Month: November 2010

ORR, where is the annual report to Congress?

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I’m going to keep asking until we see the two annual reports that the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) in the Department of Health and Human Services was by law supposed to send to Congress.   As you can see they are only up to 2007 (here) as of today.  I asked the same question, here, last month.

We began FY2011 on October 1st with a Presidential Determination letter to admit another 80,000 refugees this year, so by my calculation they owe Congress the report for 2008 and 2009.  The importance of the annual report is that it tells members of Congress and the public what refugees were resettled and to which states.  It tells us employment rates.  It tells us what resettlement agencies are doing good jobs in finding employment and which aren’t.  It tells us what the welfare useage is and relates that to previous years and so on.

So as we continue high rates of refugee resettlement through the great recession years we have no official picture of how those refugees are doing.

Write to your Congressman and US Senators and ask where the 2008 and 2009 annual reports are!

VDARE writer reminds us today is the day….

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

….the last day to  get your comments in to the US State Department on the plan to re-open the P-3 family reunification program!

Paul Nachman writing at VDARE tells readers to “get to your keyboards” today and comment on proposed Federal regulations to restart the program that was found in 2008 to be fraud ridden.  Some DNA testing will be required to determine who is and who isn’t “family,” but the plan as crafted is inadequate.

We told you about the proposed regulations recently here and here.  Please read the comment discussion following the second post, but don’t let the seeming complexity of the regulatory plan deter you from writing to the State Department.  Indeed one point that concerns me and I said so in my comments is that there is still too much confusion about the process and so therefore the re-opening of the program is premature.  Follow instructions for submitting comments at Mr. Nachman’s VDARE post.

For a review of the shocking discovery in 2008 that as many as 80 percent of the family reunification cases, mostly from East Africa, were fraudulent because the supposed “family” members were really not related at all, go here.

One of the points I made in my comments was related to the fact that the State Department determined that as many as 36,000 “family members” entered the US fraudulently between 2003 and 2008.  Those people will not be found and deported. I reported this story here last year.  AP reporter Matthew (where are all the Iraqis) Lee* learned of the 36,000 who will not be found.  Fortunately I recorded the story because I see it is no longer available at AP—interesting huh!  At minimum, those 36,000 should be located and prohibited from filing AORs (Affidavits of Relationship) to bring over their “blood” relatives.  They shouldn’t now be rewarded for their previous lies.

One point I am sure has not escaped discerning readers is that all the DNA testing in the world won’t screen out potential terrorists related by blood to those who lied to get in here in the first place!

Please keep in  mind today as you consider whether to write to the State Department that the Open borders gang is surely writing because they don’t want any DNA testing at all, here.

So write something!  Show the State Department that people care about this important issue of chain migration!

* Matthew Lee is an AP reporter who in 2008 wrote like clockwork at the end of each month (when the stats came in) that boo hoo bad Bush was not admitting enough Iraqis.  I figured he was the go-to reporter for the refugee industry advocates.  Then I have noted, I have never seen him write on the unhappy Iraqis who were resettled here.

Utah Catholic Bishop is one smart politician

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Update November 17th:  They picked Dolan of New York, here.

The US Conference of Catholic Bishops, a religious Left political organization and one of the largest recipients of federal dollars (top eleven volags*) to resettle refugees is about to pick a new head honcho.  Here is a story in the Salt Lake Tribune about how it might be the Bishop from Utah.

Utah’s Catholic Bishop John C. Wester is on a short list of finalists to become the next president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Wester, leader of Utah’s 300,000 Catholics since March 2007, is among 10 nominees to succeed outgoing president, Chicago Cardinal Francis George, who will complete his three-year term at the bishops’ annual meeting in Baltimore Nov. 15 through 18.

By a long-standing tradition, the conference’s vice president, Bishop Gerald F. Kicanas, 69, of Tucson, Arizona, is the likely successor, according to Vatican watcher Rocco Palmo, of Philadelphia.

But that still leaves nine other men, including Wester, the youngest nominee at 58, vying for vice president.

The money and the political power flow from immigration issue

As head of the cash cow portion of the USCCB, Bishop Wester positioned himself well.

Wester heads the bishops’ influential committee on Migration and Refugee Services, as well as the Administrative Committee, Catholic Legal Immigration Network (CLINIC) Board, Catholic Relief Services Board and the Subcommittee on Interreligious Dialogue. He already spends much of his time speaking out on immigration issues and traveling the world representing the bishops’ concerns about displaced peoples.

* Volag stands for “voluntary agency” but thats a misnomer.  They are not voluntarily taking care of refugees out of the goodness of their hearts, they are paid by you, the taxpayer, to give others your charity.

Portland, OR Somali population at 8000 and growing

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Update:  Allahsoldier tells us its 20,000.

And, the school system is stressed with students not literate in their own language.

From Oregon Live:

Somalia’s ongoing civil war, which began in 1991, forced many families to seek shelter in neighboring countries. In 2001, charity organizations began bringing them to Portland, and the Somali population here grew to about 8,000, said Bashir Warsame, executive director of Southwest Portland’s Somali Community Services Coalition of Oregon. [Another ECBO—ed]

Last year, Madison had 25 Somali-speaking students enrolled in English as a Second Language classes, Vice Principal Roger DeVille said. DeVille said school officials have heard speculation that more Somali refugees could be moving to Portland as soon as December.

The so-called “charity organizations” are actually taxpayer funded federal contractors.  Most people think that if Catholic Charities is involved, or Lutheran Immigration Services (two volags operating in Portland) that the funding comes from church collection plates—no it’s from federal grants.

Schools are challenged with learners who have passed the “magic time” (?)

“Some kids show up and they don’t even know what a pencil is,” DeVille said. “The older they are when they get here, the more frustrated they are with learning English because they’ve passed that magic time.”

Farther east, David Douglas High School has a high enrollment of Somali-speaking students in the David Douglas District’s ESL program. Principal John Bier said he believes families have come to east Multnomah County for cheaper housing. Bier added that because most Somalis are not literate in their own language, it makes learning English more difficult.

“That’s a real challenge,” he said. “How are you going to give them enough credits to graduate and also meet the demands for achievement tests when you’re not literate in your own language?”

Yeh, Portland, good luck with that.  You know you can tell the federal government NO! to new resettlements.  Other cities have!

Another asylum seeker to test Canadian refugee policy

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Update November 9th:  Chinese man had US passport, here.

Canada is in the midst of soul-searching over how to handle all the asylum seekers arriving in Canada these days.  Here is the latest and most novel entry so far (forget those mundane human trafficking ships)!

Old man turns into young man (CBC News) on flight, thanks to Drudge (be sure to see photos):

A young Asian male has been intercepted by authorities in Vancouver after boarding a flight from Hong Kong disguised as an elderly white man, officials say.

Canada Border Services Agency officers boarded the Air Canada plane after it landed Oct. 29 and took the man into custody, the agency said in a statement issued by its Pacific region.

[….]

The man quickly made a claim for refugee protection after his arrest, the agency said.

[….]

A CBSA official said he would appear before an Immigration and Refugee Board hearing.

His name, the date of his hearing and his reason for seeking refugee status have not been made public.

About two weeks ago we told you about an American actor and his wife, running from the law in the US, asking for asylum in Canada, here.