If you are looking for answers about how South Carolina has become a target for refugee resettlement where the Governor (Nikki Haley) and even Rep. Trey Gowdy*** are obviously reluctant to stand up and question the choice of the state as fresh territory for third world resettlement (colonization!), look no further than the senior senator of the Palmetto State.
Do Haley and Gowdy jump when Lindsey says jump?
Editor’s note: There will be hundreds of articles in the coming days about the Syrian refugee numbers to be admitted to the US (Obama said 10,000 yesterday, but I suspect that is a trial balloon). We will post the ones that are the most informative we find. Like this one!
Somehow South Carolina had dodged a bullet over the years as surrounding states of North Carolina, Kentucky and Georgia have been flooded with refugees.
All that is changing (see our archive on the controversy in Spartanburg) and it sure looks like the driver behind that change is none other than SC senior Senator Lindsey Graham. See his asinine and ill-informed comment about the Statue of Liberty and how America has to take it’s “fair share” of Syrian, mostly Muslim, refugees. What the hell! We had nothing to do with the Syrian civil war, why should any be our “fair share.”
(Now, if Graham is talking about Syrian Christians, he better get the backbone to use the word — Christian!)
The US has long been the leading nation permanently resettling refugees from every continent on the globe—over 100,000 Iraqi Muslims from the Middle East in the last 8 years—-isn’t that enough for the Senator?
From The Fiscal Times in an article entitled, ‘Can the U.S. Handle 100,000 Syrian Refugees?’ (emphasis below is mine):
While much of Washington is occupied with the Iran nuclear deal, another debate is looming about whether the U.S. should open its doors to more refugees from the Syrian civil war.
Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina raised the possibility on Tuesday that Congress might approve emergency funding to greatly increase the U.S. quota for Syrian refugees in the face of an historic migrant crisis in Europe and the Middle East.
During an appearance before the National Press Club, Graham became the first GOP presidential candidate to urge the Obama administration to accept its “fair share” of Syrian refugees, amid international criticism that the U.S. is grossly shirking its responsibility to the international community. In a fit of melodrama, Graham said that “we should take the Statue of Liberty and tear it down” if the U.S. preserves its current, highly restrictive immigration policies with regards to victims of Syrian violence.
Graham is chair of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on State and Foreign Operations, which means he has some say over the budget for the State Department and other international agencies. He said he would be in favor of “emergency spending” to cover the cost of bringing substantially more Syrian immigrants to the U.S., which would add to the federal deficit. He said he would confer with Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, the ranking Democrat on his subcommittee, to sound him out on a possible bipartisan proposal.
“I don’t just want to pick a number,” Graham said, according to Roll Call. “I don’t know how many we should take, I don’t know how much money we should spend, but I know we should take our fair share and we need to spend more to get ahead of this.”
The U.S. currently allows the immigration of no more than 1,500 Syrians a year [inaccurate information—ed] – a miniscule number in the face of the millions of refugees streaming out of Syria, headed for Germany and other European countries. The United States Committee for Refugee and Immigrants has urged the administration to accept 100,000 Syrians in the coming year. [Dumb reporters quoting, as some sort of authoritative voice, a non-profit resettlement contractor which is being paid by the head to resettle refugees!–ed]
*** Rep. Trey Gowdy is chairman of the House subcommittee responsible for refugees and we will be watching closely to see if he calls for hearings when Obama sends his “Determination Letter” to Congress for consultation sometime in the next week or two. Fiscal year 2016 begins on October 1, so by law Obama must send it! The big question is, what can Congress do about it? The key committees in the House and Senate could at minimum hold hearings. And, please don’t tell me that Gowdy has too much going on with Benghazi to spend a little time on this infinitely more important issue—how many Syrian Muslims will we drop off in your towns!