Secretary of State Rubio is threatening Taliban leaders with a “very big” bounty after he heard that there are more Americans being held in Afghanistan than previously known. 

Mr. Rubio said in a post on X on Saturday that he was “just hearing the Taliban is holding more American hostages than has been reported.”

“If this is true, we will have to immediately place a VERY BIG bounty on their top leaders, maybe even bigger than the one we had on Bin Laden,” he warned. 

The post followed a deal that freed two Americans held by the Taliban, Ryan Corbett and William McKenty, in exchange for a Taliban leader, Khan Mohammed, who had been sentenced to two life terms on drug trafficking and terrorism charges. 

Mr. Corbett was living in Afghanistan during the chaotic American withdrawal and the Taliban’s return to power. He was detained in 2022.  Before leaving office, the Biden administration was trying to secure the release of two other Americans, George Glezmann and Mahmood Habibi. However, it was only able to secure the release of the first two Americans. 

The Taliban celebrated the deal as part of a “normalization” of relations between America and Afghanistan.

It was not clear from Mr. Rubio’s post where he heard the information about the number of Americans being held in Afghanistan. The State Department did not respond to the Sun’s request for comment by the time of publication. 

The Taliban’s ambassador to Qatar, Suhail Shaheen, responded to Mr. Rubio’s statement by saying it would like to resolve issues through dialogue, the Associated Press reported. The Taliban official added a warning, saying, “In the face of pressure and aggression, the jihad (struggle) of the Afghan nation in recent decades is a lesson that everyone should learn from.”

At least one of the men the Biden administration failed to secure the release of, Mr. Glezmann, is facing deteriorating mental and physical health since he was detained in 2022. A Senate resolution from July 2024 states that he has had limited calls to his family and is suffering from “facial tumors, hypertension, severe malnutrition, and other medical conditions” while being held in an underground cell. 

The Taliban has previously acknowledged that it is holding Mr. Glezmann but has denied holding Mr. Habibi. However, Mr. Habibi’s family members say they have witnesses who saw him being arrested by the General Directorate of Intelligence. His brother, Ahmad Habibi, told Fox News Digital that the Biden administration refused to use evidence of his arrest to confront the Taliban’s denials while they were negotiating the exchange. 

A spokesman for the National Security Council told the Associated Press that the Trump administration will “continue to demand the release of all Americans held by the Taliban, especially in light of the billions of dollars in U.S. aid they’ve received in recent years.”

While the Taliban has denied it is holding Mr. Habibi, it has sought to secure the release of an Al Qaeda member, Muhammad Rahim, from Guantanamo Bay.