U.S. Sen. John Cornyn of Texas is pressing the Biden administration to provide information on the location and potential rescue of Austin Tice, an American journalist who was abducted in Syria in 2012.
Cornyn—along with three other senators from Maryland, Virginia, and Washington—sent a letter to President Joe Biden on Wednesday requesting an update on efforts to bring Tice home.
“We know that you are familiar with Austin’s case, as your administration publicly acknowledged Austin’s detention by the Syrians in 2022,” the letter reads. It adds that Biden “also met with Austin’s parents, Debra and Marc Tice, in 2022.”
The letter points out that the Biden administration announced that it believes Tice is still alive, and that it is a “top priority” of the administration to locate where he is inside Syria and return him to his family.
The letter concludes by asking the federal government to provide a briefing by December 20 on current operations to rescue Tice.
On August 6, Cornyn sent a separate letter to Biden—this one jointly with over 30 lawmakers, including U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz—demanding that his administration do “everything possible” to bring Tice back stateside.
Originally from Houston, Tice is a Marine Corps veteran who served in both Afghanistan and Iraq. At the time of his abduction from the outskirts of Damascus in 2012, he was working as a freelance journalist.
He was 31 years old at the time. His last public statement was made in mid-August of 2012 on the social media platform X—formerly Twitter—in which he discussed the celebration of his birthday with Syrian army fighters.
Tice went missing and was reportedly not heard from again until a short video surfaced revealing a blindfolded Tice praying in a mix of Arabic and English while surrounded by his captors.
Discussions of Tice’s potential release were reignited following the collapse of Bashar al-Assad’s regime this past weekend.
“There are intensive efforts underway by the United States to find Austin Tice and bring him home to his family,” Fox News quotes State Department spokesman Matthew Miller as having said. “We encourage anyone who has information about Austin’s whereabouts to contact the FBI immediately.”
No ads. No paywalls. No government grants. No corporate masters.
Just real news for real Texans.
Support Texas Scorecard to keep it that way!
