Biden called the families of 3 Americans held by the Taliban to tell them he had not reached an agreement on their release

In a roughly 30-minute phone call Sunday afternoon, President Biden delivered the difficult news to the families of three Americans being held by the Taliban. He had no deal with the Taliban to free their loved ones from captivity, despite what U.S. officials described to CBS News as a significant U.S. offer in Doha days earlier. The US considers Ryan Corbett and George Glezmann to have been unjustly detained by the Taliban, and describes Mahmood Habibi, who holds dual US and Afghan citizenship, as “unjustly detained” since 2022.

Ahmad Shah Habibi, Mahmood Habibi’s brother, told CBS News that during the conversation, Mr. Biden clarified that he would not agree to the Taliban’s request that the US release Muhammad Rahim al-Afghani, a prisoner at Guantanamo Bay, unless the Taliban, now the government of Afghanistan, also released Mahmood. An NSC spokesman declined to respond to CBS’ inquiry about that specific claim.

Mahmood Habibi disappeared in Afghanistan in 2022, and the Taliban denied abducting him. ua public notice released by the FBI in August 2024, the agency said it “believes” Habibi was abducted by Taliban military or security forces and “has not been heard from since his disappearance.” The FBI said in its notice that Habibi was working as a contractor for a telecom company based in Kabul when he disappeared.

The Taliban still say they do not have Habibi in custody.

“No, we don’t have it,” Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid told CBS News on Monday.

Asked if Mahmoud had disappeared in Afghanistan, Mujahid said: “That’s not clear either, because we didn’t know him before.”

Ahmad Habibi told CBS News: “My family fully believes that my brother is alive. There are things that neither we nor the US government can say publicly, but Mahmood’s case is different from the other two Americans.”

“We know that other families are desperate to bring their loved ones home and I told the president that we want them home too,” Ahmad Habibi added. “But anyone speculating that my brother is dead is only supporting the Taliban’s claims. We are grateful that President Biden has pledged not to leave Mahmood behind,” and said national security adviser Jake Sullivan had also made similar assurances.

The FBI declined to comment.

Corbettfluent in Pashto, he was working for local NGOs before starting a microcredit and consulting business in Kabul when he was arrested with three associates – one German and two Afghans – during a business trip to northern Afghanistan in 2022.

Glezmann is an Atlanta native who was detained while on a tourist visit in December 2022.

The family of Ryan Corbett is publicly calling on Mr. Biden to consider a deal to bring him and Glezmann home.

“We hope that President Biden will have the courage to take the deal in front of him, given that the lives of several Americans rest on his shoulders,” Erin Pelton, a spokeswoman for the Corbett family, told CBS News.

Corbett’s wife, Anna Corbett, described the conversation with the president during an appearance on Fox News on Monday.

“He was very kind and empathetic, but what I heard him say was that he wasn’t going to bring Ryan home, and that was devastating,” Anna Corbett said. She blamed Mr. Biden because he refused to agree to the Taliban terms of the deal. “It’s not being taken and it’s incredibly difficult for our family.”

In recent days, she launched a public campaign to urge the new administration to press for her husband’s release, and traveled to President-elect Donald Trump’s Mar-A-Lago residence in hopes of making a personal plea to Trump. Neither Mr. Biden nor Mr. Trump has yet met with her.

Anna Corbett told Fox News that Trump sent new national security adviser and current Florida Rep. Mike Waltz to meet with her. She said he spent more than an hour listening to her family’s story. She expressed frustration that it took more than a year to get a similar meeting with the current national security adviser, Jake Sullivan.

The Taliban are demanding that the US release Muhammed Rahim al-Afghani, who is being held indefinitely at Guantanamo Bay. A source familiar with his case said the US intelligence community and the Pentagon oppose Rahim’s release and cannot guarantee he no longer poses a threat to the US. However, the president could waive this if he concluded that it was in the US interest to finalize the prisoner exchange.

Rahim was captured by the CIA in Pakistan in 2007 and was the last prisoner sent to Guantanamo Bay by the Bush administration in 2008. He was never indicted for war crimes, but the Periodic Review Board deemed his continued detention a national security concern. His Intelligence Profile 2016 describes him as a courier for Al Qaeda.

In its statement confirming the phone call, the White House also noted that Mr. Biden was able to bring home American citizens who were detained before the US withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021. Corbett, Glezmann and Habibi were detained after traveling to Afghanistan following the Taliban’s return to power. That the rise of the Taliban followed by a diplomatic agreement negotiated by Trump administration the withdrawal of US troops and a surprisingly strong Taliban military offensive that caught the Biden administration off guard, leading to a hasty and chaotic Evacuation of the USA. Not wanting to be without American troops, NATO forces also withdrew.

The US does not officially recognize the Taliban, with their appalling human rights record, as the legitimate government of Afghanistan, but is in contact with their leaders through US agencies, as well as through the Qatari government. Last weekend in Doha, special presidential envoy Roger Carstens and NSC official Jen Daskal sought a deal with the Taliban to free the Americans.

A US official described the Doha meetings as unsuccessful but declined to say which other individuals the Biden administration was willing to offer to the Taliban as part of a potential trade. The White House described Biden’s efforts as continuing through the end of his term.

Mr. Biden has devoted a large part of his career to foreign policy, and that part his legacy it is extremely important to him. In a speech Monday at the State Department, the president will describe America’s chaotic exit from Afghanistan, arguably his biggest foreign policy failure, as a successful end to America’s longest war.

contributed to this report.