Month: October 2018

How more of your money flows out of Washington to non-profit groups that ‘help’ immigrants and refugees

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

The grant program is known as the ‘Ethnic Community Self-help Program’ run out of the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement (HHS).

At one point I followed their activities closely and began a file on it, see here, but too much breaking news pushed the subject to the back burner.

Money machine

First, as you know, nine federal resettlement contractors*** are hired by the US State Department to place refugees in your towns and cities.  Their job is to help the refugees settle in and get them signed up for their ‘services.’

You also know that the nine are paid by the head to place those refugees, but in addition the Office of Refugee Resettlement doles out many millions more each year to non-profit groups including those nine in the form of discretionary grants.

But, what you might not know is that an entire cottage industry of non-profits have sprung up which get federal grants in most cases to benefit their specific ethnic group—Ethnic Community Based Organizations (ECBOs for short).

The grants are ostensibly to help the refugees integrate into a community, but one might wonder then why the funding is specific to groups that are maintaining their own cultural identity. 

If such a helping hand is needed in certain cities, why isn’t the money given to local government agencies to help all ethnic groups, all races and all religions, instead of favoring one ethnic non-profit group over another?  Seems to me that the present system creates division rather than integration.

Here is what ORR says about the grant program.

Pay attention to the list of what you are paying for—getting refugees their resources, building their community, getting them involved in local “civic participation” (aka voting!), and getting local citizens minds right about the immigrants’ presence in the community!

In other words, you are paying for ethnic non-profit groups to organize in your community.  Remember ACORN? Well these are little ACORNs!

(Don’t you just love this deceptive language!)

The Ethnic Community Self-Help program supports ethnic community-based organizations in providing refugee populations with critical services to assist them in becoming integrated members of American society.

Program Description

The Ethnic Community Self-Help program provides assistance to refugee community-based organizations and other groups that:

Address community building
Facilitate cultural adjustment and integration
Deliver mutually supportive functions
Information exchange
Civic participation
Resource enhancement
Orientation and support to new and established refugees
Public education to the larger community

Ethnic Community Self-Help programs connect newly arrived refugees to community resources [aka welfare!—ed]. Ethnic Community Self-Help programs target all ORR populations, and all U.S.-based governmental and certified non-profit organizations are eligible to apply.

What is up with ORR that much (maybe all!) of their grant information is out of date!

Over the years, I’ve visited ORR and found lists of who was receiving grants and for how much, but that information is not available now.

Oh sure, you can get the old ECBO grants list.  But those grants have expired.  Check it out and see that they passed out nearly $4.5 million to a list of ECBOs around the country.  Those grants expired in 2017.

So, maybe the Trump Administration has cut out the program?

The answer is NO! 

Just this month the ORR put out a notice of two upcoming grants.  One of those is for ECBOs.  Although the money is less than in the past—$2 million instead of over $4 million—13 non-profit groups will rake in $100,000-$200,000 each.

Here is the information on the ECBO grant offering:

 

Screenshot (771)

 

An aside:  For all of you who have ever tried to get a conservative non-profit group/Tea Party up and running you know that this is one heck of a lot of money. Of course, grants like this are not available to you!

When I couldn’t find an up-to-date list of grantees right now, I emailed ORR and was sent the list below.  However, it is lacking in information—no grant amounts and no end date—so who knows if these little ACORNS are still enjoying your tax dollars.

 

Screenshot (769)
Your tax dollars went to grants ($100,000-$200,000 each) so they could get their ethnic group established, and for refugees to get their “resources” in your cities. 

 

Just a reminder:  When you see something here at RRW that you are concerned about, let the President know how you feel, here.

 

***Below are the nine federal refugee resettlement contractors.

The present US Refugee Admissions Program will never be reformed if the system of paying the contractors by the head stays in place and the contractors are permitted to act as Leftwing political agitation groups, community organizers and lobbyists paid on our dime!  

And, to add insult to injury they pretend it is all about ‘humanitarianism.’

The number in parenthesis is the percentage of their income paid by you (the taxpayer) to place the refugees into your towns and cities and get them signed up for their services (aka welfare)!  And, get them registered to vote eventually!

From my most recent accounting, here.  However, please see that Nayla Rush at the Center for Immigration Studies has done an update of their income, as has James Simpson at the Capital Research Center!

Pittsburgh Mayor Peduto refused to meet the President yesterday

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Surely you know all about Democrat Mayor Bill Peduto shunning the President and his family when they went to Pittsburgh yesterday to pay their respects to those murdered in the synagogue attack last Saturday.  Here is one of many stories about the Mayor’s snub.

And, here is Peduto with Chris Matthews:

 

 

By the way, the Rabbi, who was leading services on Saturday when the attack happened, welcomed the President saying “he is my President.”

So, what does this have to do with RRW?

Let’s take a trip down memory lane!

Mayor Bill Peduto was one of 18 mayors who signed a 2015 letter to then President Obama telling the President that 10,000 Syrian refugees for America in the upcoming fiscal year was too few and they wanted Obama to ultimately admit 100,000.

The letter was organized by Cities for Action which says it is: “A coalition of city governments who stand in support of stronger cities through immigration action.”

As you know, President Trump is permitting very few Syrians to enter the US at the present time.

If you missed it in 2015, here are the 18 mayors pressing Obama for more Syrian refugees for their cities:

Ed Pawlowski, Mayor of Allentown, PA
Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, Mayor of Baltimore, MD
Martin J. Walsh, Mayor of Boston, MA
James Diossa, Mayor of Central Falls, RI
Mark Kleinschmidt, Mayor of Chapel Hill, NC
Rahm Emanuel, Mayor of Chicago, IL
Edward Terry, Mayor of Clarkston, GA
Nan Whaley, Mayor of Dayton, OH
Domenick Stampone, Mayor of Haledon, NJ
Pedro E. Segarra, Mayor of Hartford, CT
Eric Garcetti, Mayor of Los Angeles, CA
Betsy Hodges, Mayor of Minneapolis, MN
Bill de Blasio, Mayor of New York City, NY
Jose Torres, Mayor of Paterson, NJ
William Peduto, Mayor of Pittsburgh, PA
Javier Gonzales, Mayor of Santa Fe, NM
Francis G. Slay, Mayor of St. Louis, MO
Stephanie A. Miner, Mayor of Syracuse, NY

Some posts on that campaign by the leftwing open-borders mayors, especially Pittsburgh’s Mayor Peduto, worth revisiting:

18 US Mayors tell Obama: We want MORE Syrian (Muslim) refugees!

Pittsburgh letter writer: Mayor is wrong to invite Syrian refugees to city

ACT for America launches citizen action campaign urging 18 mayors to re-think their demand for more Syrian refugees

Pittsburgh, PA Mayor Peduto: Bring us Syrian Muslims!

 

And, a few additional posts on Pittsburgh:

Pittsburgh: Jewish agency and Islamic Center working together to bring more Syrians to the city

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette editorial: Are there holes in US refugee vetting process?

Pittsburgh: Refugees placed in dangerous housing complex….

Jewish refugee resettlement agency: Let’s bring Rohingya Muslims to Pittsburgh (to increase diversity!)

Pittsburgh at “tipping point” as refugee population mushrooms

Pittsburgh working hard to “welcome” refugees

More on refugee mental health issues from Pittsburgh

Pittsburgh: World Refugee Day brought out the diversity, but few Americans

Pittsburgh Catholic Bishop defends Catholic Charities and calls a meeting

And, there are more, but you get the idea!

A comment on commenting

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I know things are tense as we head into the final week before the midterm elections, but if you want to comment here at RRW, you gotta tone it down.

RRW logo

Many of you are new readers, so you don’t know about my policy regarding comments.  I have a few rules.  First, no threats of violence to anyone. No foul language. And, no attacking another commenter personally.  You can attack their ideas and opinions, but not the person.

Frankly, if you can’t make your point with a good argument, attacking someone personally only makes you and your opinion look weak.

I moderate comments when I have time, so you may not see yours posted immediately.

And, I apologize, I had a look at RRW’s spam folder the other day and see that wordpress has been sending some of you, even long-time commenters, to spam for no apparent reason.  I’ll check that more often.

One last thing, if you write a book or send many links, I might have to not post your comment.  I don’t have time to open each link to check what you are sending, and no one reads long comments anyway.

If you have something long (under 600 words!) and think readers here would find it useful (on topic!) then send it as a comment with a note asking me to consider it as a guest column.

Thanks as always for visiting RRW!

Immigrants are registering to vote before becoming citizens

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

No duh!

Sorry no time to write much today, but I want you to have something to read, so have a look at a report at the Center for Immigration Studies about aliens voting.

vote here

Surely, you have all pondered the fact that as aliens of all stripes get drivers’ licenses, they can simply check a box and register to vote in the licensing process.

No one asks that they produce their citizenship papers at the DMV!

Remember it isn’t just illegal aliens!  Refugees and other classes of legal immigrant can easily do this even if they haven’t yet gone through the citizenship process.

And, don’t you wonder how many of those hundreds of thousands of recipients of Temporary Protected Status are acting like legal citizens and voting?

Here CIS tells us more, from yesterday.

Aliens and Voter Fraud

Italy: Sale of Christian chapel to a Muslim group will be blocked

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

“Centuries of history risk disappearing if Islamisation, which up until now has been underestimated, gains the upper hand.”

(Matteo Salvini)

 

They are fighting hard in Italy to save Western Civilization.  We just hope it isn’t too late.

From Reuters:

ROME (Reuters) – Italy’s far-right League party intervened on Sunday to block efforts by a Muslim association to turn a former hospital chapel into a mosque.

The Muslim group last week made the highest offer for the chapel in the northern city of Bergamo at an auction organized by a local hospital, outbidding the Romanian Orthodox Church which had been using the building for its religious services.

map Bergamo

But the project proved short-lived, with League leaders in the wealthy Lombardy region, which includes Bergamo, announcing they would halt the sale by using a 2004 law that enables them to intervene and safeguard cultural sites.

“I would never put a Church on sale and I am amazed that the hospital management did not realize what a sensitive issue this is,” Lombardy President Attilio Fontana, a League politician, wrote on Twitter.

“However, we will exercise our right of first refusal (for the sale) and there will be no space for any appeal,” he added.

Salvini grim
Italian Interior Minister Matteo Salvini

His decision means the region must now buy the property.

League leader Matteo Salvini warned earlier this year that Italian culture and society risked being eradicated by Islam. “Centuries of history risk disappearing if Islamisation, which up until now has been underestimated, gains the upper hand,” he said in a statement.

More here.

There is a discussion in the Reuters story about the demographic change in Italy.

The story suggests that the Muslim population is still relatively small, but we know that the size doesn’t have to grow that much before demands for religious accommodation begin.

Mosques become a place around which Muslim communities build (even if there aren’t many practicing Muslims in the area when the mosque is first opened).

See my ‘Invasion of Europe’ archive here.