Faculty Sponsor: Logan Dancey
Abstract: In this project, we employ topic modeling and word count differences to examine congressional reaction to the end of the war in Afghanistan through an analysis of House and Senate committee hearings pre- and post-withdrawal. The heightened media attention to the withdrawal provides us with an opportunity to study how member rhetoric changes following an abrupt shift in salience and material circumstance on a foreign policy issue. We find that Democrats were more likely to speak about a conditions based withdrawal and women’s rights while Republicans were more likely to speak about Biden taking accountability, frequently regarding the bombing at Kabul’s airport. We also find that post withdrawal Democrats maintained a focus on women while shifting attention towards lessons learned while Republicans shifted from discussing threats and military capability to the Biden administration and the intelligence community.
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