Kamlager-Dove Celebrates Committee Passage of Bill to Protect Afghan Women and Girls

March 26, 2026 Press Release WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today, the House Foreign Affairs Committee passed legislation offered by Representative Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D, CA-37), Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on South and Central Asia, to protect Afghan women and girls. Rep. Kamlager-Dove's Rejecting the Erasure of Afghan and Women and Girls Act passed through committee with strong bipartisan support. The bill is cosponsored by House Foreign Affairs Committee Ranking Member Gregory Meeks (NY-05) , South and Central Asia Subcommittee Chair Bill Huizenga (R, MI-04) , along with Representatives Mike Lawler (R, NY-17) , Amata Radewagen (R, AS-AL) , Randy Fine (R, FL-06) , Darrel Issa (CA-38), María Elvira Salazar (R, FL-27) , and Brad Sherman (D, CA-32) . Image Congresswoman Kamlager-Dove also met with three Afghan girls pursuing the education they were denied by the Taliban here in the U.S., who were in attendance at the markup during the moment the bill passed. “No one has suffered more under Taliban rule than Afghan women and girls, who face greater restrictions on their humanity and autonomy than anywhere else on the planet,” said Congresswoman Kamlager-Dove . “The Taliban has stripped Afghan women of nearly every right they are entitled to as human beings: education, employment, freedom of speech, freedom of movement, and freedom of religion. They even criminalized women’s voices and faces. The Foreign Affairs Committee’s passage of this legislation sends a forceful message to the Taliban that Congress will not back down in our support for Afghan women. I am grateful to Chairman Mast and Ranking Member Meeks for bringing my bill to markup, and to my Subcommittee Chair, Congressman Huizenga, for his continued principled leadership and cosponsorship of my legislation.” H.R. 7669, the Rejecting the Erasure of Afghan and Women and Girls Act, would: Require the State Department to document Taliban abuses against women and girls and determine whether those conditions constitute torture, crimes against humanity, or a gross violation of human rights; Make it the policy of the United States that the U.S. will not recognize the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan absent meaningful protections for Afghan women’s human rights; and Urge the Secretary of State to support efforts to document Taliban human rights abuses and to promote international support for the education of Afghan women and girls. The House Foreign Affairs Committee voted to report H.R. 7669 as amended favorably to the House by a vote of 44 - 2. Full text of the original bill can be found here , and the amendments adopted by the committee can be found here and here . ###