June 20th is World Refugee Day and you may see gushy self-promotion of their supposed humanitarian work by the Volags (federal contractors) and their hundreds of sub-contractors. You have already seen that Clinton’s State Department had a star-studded event yesterday (for those with papers). But what they won’t tell you, and you likely will not read anywhere else, are the excellent points raised here by Christopher Coen of Friends of Refugees. (Emphasis mine.)
June 20th marks World Refugee Day, a day when we look at the plight of all refugees, not just those resettled to the U.S., but the overwhelming majority of refugees who will never be resettled here or to any other nation. While the world’s refugee population is growing, the world is able to resettle less than 1% them. The cost of resettling refugees is inarguable enormous, which always brings up the issue of what is the best way to spend limited resources on the world’s refugee population.
A 2002 study by North Dakota State University in Fargo estimated that a refugee family of four costs the taxpayer $21,965, just for the initial resettlement period. Although there are certain advantages to resettlement — refugees who are able to thrive in the U.S. are then able to significantly aid their cohorts who stay behind — there is no doubt that we could aid far more refugees by redirecting the dollars used on resettlement for those who stay behind in limbo. The 99% of refugees who stay behind are desperately in need of food, medicine, medical care, and protection. Only people deluded by the PR of domestic refugee resettlement agency contractors — exalted “partners” in refugee resettlement speak – who claim that resettlement is unquestionable, would not be bothered by this dilemma.
It would help if the U.S. refugee program did refugee resettlement well, but we are regularly deluged with accounts from refugees whom resettlement agencies have placed in deplorable conditions, often times in dangerous urban neighborhoods, and left to fend for themselves with little of the minimum-required help that the agencies promise to give when taking public funds.
Read it all.