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(WASHINGTON) — With fewer than 4 in 10 Americans approving of President Joe Biden’s handling of Afghanistan, there is overwhelming bipartisan support for keeping U.S. troops in the country until all Americans and Afghans who aided the United States during the 20-year war have been evacuated, a new ABC News/Ipsos poll finds.

Although President Joe Biden has held firm that all U.S. troops must be out of the country by Tuesday, regardless of whether the evacuation mission at hand is complete, Americans broadly disagree, according to the poll.

The poll was conducted using Ipsos’ KnowledgePanel and all interviews were completed after the terrorist attack at Kabul’s Hamid Karzai International Airport that left at least 13 U.S. service members and 170 Afghans dead. Hundreds more were wounded in the attack, which an affiliate of the Islamic State, ISIS-K, claimed responsibility for.

More than 8 in 10 (84%) Americans think U.S. troops should remain in the country until all Americans are evacuated, and just over 7 in 10 (71%) think they should stay until all Afghans who helped the United States are evacuated as well.

Breaking from the typical polarization that characterizes public attitudes, support for U.S. troops staying is strikingly consistent across party lines. Among Republicans, Democrats and independents, overwhelming majorities — 87%, 86% and 86%, respectively — believe U.S. troops should not leave until all Americans are out of Afghanistan. The partisan gap is also negligible for keeping troops in Afghanistan until all Afghans who aided the United States are evacuated, with 77% of Republicans, 72% of Democrats and 70% of independents saying troops should stay until that happens.

Speaking about the attack Thursday, Biden said the mission’s danger is why he’s “been so determined to limit the duration” of it.

“The sooner we can finish the better. Each day of operations brings added risk to our troops,” the president said Tuesday, two days before the suicide bombing. “Every day we’re on the ground, is another day we know that ISIS-K is seeking to target the airport and attack both U.S. and allied forces and innocent civilians.”

In a statement Saturday afternoon following a meeting with his national security team, Biden said U.S. troops are continuing to evacuate civilians amid “extremely dangerous conditions,” warning that another attack is “highly likely in the next 24-36 hours.” Earlier Saturday, the U.S. Embassy in Kabul issued an alert similar to the one issued roughly 14 hours before Thursday’s terrorist attack warning of security threats at the airport, telling all U.S. citizens to avoid the area or “leave immediately” if at the gates. In the evening, the U.S. embassy issued an updated warning of a “specific, credible threat” at the airport.

Fewer than 4 in 10 (38%) Americans approve of the president’s handling of Afghanistan — 17 points lower than the share who said they approved of Biden’s handling of the U.S. troop withdrawal in a July 23-24 ABC News/Ipsos poll.

While Sunday’s ABC News/Ipsos did not measure Biden’s overall approval, FiveThirtyEight’s tracker averaging presidential approval polls showed his approve-disapprove ratings were even for the first time during his term, converging at 47%-47% as of Friday.

But the public’s disapproval of his handling of Afghanistan has not influenced their views on other issues, according to the new ABC News/Ipsos poll. A strong majority (64%) approve of how Biden is responding to the coronavirus pandemic, which is virtually identical to the findings in July’s ABC News/Ipsos poll. Biden also enjoys high approval (62%) for his handling of rebuilding U.S. infrastructure.

A majority (55%) of the American public also approves of his handling of the economic recovery; 53% approved in July’s poll. About 4 in 10 (41%) approve of his handling of immigration and the situation at the southern border, compared to 37% last month.

On his handling of gun violence and crime, issues that track closely with one another, about half of Americans disapprove — 52% and 50%, respectively. But this actually represents an improvement since July, when 61% of Americans disapproved of Biden’s handling of gun violence and 58% disapproved of his handling of crime, according to the July ABC News/Ipsos poll.

For each issue, at least two-thirds of Democrats approve of how Biden is handling them. His highest approval ratings among his own party are for his handling of COVID-19 (91%), infrastructure (91%) and the economic recovery (89%), and his lowest approval ratings — each at 67% — are for his handling of the border, gun violence and Afghanistan.

Among the key group of independents, approval ratings track closely with the results among the public overall for each issue.

Fewer than a third of Republicans approve of Biden’s handling of each issue, but he gets the highest marks for his handling of the pandemic response (32%). On his handling of Afghanistan, only 1 in 10 (11%) Republicans approve, his lowest mark of the issues polled.

While two-thirds (67%) of Americans are at least somewhat worried about a major terrorist attack in the United States, Republicans are more likely to be concerned than Democrats and independents, 80% compared to 59% and 65%, respectively.

But even after the deadly terrorist attack in Kabul, the public has a lower level of concern for a major terrorist attack at home than during other times in recent years when it was measured by ABC News/Washington Post polls. In October 2014, about 7 in 10 (71%) of Americans were worried about an attack in the United States; in January 2015, about three-quarters were worried; and in September 2016, the last time this question was asked in ABC News polling, nearly 8 in 10 (78%) were worried.

A majority (56%) of Americans also feel that the end of the United States’ military presence in Afghanistan makes no difference in how safe the nation is from terrorism. Over a third (36%) feel this makes the United States less safe from terrorism, but again, Republicans are more likely than Democrats and independents to think it makes America less safe, 59% compared to 21% and 36%.

METHODOLOGY – This ABC News/Ipsos poll was conducted by Ipsos Public Affairs’ KnowledgePanel® Aug. 27-28, 2021, in English and Spanish, among a random national sample of 513 adults. Results have a margin of sampling error of 4.9 points, including the design effect. Partisan divisions are 31%-24%-36%, Democrats-Republicans-independents. See the poll’s topline results and details on the methodology here.

ABC News’ Dan Merkle and Ken Goldstein contributed to this report.

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(WASHINGTON) — Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., accused President Joe Biden and his administration for painting a rosier picture of the Afghanistan evacuations as the Aug. 31 U.S. troop withdrawal looms.

“There is clearly no plan. There has been no plan. Their plan has basically been happy talk,” Sasse told ABC “This Week” co-anchor Martha Raddatz.

In an earlier interview with Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Raddatz pressed the secretary about the United States’ ability to get the remaining U.S. citizens and Afghan allies out of the country once all U.S. troops where out of Afghanistan.

Blinken pointed to private and public assurances from Taliban leadership to allow free travel after America’s departure to anyone who wishes to leave the country. Sasse called the interview “disgusting” and he said the thinking that the U.S. should trust the Taliban is “stupid” and “insane.”

“And their plan still seems to be, ‘let’s rely on the Taliban’ because the Taliban cares a lot about what world opinion thinks of them — it was a disgusting revelation of yet again no plan,” Sasse added.

The senator, who serves on the Senate Intelligence Committee, has been critical of the U.S. troop withdrawal from Afghanistan since the final months of the Trump administration.

“I fear this weak retreat is not grounded in reality and will make the world a more dangerous place,” Sasse said in a statement in November 2020.

In the last few days, Sasse has repeatedly urged Biden to keep troops in Afghanistan past Tuesday’s deadline to ensure that every U.S citizen and ally who wants to leave the country is safely evacuated.

Raddatz asked the senator Sunday what he thinks should be done to continue evacuations.

“There are some small ways to try to do things around the margins. But what we need is a commander in chief that actually has a big plan and a big way to solve this problem,” Sasse responded, accusing Biden of being “disconnected from reality.”

Sasse continued to hammer the “happy talk” he claimed is being used by Biden and that he said won’t resolve the growing terror threat in Afghanistan.

“The consequences are going to be a return of the Taliban that has been willing to provide safe haven to terrorists in the past,” Sasse added. “We have so many different groups who want to turn Afghanistan into the global capital city of jihad, and the administration doesn’t have a plan.”

Raddatz asked Sasse whether his plea to keep more U.S. forces in Afghanistan past the Tuesday deadline would put them at risk.

“Given that the Taliban said this date was a red line, given that ISIS is now carrying out these horrendous bombings and threatening more violence, wouldn’t staying have put our forces more at risk?” Raddatz asked.

“Joe Biden put our forces at risk by having no plan for how to evacuate. We are absolutely at risk,” Sasse responded.

“Abandoning Bagram base will be read about in military textbooks for decades as one of the stupidest military blunders ever,” Sasse continued, adding that the rapid reduction of U.S. forces in Afghanistan has left a “ridiculously untenable position” for evacuations.

“Thirteen servicemen and women died this week, and our families across this country are in prayer for those families and for the ultimate sacrifice they have made, but they were doing something to make sure that no one was left behind,” Sasse said.

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(WASHINGTON) — Hours after President Joe Biden issued a dire warning that it was “highly likely” the Kabul airport could see another attack in the 24 to 36 hours leading up to the final U.S. troop withdrawal, Secretary of State Antony Blinken underscored the warning in an interview for ABC’s “This Week.”

“This is the most dangerous time in an already extraordinarily dangerous mission, these last couple of days. And so, we will do everything possible to keep people safe. But the risk is very high,” Blinken told ‘This Week’ Co-Anchor Martha Raddatz.

The Pentagon confirmed Saturday that the final drawdown of troops had begun, intensifying pressure on the United States to evacuate the remaining Americans looking to leave the country as the terror threat is ratcheted to new heights.

Blinken, who met with the president and top commanders at the White House Saturday morning, said the U.S. was doing “everything possible” to get the remaining Americans safely out of the country.

“We have about 300 American citizens left who have indicated to us that they want to leave. We are very actively working to help them get to the airport, get on a plane and get out of Afghanistan,” Biden’s top diplomat said.

The new warnings of possible attacks come as the country is still reeling from the bombing at Kabul’s airport Thursday that killed 13 U.S. service members, and more than 170 Afghans, even after the U.S. Embassy issued a warning of the urgent threat at the airport.

“The hard reality of this mission is that at a certain point, direct contact was necessary between our people, our men and women in uniform, and those coming into the airport,” Blinken said, when pressed by Raddatz why more steps weren’t taken to ensure troop security after the warning went out.

“Whenever you have something as horrific as this, anytime we have a loss of life, we’re going to go back and look very hard at what was done, and whether anything could have been done better,” Blinken said, again stressing the dangerous mission at hand.

But with a ticking clock, and the administration committed to keeping their Aug. 31 deadline for all troops to leave Afghanistan, real questions remain about the United States’ ability to get any remaining Americans and Afghan allies out of a country under Taliban control once U.S. troops are gone.

Blinken pointed to private and public assurances from Taliban leadership to allow free travel after America’s departure as a reassurance that there would be ways out of Kabul — a suggestion many fearing retribution for helping the United States take little comfort in.

“They’re not reassured — those Afghan interpreters who aren’t getting out, they’re not reassured by a statement like that. So what more can you tell them (about) how to get out?” Raddatz asked.

“One hundred and fourteen countries have made very clear that it’s their expectation that the Taliban will permit people to travel, going past Aug. 31. So, that is a clear expectation, across the entire world, across the entire international community,” Blinken argued.

“We have very significant leverage to work with over the weeks and months ahead to incentivize the Taliban to make good on its commitments,” he added, noting the U.S. has been “actively planning” to keep Kabul’s airport functioning, or reopening it quickly if needed, in conjunction with other countries in the region.

“If the Taliban is serious about the commitments that it’s repeatedly made in public, including nationally, across the country, as well as in private — commitments that the international community intends to hold the Taliban to — then we’ll find ways to do it,” Blinken said.

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.