Illinois Valley Times

U.S. Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R - Rockford) has not been shy about his opposition to President Joe Biden's decision to withdraw troops from Afghanistan. After reportedly calling Biden's decision "short-sighted and a grave mistake" according to CNN, the Republican representative went on to say that the withdrawal is incredibly disappointing. 

"It is a tragic situation in Afghanistan [...]," Kinzinger said on April 14 on CNN. "But in the last 20 years we have not had a terrorist attack in the United States of America that was planned and executed out of Afghanistan."

Biden promised to pull all American troops out of Afghanistan by September, which would bring the two-decade-long conflict to an end. Kinzinger isn't the only Republican to criticize Biden's decision to withdraw from the war-ridden nation; according to reporting from The Guardian, Senate Minority Speaker Mitch McConnell and Sen. Lindsey Graham opposed Biden's decision, holding firm in the position that a U.S. presence in the East was necessary to "keep radical Islamic terrorism in check."

The representative has caught heat from his own family. In January, 11 of his relatives sent him a letter calling him a member of the "devil's army" after he wrote seething criticisms of Trump following the January insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. 

Kinzinger, an Iraq and Afghanistan veteran himself, said the withdrawal is sending the wrong message at the wrong time to world powers including China, Russia and Iran. 

"I fear this will be a repeat of what we saw in Iraq after the U.S. left," Kinzinger said. "We only had to go back with a bigger force."

Catalina Lauf, who plans to run for his seat in next year's Republican primary, criticized him this week for bashing former President Trump and other Republicans.