04/12/2018 - Refugee Resettlement Watch

In a press release dated yesterday, the Manhattan-based International Rescue Committee (IRC) asks its followers to contact members of Congress and Senators to pressure the Prez to fulfill the 45,000 refugee CEILING set by Trump last fall.

brexit-news-tony-blair-1072435 — From his perch in Manhattan, Miliband pulls down a nearly $700,000 annual salary (doing well by doing good!) while he dabbles in UK politics, specifically the Brexit controversy. https://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/856974/Brexit-news-Tony-Blair-EU-latest-news-Concordia-summit-David-Miliband

At the present rate the Trump State Department will admit about half that number and the resettlement contractors*** are shaking in their boots.
Each refugee admitted represents money, your money, to their budgets and reports are that at least one of the nine that have monopolized all resettlement to the US for a decade might not survive.
That is not true for the IRC, it is rolling in money….
Which reminds me (as I read this press release)—where is “moneybags” Miliband? Why is he not quoted? Too busy mucking around back home in the UK?
This press release wouldn’t be worth mentioning except for one nugget I found interesting (and for the fact that I love writing about this super rich Manhattan-based taxpayer-funded organization making decisions for small city/town America.).
Here is some of it:

New York, NY, April 11, 2018 — Midway through the 2018 fiscal year, which ends September 30, just 10,584 refugees have been resettled to the United States. By contrast, 39,098 refugees were welcomed to the U.S. in the first half of the 2017 fiscal year—even with the slowdown on admissions due to the Trump Administration’s refugee bans. This decline in refugee admissions represents a stark 73 percent year-over-year drop. The International Rescue Committee (IRC) projects that a series of excessive red-tape vetting and processing changes will result in no more than 23,000 refugees being resettled in FY18, barely achieving 50 percent of the ceiling.

[They are so deceptive, the reason the number is so high, 39,098, for the first half of FY17 is because Obama presided over October, November, December and most of January and his outgoing State Department was pouring them in as fast as they could before Trump was inaugurated.—ed]

Now this next bit is rich!
Here we have Hans (most likely still a Dutch national) who works for a British national (David Miliband) lecturing us about “core American values.”

Said Hans Van de Weerd, Vice President, US Programs, International Rescue Committee:

“Halfway through FY18, the U.S. is establishing a record on resettlement that runs counter to core American values of freedom and welcome and strategic interests abroad.

I can’t believe that they think they can still sell this silly notion, that somehow by curtailing immigration to the US from Muslim countries, we make Islamic terrorists angry (angrier?) with us.

Hans bald — Hans Van de Weerd lectures us on “core American values!”

“Drastically diminished refugee arrivals have detrimental consequences for U.S. national security and foreign policy interests, including fueling the anti-American narratives of the very terrorist organizations we aim to defeat. The Trump Administration must change course in the second half of FY18 and meet its commitment to admit 45,000 refugees.” [For the umpteenth time, the 45,000 is a CEILING, a cap, NOT a target!—ed]

Now, here comes the part that interested me most.

We know that the contractors have been dependent on the large number of SIVs entering the US (Iraqi and Afghans who supposedly gave us support at some point) to help feed their budgets (see my recent post here). However, apparently even those numbers are dropping (eeeek!).

Shocking drop in March in admissions of those who assisted U.S. missions

Without explanation, only 510 Iraqi and Afghan Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) recipients arrived during the month of March, a more than 68 percent drop compared to average monthly arrivals in FY17.

Total SIV arrivals overall in the first half of FY18 have declined by 28 percent compared to the same time period in FY17.

I wonder (if there is a slowdown), if it is because they are running out of places to put them. Supposedly most go to San Diego or Northern Virginia where there is an overload of SIVs and as we reported here, they aren’t finding work.

U.S.-affiliated Iraqis (P-2s) left behind

These are supposed ‘beneficiaries’ and their family members. They always say they are translators, but they could have been taking out the garbage. See here.

U.S.-affiliated Iraqis are individuals who provided critical services, like translation, to U.S. missions abroad and now face persecution as a result.

Conservative estimates suggest that there are approximately 50,000 Iraqis with close affiliations with the U.S. government waiting for interviews to have their cases for resettlement processed.

Yet, only 36 U.S.-affiliated Iraqis have arrived in FY18.

Then here is Hans’ wrap-up:

It’s time to pressure the Administration to pick up the pace on refugee resettlement. Take action now.

Click here to see what they want their groupies to tell Congress.
You should tell your member of Congress and US Senators what you think too, but honestly I have little hope they will get off their duffs and do anything, so right now, it is best to Contact the White House and tell the Prez to hang tough!
And, for fun, ask him why we pay David Miliband over a half a million a year so he can do his anti-Brexit political agitation work in his home country.
See my David Miliband archive here. Waaahhh! What will I do when he finally goes home!

*** I post the contractor list almost every day because I want new readers to know exactly who is responsible for driving the US Refugee Admissions Program (in addition to the UN!).
The number in parenthesis is the percentage of the nine VOLAGs’ income paid by you (the taxpayer) to place the refugees, line them up with (low paying) jobs in food production and cleaning hotel rooms, and get them signed up for their services! From most recent accounting, here.

This is really a kind of ‘nothing-burger’ article from a policy wonk at the Brooking’s Institution attempting to influence the Far Left Dems to ask questions about refugees when Trump’s new pick to head the US State Department, Mike Pompeo, goes before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee today.

Pompeo and Trump — Trump: Mike Pompeo and I are on the same wavelength! https://www.today.com/video/trump-mike-pompeo-and-i-are-on-the-same-wavelength-1184613443805?v=b

Here is a bit of it. We can definitely agree with Jessica Brandt‘s opener—the Trump Administration needs to staff-up at DOS. But, they must assure people loyal to the President and his policies are in those appointed jobs!

Tomorrow [today—-ed], former CIA Director Mike Pompeo, President Trump’s pick to replace Rex Tillerson as secretary of state, will come before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. The hearing is an opportunity for congressional leaders to question him on a broad range of consequential subjects. Resourcing the State Department should be first on the list. It is difficult, if not impossible, to craft and implement an effective set of strategies on any foreign policy issue without the personnel in place to do so.

brandtj_portrait — Jessica Brandt is “a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations and a David Rockefeller Fellow of the Trilateral Commission.”

But exploring Pompeo’s views on refugee policy should also be a high priority. That’s for three reasons.

First, Pompeo has a history of expressing deep distaste for refugee policies he views as lax. While in Congress, he cosponsored a bill calling for an immediate ban on the entry of all refugees, regardless of their country of origin. The measure would have gone farther than then-candidate Trump’s controversial proposal to bar Muslim immigration. Later that year, after returning home from a study tour focusing on the migration crisis in Europe, he argued in support of Trump’s instincts on these issues in the Wall Street Journal.

You can read the rest yourself by clicking here.
Then this closer made me laugh. These Leftists can’t help themselves. In an article at the venerable Brookings Institution, Ms. Brandt can’t resist the snark!

Pompeo’s answers to these questions could reveal a great deal about how he plans to approach a sensitive, consequential issue. I hope he plans to be more forward leaning than his predecessor. But given his record, I doubt it.

And, btw, what the heck is “forward leaning?” I think we know….

Day: April 12, 2018

Press Release: International Rescue Committee (again) on low Trump refugee admission numbers

Now, here comes the part that interested me most.

Brookings has questions about refugee policy for Secretary of State nominee Pompeo