The Afghan man alleged to have shot two National Guardsmen near the White House had his asylum approved by the Trump administration earlier this year, according to reports.
The suspect has been identified by multiple law enforcement sources and media outlets as 29-year-old Rahmanullah Lakanwal. According to CNN, fingerprints matched a man of that name who fled to the U.S. during the Taliban takeover of his homeland in 2021.
Lakanwal, the outlet reported, had “applied for asylum in 2024, and it was granted by the Trump administration in April 2025.”
ABC News also identified the suspect as Lakanwal, reporting three law enforcement sources who said his asylum was approved in April 2025.
While not naming Lakanwal, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem confirmed on X that the suspect had arrived “under Operation Allies Welcome on September 8, 2021.”
The shooting unfolded by the Farragut West Metro entrance around 2:15 p.m. on Wednesday. Officials said the West Virginia Guardsmen—a woman and a man on “high-visibility patrols” in the capital—were initially fired upon before subduing the gunman, who was also hospitalized.
Both Guardsmen remain in critical condition, and the suspect is in custody after being wounded following the incident. Authorities have not publicly released the Guardsmen’s identities.
Officials have not announced a motive. The FBI is probing whether the attack could have international terror links, ABC reported.
Following the shooting, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced it was halting, “effective immediately,” the processing of immigration requests relating to Afghan nationals pending a security review.
President Donald Trump, 79, delivered a late-night address from Florida calling the ambush “an act of terror,” vowing to “re-examine every single alien” who entered from Afghanistan and to send 500 more Guard troops to Washington.
“He was flown in by the Biden administration in September 2021, on those infamous flights that everybody was talking about,” Trump said.
“Nobody knew who was coming in. Nobody knew anything about it. His status was extended under legislation signed by President Biden, a disastrous President, the worst in the history of our country.”
He added, “If they can’t love our country, we don’t want them. “America will never bend and never yield in the face of terror. And at the same time, we will not be deterred from the mission the service members were so nobly fulfilling.”
Trump announced that his “Department of War” would send 500 more troops to Washington.
Noem also blamed the Biden-era program: “The suspect who shot our brave National Guardsmen is an Afghan national who was one of the many unvetted, mass paroled into the United States...under the Biden Administration,” she wrote on X, in a post which drew immediate pushback from critics who pointed out that the asylum approval had occurred this year.
Declining to name Lakanwal, she added, “I will not utter this depraved individual’s name. He should be starved of the glory he so desperately wants.”
Before moving to America, Lakanwal had served alongside U.S. Special Forces troops in Afghanistan, NBC reported, per a close relative and CIA Director John Ratcliffe.
Intelligence sources told Fox News Digital that Lakanwal had worked “with various entities in the U.S. government, including the CIA, due to his work as a member of a partner force in Kandahar.”
Ratcliffe told the outlet: “In the wake of the disastrous Biden withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Biden administration justified bringing the alleged shooter to the United States in September 2021 due to his prior work with the U.S. government, including CIA, as a member of a partner force in Kandahar, which ended shortly following the chaotic evacuation.”
A White House official said that, as President, Joe Biden entered into the 2023 Ahmed Court Settlement, meaning that, regardless of his asylum status, Lakanwal would not have been removed due to his parole status.
They added that the Democrats had “sued the Trump administration relentlessly and blocked us in court repeatedly every time we have tried to revoke parole status.”
White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson told the Daily Beast: “This animal would’ve never been here if not for Joe Biden’s dangerous policies, which allowed countless unvetted criminals to invade our country and harm the American people.”
