It is a dumb idea to bring 50,000 to the whole of the United States, but that is exactly what some in the refugee contracting community want to see. Remember UK Labor Party transplant, David Miliband, now CEO of the largest (financially) US resettlement contractor, the International Rescue Committee recently said Obama must admit 65,000 Syrians to the US by the end of his term in office—by the end of 2016!
Now the New York Times has published an Op-Ed by a couple of open borders agitators suggesting Detroit could be saved by the infusion of 50,000 Syrians refugees into the city overnight. On what planet are these guys living?
They never mention of course that the FBI testified in the House Homeland Security Committee that we cannot properly screen Syrians for security concerns because there are no records available on who they are!
You’ve probably seen this outrageous suggestion because it came out the day before I went to Iowa. (I have a lot of catching up to do and my internet connection is dropping!—grrrr!)
LOL! looks like the idea was dead in the water by Friday as hundreds of critical comments flooded the NYT! Maybe it’s not too late for yours to be added!
The New York Times (hat tip: Dick):
Detroit, a once great city, has become an urban vacuum. Its population has fallen to around 700,000 from nearly 1.9 million in 1950. The city is estimated to have more than 70,000 abandoned buildings and 90,000 vacant lots. Meanwhile, desperate Syrians, victims of an unfathomable civil war, are fleeing to neighboring countries, with some 1.8 million in Turkey and 600,000 in Jordan.
Suppose these two social and humanitarian disasters were conjoined to produce something positive.
Gov. Rick Snyder of Michigan, a Republican, has already laid the groundwork. In January 2014 he called for an infusion of 50,000 immigrants as part of a program to revitalize Detroit, and signed an executive order creating the Michigan Office for New Americans. [Here is one story about Gov. Snyder inviting in to Michigan Middle Eastern migrants.—ed]
Syrian refugees would be an ideal community to realize this goal, as Arab-Americans are already a vibrant and successful presence in the Detroit metropolitan area.
You have to give it to these authors for hutzpah as they list cities (as wonderful examples of immigrant assimilation) that are having huge problems with their refugee communities. And, they don’t even mention the Somali ISIS-wannabes in Minneapolis!
Utica this year filed suit against the State of New York attempting to get more money out of the government for its horrific immigrant-overloaded school system problems, and we have a lengthy archive of horror stories from Lewiston, ME where one recent little problem cropped up when a Somali kid burned down an apartment building!
Refugees resettled from a single war zone have helped revitalize several American communities, notably Hmong in previously neglected neighborhoods in Minneapolis, Bosnians in Utica, N.Y., and Somalis in Lewiston, Me.
Obama would have to lift the ceiling (exactly as David Miliband recommended), the already impossible security screening would have to be expedited, and you the taxpayer, will be hit up for an expansion of the refugee spending budget of $1.5 billion! (which, by the way, is a figure larger than it has been previously reported).
Resettling Syrians in Detroit would require commitment and cooperation across different branches and levels of our government, but it is eminently feasible. President Obama and Congress would have to agree to lift this year’s refugee ceiling by 50,000. The State Department, which handles overseas processing of refugees, would need to open offices at the camps in Jordan and Turkey, determine eligibility and administer a lottery for resettlement. Homeland Security, which controls the borders, would have to carry out accelerated security checks, as has been done in the past for Vietnamese and for Iranian religious minorities. Health and Human Services would need an expansion in the $1.5 billion it budgets for refugee resettlement.
There is much more, read it all here.
And, as for the African American community of Detroit buying this diversity is beautiful mythology. Check out Baltimore where black gangs directed mobs to loot Arab and Asian stores!
About the photo caption: Go here for more information on the expansion of Medicaid as a “key indicator” of the “capacity” of your community to ‘welcome’ refugees.