70,000 needy people in search of jobs and social services will be on the way to your towns…will cost the US taxpayer in excess of $1 billion!
Every year the President is required by law to send a determination letter to Congress before the first day of the new Fiscal Year which begins on October 1. Usually some national news outfit runs a big piece heralding its arrival. This year I didn’t see anything (I could have missed it), but today I actively searched and here it is.
The admission of up to 70,000 refugees to the United States during Fiscal Year (FY) 2013 is justified by humanitarian concerns or is otherwise in the national interest…
You see that phrase I’ve highlighted. That means that all those coming are not poor and downtrodden refugees, but we are taking them for some other (political?) reason—to give some benefit to another country that wants its undesirables removed perhaps? Meshketian Turks come to mind and how about those Uzbek dissidents we scooped up in a special air lift in 2005? Back in April I sent testimony to the US State Department recommending a moratorium on the whole program, #7 in my ten reasons why it was warranted addressed this concern.
The entire report to Congress for FY2013 is here. I have only skimmed it and will have to read it carefully, but below are a few points you should have a look at.
For FY2012 Obama wanted 76,000 refugees, but we only got 58,238. This “low” number is blamed on extra security screening put in place after the arrest of the Iraqi refugee terrorists in KY. By the way this number, 58,238, can be found here. When the report went to Congress for FY13, they hadn’t finished bringing in the September refugees.
You can see from the chart on Page 5 (of the President’s recent report) that although we were aiming for 80,000 in FY 2011 we brought in 56,424. Obama dropped the target to 76,000 for 2012 and we got the 58,238. For the year that started last week, the target has dropped further to 70,000. The resettlement contractors are having a helluva time finding enough jobs for the refugees and I suspect that is the major reason for the further reduction in numbers.
Some other interesting nuggets that jumped out at me were:
* We are looking forward to getting more Rohingya Muslims as soon as Bangladesh stops holding up their applications. We are taking some Rohingya from “Indian urban areas.” What is up with that? Can’t India deal with its own so-called “refugees?” (really illegal aliens/economic migrants). It is a prosperous country!
* We are opening the P-3 family reunification program for Somalis. The State Department had put a moratorium on the program in 2008 after figuring out that over 30,000 Somalis got into the US by claiming a family relationship with Somalis here before them. Turned out they weren’t related at all. There will be some DNA testing of some relationships.
* On pages 52 and 53 you can see where everyone came from in FY2011. That year we brought in 3,161 Somalis. In FY2012 the Somali admission numbers jumped to 4,911 (you have to go back here for that number).
* On page 59, note that we take roughly 70% of the world’s refugees. The next 4 countries in the top 5 are Canada, Australia, Sweden and Norway.
* The top receiving states in the US (for 2011) were as follows:
During FY 2011, 63 percent of all arriving refugees resettled in 12 states. The majority were placed in Texas (10 percent), followed by California (8.8 percent), New York (6.3 percent), Pennsylvania (5.3 percent), Florida (5.2 percent), Georgia (4.7 percent), and Michigan (4.6 percent). The states of Arizona (3.8 percent), Washington (3.8 percent), North Carolina (3.8 percent), Illinois (3.4 percent,) and Minnesota (3.3 percent) also were in the top twelve states where refugees were resettled. (See Table VI.)
* On page 58, you will see that the program costs us over $1 billion dollars to resettle less than 60,000 refugees. This figure does not include: healthcare, subsidized housing, food stamps and education for the kids.
More, when I have time to read the whole thing.
Update: In case you don’t ever look at our few comments, reader Tomasrose made the following point a few minutes ago:
The refugee industry wants higher numbers. One way they have gotten higher numbers is by being able to serve (for pay of course) “unaccompanied minors” as well as refugees, Cuban-Haitians, successful asylum seekers and trafficking victims. All of these numbers are in addition to the 70,000 refugee cap. The number of “unaccompanied minors” is surging now in order to take advantage of Obama’s deferred action plan – i.e. work and welfare permits and the promise of eventual citizenship.
At least 12,000 “unaccompanied minors” have come in this year. Many are obvious gang members – assaults on guards at processing centers, etc.
When an “unaccompanied minor” assaults a guard at a border processing center, he is merely moved to another center and eventually will be placed into the U.S. welfare system.