But when Naser showed up at the San Diego courthouse this June, he learned his by-the-book efforts had been for naught. The government announced it was dismissing his case requesting asylum because the Department of Homeland Security claimed his notice to appear had been “improvidently issued,” a rationale the agency has begun invoking in asylum cases to the confusion of immigration lawyers. Within minutes, two masked Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials detained and handcuffed him in the courthouse hallway.

“I worked with the US military,” court observers recorded Naser saying over and over as ICE officers led him away. “I didn’t even know this was going to happen.”

When Navy veteran Shawn VanDiver heard about Naser’s case, he was outraged. He couldn’t believe how government officials were treating someone who’d risked his life to help US service members. Along with fellow veteran Kyleanne Hunter, VanDiver created Battle Buddies, an organization that’s recruiting US veterans all over the country to stand with Afghans in immigration court.

Since VanDiver launched the program in June, over 1,000 vets have signed up to serve as Battle Buddies.

Battle Buddies continues the US tradition of “accompaniment programs” that help recent arrivals navigate the immigration system. But at a time when the government is denying immigrants’ due process rights, Battle Buddies is fulfilling an urgent need for court observers who can hold officials accountable. For threatened Afghan asylum-seekers, it’s the kind of local, volunteer-based resistance that could potentially mean the difference between deportation and freedom.

“We know that veterans in particular are well regarded by the American public,” VanDiver says. “We thought that we could show up not in protest but in solidarity, saying, ‘These folks are with us. They matter to us.’”

VanDiver has worked to do right by Afghan allies since retiring from the Navy. During the 2021 US withdrawal from Afghanistan, he founded an organization called AfghanEvac, which collaborated with the National Security Council to ensure Afghans’ safe resettlement in the United States, where about 200,000 Afghan refugees have relocated in the past few years.

When Donald Trump cruised to election victory with “mass deportation now” rhetoric, VanDiver knew Afghan allies would be under threat, especially after the administration announced its intent to end relocation programs for Afghans. Naser’s San Diego case channeled VanDiver’s simmering anger into action. He posted about Naser’s plight on social media, and as his posts racked up views and likes, he realized how many others felt strongly about safeguarding Afghans who had served alongside American soldiers.

So he called his friend Kyleanne Hunter, an Afghanistan Marine Corps veteran. “I said, ‘Hey, what do you think about us doing a joint effort here? These guys stood with us shoulder to shoulder while we served. I think it would be useful to show up to court with them shoulder to shoulder.’”

US Marines, with the help of an Afghan translator, interviewed a local man in Helmand province on Dec. 11, 2009.Kevin Frayer

It helps that public opinion is in VanDiver’s favor: In a recent poll, 84 percent of Americans supported allowing Afghan allies to resettle in the United States. The bipartisan Enduring Welcome Act of 2025, introduced in Congress this year, would establish a national office supporting US efforts to relocate Afghan allies, while the Afghan Adjustment Act would give them a pathway to secure permanent resident status without having to navigate the backlogged asylum system. However, these bills are far from guaranteed to become law, because of the Trump administration’s hostility to pro-immigration measures.

Given the precarious status of arrivals like Naser, Hunter and VanDiver decided to structure Battle Buddies as an emergency matchmaking service. When VanDiver launched the official website, he created two online forms: one for would-be volunteer Battle Buddies and one for Afghan immigrants who have upcoming court dates or immigration appointments. “If we have Battle Buddies near you,” he says, ”we can arrange for someone to accompany you.”

Before new volunteers make their first court appearances, Battle Buddies walks them through an in-depth online training process that stresses safety and decorum. “You’re not lawyers, you’re not there to speak on anybody’s behalf. You are there to just show up in solidarity,” VanDiver says.

Among the first, most enthusiastic Battle Buddies volunteers was James Seddon, a Navy veteran who had worked with VanDiver on AfghanEvac. He felt strongly about the venture because he’d served with Afghan allies and seen the sacrifices they made for the US war effort.

“This idea that there were Afghan allies who stood with us — it sounds very academic,” says Seddon, who watched local allies die under enemy fire. “When you’re holding an Afghan who’s bleeding to death because they were standing with America, it makes it viscerally real.”

Although it’s nothing like an overseas deployment, Battle Buddies service is not for the faint of heart. Courtroom visits can be quite intimidating, says Amanda, a veteran and Battle Buddy who doesn’t want her full name used for fear of retaliation. Even if Afghan arrivals have followed all the required procedures, they are at real risk of being arrested at their immigration appointments, making the atmosphere spiky and unpredictable.

When Amanda, James Seddon, and others came to the San Diego court to stand with an Afghan ally who goes by Abdul, they were not allowed to enter the courtroom itself. Though Amanda wore a cap showing her military affiliation, she says that ICE officials on site tried to intimidate her and other volunteers. ”We were basically surrounded. There was a guy that would walk up and down the hall, periodically telling us not to lean on the wall.” One ICE official, Seddon says, ordered him to move because he was blocking a door, even though he was not doing so.

In the end, Abdul was allowed to return home that day.

Seddon can’t say for sure why he made it out when others in similar situations have faced arrest. But he thinks it’s possible the Battle Buddies’ presence made a difference — and research suggests people are less likely to behave unethically when they know they’re being observed. As of this writing, VanDiver says, no Afghan ally who has shown up in court with Battle Buddies has been detained or deported.

“When our guy came out of the appointment, I stood right next to him. And if they wanted to get to him, they were going to have to move me,” Seddon says. “There was no way I was going to get in a fight with ICE. But if ICE was going to try something, it wasn’t going to be unwitnessed. We were going to make noise about it.”

Afghan villagers looked at a translator for the US military in Kandahar on Sept. 24, 2012.TONY KARUMBA

To that end, Battle Buddies asks volunteers who are comfortable doing so to record a video of themselves before or after their court appearance, stating their reasons for showing up that day — and, if relevant, what they observed in the courtroom.

“These are US citizens, American veterans, who are safe,” says Boston-based Battle Buddies communications lead Jessica Bradley Rushing. “Their faces and their stories are the way that we’re able to tell the story of the Afghans who are in danger.”

A country that keeps its word

Though Battle Buddies’ recruitment has succeeded with flying colors, VanDiver is intent on ramping up still more. Because many Afghans’ temporary protected status expired this year, “a lot of folks are going to be having to go to court,” VanDiver says. ”We’re trying to scale it up as much as possible.”

In recent weeks, Battle Buddies has matched Afghan allies to volunteers in a number of cities, including Washington, D.C.; Charlotte, N.C.; Houston; and San Antonio. Battle Buddies chiefly recruits veterans, but civilians can also volunteer to accompany immigrants to court through outfits like Love Resists, run by the Boston-based Unitarian Universalist Association, and the Migrant Accompaniment Network, a Jesuit Refugee Service project.

For Sayed Naser, whose case inspired Battle Buddies, things are looking up. After being detained at a San Diego immigration facility since June, Naser was finally released on Sept. 26 thanks to a habeas corpus petition his lawyer filed, which prompted Judge Gonzalo Curiel’s verdict that his detention violated due process standards. The court placed him back on humanitarian parole status as he awaits the results of his asylum case. “I do not feel betrayed,” Naser said at an Oct. 2 press conference in San Diego. “I feel hopeful because of how many Americans stood up for me when I was arrested.”

VanDiver and Rushing hope many others like Naser can remain here if people keep demanding that the US government fulfill its promises.

“The idea of America for two hundred and some-odd years has been a country that shows up, that backs up their word, that takes care of their friends, that leaves no one behind,” VanDiver says. Many Afghan allies, despite everything, want to see the United States as that country — and for Battle Buddies volunteers, each court appearance is a declaration that it still is.