Which of several methods of getting into the US did “refugee” family Tsarnaev use?

04/23/2013 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Update: Blogger Federale has more information on the asylum claim here. Wonder how the aunt fits into all this, looks like the WHOLE family came at some point!

Has anyone figured this out yet? I assumed by now some crackerjack investigative reporter would have unearthed their immigration paperwork—maybe they have. If you see it, let me know!

We have been told innumerable times since Friday that they are “refugees” or received “political asylum.” Those are slightly different terms of art. I’ve got farm chores to do, so no time to explain the slight difference now.

Maret Tsarnaev, aunt of alleged Boston bombers says she is studying law. But, did she say she did the paperwork to get her brother and family into US? How?

In my post on Friday I reported this:

A commenter tells us that it’s a chain migration refugee case (sometimes called family reunification) usually done through resettlement contractors like Catholic Charities. Will look for a link:

Not a rumor, sister of father on Canadian TV said she did refugee paperwork for mom and dad in 2002, they got it. Then under refugee family reconcilement, got 2 sons, the jihadists, and two daughters into US.

However, I got thinking today about the I-130 and the I-730 visa application process. Surely some real investigative reporters are looking through the records for those Visas!

But how could an adult apply for refugee status for her extended family? (They are not her spouse or children). It doesn’t make any sense unless she lied somehow. Although once Mom, Dad and little Dzhokhar got in then they surely used one of these to get the remainder of the kids in.

A year ago next month I reported on how those two Visa programs have a serious potential for fraud, and here is what a kind reader sent to explain the two programs. Visas for family reunification explained:

A few days ago I reported on Somalis in Minneapolis who are angry that the US State Department/Homeland Security are making it harder for them to bring their “families” to the US. I explained that the P-3 program had been suspended in 2008 when it was learned that tens of thousands of Africans (mostly from Somalia) had gotten into the US fraudulently—they lied about their family relationship. The program is still partially closed. And, now the I-130 visa process has added some hurdles which has ticked-off the would-be migrants (and their lawyers) even further.

Since these visa application processes are all ‘greek’ to those of us on the outside, I appealed for help in understanding the I-130 visa and the I-730 visa as it relates to “refugees.” A kind reader with experience has sent us the following explanation (emphasis mine). This will be filed in our ‘where to find information’ category for your future reference.

I-130’s

This is the name used for a form to apply for the legal immigration of certain relatives of certain types of US legal residents. It is not a part of the US refugee resettlement program. It’s an application for a permanent visa based on family relationship criteria.

Any US citizen can petition for parents, spouse , minor children, single adult children over 21, married children , and siblings. (spouses and minor children of beneficiaries are included on the visa)

Depending on the relationship to the petitioner,there are various waiting times based on the number of pending applications.

Parents, spouses and unmarried minor children are eligible for “immediate” visas and it’s just a matter of the actual processing time (although it’s usually several months to a year). Older children have a much longer waiting period and for siblings, the wait hovers around 10 years .

Legal permanent residents (green card holders) can only petition for spouses, unmarried minor children. Those are not “immediate” visas, but are subject to another waiting list but is usually 3-4 years),

Visas are initially adjudicated by the visa center here in the US simply based on documentation presented with the application, and then (provided they are initially approved) , once they become “current” , sent overseas to the nearest embassy/consulate for final decision, based on a face to face interview and documentation.

The US petitioner is also required to file an “affidavit of support” (showing financial ability to support the applicant (s)) which precludes the applicants from accessing any public benefits upon entering the US. (this is a whole other issue, since actual enforcement of those affidavits varies greatly from state to state and many legal visa recipients do access public benefits).

At one time, in the P-3 program, US relatives who were US citizens were barred from utilizing the P-3 process and required to file I-130’s. Refugee advocates successfully lobbied to have this rule changed, thus US citizens could file P-3 applications. While no longer required to, they could still also simultaneously file I-130’s as a back up in case the applicants failed to meet refugee criteria (one does not preclude the other). In my experience, most US relatives chose not to file the I-130s and , instead, rely solely on the P-3 process which, as you know, confers refugee status and eligibility for all available public benefits and puts no onus of financial responsibility on the US anchor relative.

I-730’s

This is where the lines can get a bit blurry.

This is a US visa called “following to join.” There are 2 categories:

Visa 93 (US relative was admitted as a refugee)
Visa 92 (US relative was granted political asylum in the US)

Applicants are limited to spouses and unmarried minor children (not parents, siblings, married or over 21 kids).

Relationships must have existed prior to granting of US petitioner’s status (some tricky parts here!). Application must be filed within 2 years of granted status.

Visas 92/93 can be filed simultaneously with P-3 applications.

Those applications are initially approved by US immigration processing centers (there are only a couple who do these) and sent to the local embassy/consulate for final adjudication. The applicants are under no requirement to provide any proof of refugee claims themselves, but only proof of relationship to the petitioner. If the visa is granted, they are admitted to the US under “derivative refugee/asylee” status. Affidavits of support are not required, and they are eligible for public benefits subject to the petitioner’s income (again,… my experience showed a large amount of easily-conducted fraud).

Of course I find it amusing beyond belief that the “persecuted refugees” (Mom and Dad) decided to go home to their persecutors a year or so ago and left the boys behind going to school and living off the US taxpayer in some form or another.

I’ll bet you a buck we will find immigration fraud in the case of the Brothers Tsarnaev—assuming some enterprising reporter does the digging and gets the news out!

How did we let them in? Everyone knew the father was crazy!

04/21/2013 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Besides being “crazy,” did US immigration officials know that he was a “political activist” in Russia?

Mom’s mugshot when she was busted for shoplifting at Lord & Taylor last year.

There is so much news flying around now about the Boston bomber brothers Tsarnaev that it’s hard to sort through it and pick out what’s important and what isn’t. But this little nugget in the Huffington Post (hat tip: Jeff) is something I want to share here because it goes to the question of how much screening did this family have before being given asylum in the US?

The mainstream media and Muslim apologists are going to make the case that the brothers unpredictably just went off the deep end, but as more information comes out about this family the bigger issue is what sort of people are we letting into the US in the first place?

A woman who went on many occasions to the Tsarnaev apartment for a facial treatment relates this account of what the mother (Zubeidat Tsarnaeva) said happened in Russia before they came to America. Incidentally, Zubeidat had reportedly been fired from her spa job and was doing facials at home—LOL! you know this had to be in violation of health laws in Massachusetts!

From the HuffPo:

In my last year of college I was getting a facial from her, and asking her about why she had originally come to the United States with her family about eight or 10 years previously. She told me that she and her husband had been lawyers and political activists in Russia. They had fled the country after “something that her husband did.” Her daughter had recently been divorced at this time, and her daughter’s ex-husband had taken their child to Russia, refusing to return him. Finally the child was returned. When my mom asked Zubeidat how they had gotten the child back, she told her that ‘her [Zubeidat’s] husband was crazy’ and everyone knew it. When he threatened the daughter’s ex-husband’s family, they returned the child.

I guess everyone (but US immigration officials) knew he was crazy. We are still waiting for more details on how this bunch received asylum. Were they resettled by a refugee resettlement contractor? Or, did they arrive here and ask for asylum and go before an immigration judge? There will be records that are surely being unearthed. If you find out the details before me—-please send the info. my way.

And, here is what else I want to know: If they were so persecuted back in Russia, then why did the parents return to Russia?

One more thing! The Gang of Eight amnesty bill introduced in the Senate last week has a refugee section we will be telling you more about—it makes it easier for more refugees to get into the US, less screening and elimination of the requirement that you have to prove you were personally persecuted—great huh!

Boston Marathon bombing archive of our previous posts is here.

Send a message to the US State Department

The next hearing on how many (and which refugees) to bring to America in FY2014 is in May. Go here to see how you can send in testimony. You do not have to be an expert on the program and testimony can be short (civil please)!

Howie Carr asks: How many of these jihadist “refugees” can we as a society survive?

04/20/2013 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I mentioned yesterday that Boston radio talk show host Howie Carr didn’t pull any punches in his criticism of our ‘humanitarian’ refugee program that is responsible for the Tsarnaev brothers good fortune in America. This is what Carr said in an opinion piece in the Boston Herald today, thanks to Judy for sending it.

Hey Howie, don’t hold back! (emphasis below is mine)

So once again, no good deed goes unpunished.

Uncle Sam lets another bunch of leeching future terrorists into the country who have absolutely no business being here, gives them “asylum,” making them immediately eligible for welfare, and this is the thanks we get?

They turn into mass murderers.

We bring in thousands of Muslims from a primitive society that has been battling Christians for centuries, and put them into a peaceful Christian society — what could possible go wrong?

This is what I was thinking about yesterday, with much of the city under what amounted to martial law. Once more, law-abiding American citizens were paying the price for the insane immigration policies that have so damaged this society in recent years.

You can see the decay everywhere — in the emergency rooms, in the courts, in the welfare offices and, yes, in the epidemic of senseless murders. The only difference this time was one of the bloodthirsty fiends was actually a naturalized U.S. citizen.

And then these “refugees” started killing the generous Americans who supported them for years in their indolence. The young Tsarnaev even got a $2,500 scholarship from the City of Cambridge — which is why I never, ever gave a dime to the Cambridge scholarship fund when I lived there.

I know you’re not supposed to paint with a broad brush, unless you’re a liberal, in which case you are not only permitted, but expected to make Adam Lanza the poster boy for 100 million law-abiding legal gun owners.

But please, before the Kool-Aid drinkers in the Senate try to get amnesty for at least 12 million undocumented Democrats, can somebody please consider how many more of these Dzhokhar Tsarnaevs we really need? [Does Mr. Carr know the Gang of Eight bill will allow more refugees into the US more easily and with less screening?—ed]

A better question: How many of these jihadist “refugees” can we as a society survive?

Look at the chaos and the tragedy these Chechens have inflicted on the people of Boston this week. Who asked them to come here? What exactly do they contribute to the culture? They have had everything — absolutely everything — handed to them.

Obviously, no other country in the world wanted these sharia-crazed Stone Age Muslim terrorists.

There is just a bit more (here) because I couldn’t resist posting most of it. Carr seems to have some firsthand knowledge of the program.

I guess I better make a whole category for the Boston Marathon bombing so that readers may access all of our posts more easily. Surely there will be more ….

Send a message to the US State Department

And, don’t forget! Al-Hijra, the Islamic Doctrine of Immigration, buy it and read it!

Media on Chechens, manipulating the numbers and twisting the truth

04/20/2013 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Steve Sailer has a very good post on Chechens, here (read it), in which he directs us to a USA Today story on Chechen “refugee” numbers.

Here is how USA Today begins (emphasis mine, and when I use red I really mean it!):

Glen Howard looks like a nice guy, maybe I shouldn’t say he is lying. But no city in America gets to pick its refugees!

There are probably fewer than about 200 Chechen immigrants in the United States, and most of them are settled in the Boston area, as many U.S. cities have refused to accept asylum applicants from the war-torn area of southern Russia, says Glen Howard, president of the Jamestown Foundation.

Glen Howard is flat out lying! First, we really don’t know how many Chechens are in the US (heck, clearly this family was moving back and forth to Russia), but more importantly I am unaware of any city in America given the opportunity to say “NO ” to any particular ethnic refugee group. Indeed, this is one of the most serious complaints about refugee resettlement (which includes asylees)—states and cities are not consulted in the resettlement process, and once the migrant has a foot in the door, they can move anywhere.

The decision about which cities get refugees and from where is made mostly by unelected federal contractors (the volags) in collaboration with the State Department. This is a Tenth Amendment States Rights issue that hardly any state has ever raised (except maybe Tennessee). Only when there has been a complete breakdown in the city due to refugee overload is there ever a hiatus for a city once it’s been deemed “welcoming” by the resettlement industry.

***Update*** A reader this evening sent this comment in response to the above point:

Not only do states and cities not have a choice to say no, but when and if they try to, the federal government simply contracts with a private non-profit to bring them anyway.

Should there ever be any peep of objection by the “native population”, they are then accused of being unwelcoming.

USA Today continued with this:

About 70% of the Chechen immigrants are women, Howard says. Very few men are granted asylum because of U.S. anti-terrorism policies and because Russia often protests when ethnic Chechens try to settle in the U.S., he said. The U.S. admitted only 197 refugees from all of Russia in 2012.

This is how they twist the numbers. There might have been only 197 from Russia proper in 2012, but that is meaningless! Go to the Office of Refugee Resettlement Annual Report to Congress for 2009 (published three years late btw) and go to Appendix A. Note that refugees are listed as from THE FORMER USSR! (not just Russia).

From 1983 to 2009 we resettled 526,308 from THE FORMER USSR which includes Russia AND all of those countries that split off—all of the ‘stan’ Muslim countries. Someone at the State Department might be able to tell us how many are Chechens, and indeed how many are Muslims!

In 2005 we resettled: 11,272

In 2006: 10,452

In 2007: 4,583

In 2008: 2,390

In 2009: 2,022

After that the numbers are hard to find (and I’ve got other things to do today!). But, if the ORR wasn’t breaking the law by not providing annual reports to Congress for 2010, 2011 and 2012, we could easily find numbers.

And, then this! We are expected to assume the US has only 200 Chechens when Austria has 30,000. Last I checked you could come to the US easily from Europe once you were in the EU.

That contrasts with many European countries, especially Austria, where many Chechens who want to leave difficult conditions at home settle. Austria has about 30,000 Chechen immigrants, Howard said.

For additional edification, readers might want to search RRW for all the problems poor Austria is having with its large and ever-growing Muslim population. Just type ‘Austria’ into our search function and see if you want that here!

Moratorium!

It is time for a moratorium on Muslim immigration, or is it too late for us already?

04/20/2013 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

There I’ve said it. I know most respectable immigration control advocates won’t say it. It is just too politically-incorrect for most people, but it has to be said. Many are afraid of what CAIR will say (LOL! they have already come out to warn against backlash!), but most are just plain afraid to be called racist, xenophobic, bigoted boobs.

The Chechen Jihadists carry deadly bombs through happy American crowd in Boston on April 15,2013

I don’t know what the total number of Muslims we admit each year is (the State Department knows, but does not release that information), but it is substantial via our Refugee Resettlement Program which includes refugees the US State Department brings here, and those who come seeking asylum.

And, as for the latter, remember that not all of those coming across our borders in the dark of night are Mexicans looking for landscaping and nanny jobs—OTMs (Other than Mexicans) account for thousands each year. The Gang of Eight bill now before the US Senate would allow those from Islamic countries to get on the path to citizenship.

National War College Report

Yesterday, as news unfolded from Boston, I couldn’t help but think about State Department official David Robinson’s report to the National War College in 2000 in which he tells us the sorry tale of Clinton/Gore demanding that we airlift thousands of Kosovars to the US to show that there was a need for the Balkan war. You see a war wouldn’t be a real one without “refugees.”

A short time later we hauled many of them back to Kosovo, here.

Cheering the decision for an airlift were the federal refugee contractors (euphemistically called Voluntary Agencies—Volags for short) who get paid by the head (by you!) to resettle the refugees.

That report opened my eyes to the realization that we were using the refugee program for political reasons unrelated to the plight of the poor and suffering camp-dwelling people you are accustomed to seeing as the poster children for the program.

The Boston bomber brothers are just two of those belonging to a particular Muslim ethnic group we are moving into your towns and cities for some other foreign policy reason unrelated to their supposed suffering.

US State Department hearing

Last year, at the State Department hearing on how many refugees to bring in FY2013, I listed ten reasons we needed a moratorium on the whole program. That testimony is here. Numbers 3 and 7 relate to my point here this morning:

3) Terrorist organizations (mostly Islamic) are using the program that still clearly has many failings in the security screening system. Indeed consideration should be given to halting the resettlement of Muslims altogether. Also, the UN should have no role in choosing refugees for the US.

[…..]

7) Congress needs to specifically disallow the use of the refugee program for other purposes of the US Government, especially using certain refugee populations to address unrelated foreign policy objectives—Uzbeks, Kosovars, Meshketians and Bhutanese (Nepalese) people come to mind. [editors note: Bhutanese are not Muslims]

Regarding #7, we have chronicled on many occasions over the last five plus years problems with refugee groups we resettled for questionable foreign policy reasons. Now we can add Chechens! Was our government helping out a foreign government (Russia!) by bringing them here in apparently large numbers?

Naive people involved in refugee resettlement have this crazy notion that America is a magic melting pot whose power is so great that Islamists will give up their Koranic admonition to wage jihad in exchange for the good life—a job, a house, a car and other material goodies.

Let’s list just a few “refugee” ethnic groups that have created problems here in addition to Chechens:

Kurds, Somalis, Ethiopians, Uzbeks, Bosnians, Iraqis, Albanians—we have written about them here at one point or another having created problems for the communities to which they were distributed. Look for more Muslims to be resettled from Syria, Afghanistan, and Burma (Rohingya!).

Don’t forget! Once the seed community is established the original settlers can apply to bring their family members with the help of the Volags (who are paid to do the paperwork processing).

Send a message to the US State Department

And, don’t forget! Al-Hijra, the Islamic Doctrine of Immigration, buy it and read it!

Follow me on twitter! I’m new at it, but am hooked and having a blast. AnnC @RefugeeWatcher