in 2025. The Harris campaign, the vice president's campaign, do we have any indication of

their approach to the al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan bill.

I believe that the Harris campaign, we have no indication because Afghanistan is not a

point of discussion with either candidate.

I don't see the Harris team being more forward-leaning than the Biden administration. The reality is that the Democrats

want Afghanistan to go away, recognizing that training camps, al-Qaeda training camps are prevalent

throughout Afghanistan is a direct admission of the failure of U.S. Afghan policy. Because remember,

President Biden told us that the Taliban

eliminated al-Qaeda, that Afghanistan is no longer a threat, that that endless war of Afghanistan

is over. It's not over. It's just a different phase. It's a phase of consolidation for the Taliban,

for, and particularly for al-Qaeda and other jihadist groups.

And a Biden administration and a Harris administration are not going to want to admit their

failures. What politician wants to admit failure? And the fact that al-Qaeda has strong links

to al-Qaeda operations in East Africa and West Africa?

Will that be an issue for the Harris administration?

I mean, it should be, but the problem I've learned doing this job for almost two decades, John, is that Africa is at such a low priority for U.S. policymakers and politicians that unless American soldiers

are killed there or American personnel are killed there, like what happened in Niger several

years back in a fight with the Islamic State, that policymakers are perfectly fine with just

...