Category: Community destabilization

88 US Mayors Want Trump Refugee Executive Order Rescinded; say 100,000 is the Right Number

~ Ann Corcoran ~ 11 Comments

Two days ago the US Conference of Mayors told America that 18,000 refugees for fiscal year 2020 is too low and that 100,000 a year is their preferred number.

Washington DC mayor Bowser signed the letter. No surprise as she was a leader of the DC Women’s (pussy hats) march against the Prez. Checked the data and just as I suspected DC takes very few refugees—only 135 in TEN years.

They also made it clear that they do not want a local or a state role in deciding where refugees are placed saying it would create a “patchwork of conflicting policies.”

That means of course they are affirming that Washington (and its nine contractors that monopolize all refugee resettlement in America) knows best.  (Well, except for when Trump is in the White House!)

Here (below) is their press release and a screenshot of all those mayors who signed the letter. (I told readers three days ago that the aim of the Open Borders community organizers was to get local elected officials on board.)

This once again confirms that the Left has captured local elected offices and the only hope of pulling out of this decline is for you all to get involved locally where you live and find candidates to challenge them.  It is a tall order that will only be accomplished if Trump gets four more years to buy time for America Firsters to get to work!

From the US Conference of Mayors:

(There are 1,408 mayors in the conference, so I guess these 88 are calling the shots! What do the other 1,320 think about the Conference taking this position?)

Nation’s Mayors Urge Administration to Rescind Executive Order Reducing Refugee Admissions

 

 

Washington, DC – Today, 88 bipartisan mayors from across the country sent a letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, urging the Administration to rescind a September 26 executive order that revamps the U.S. resettlement system and could drastically reduce, if not entirely stop, the resettlement of refugees in cities.

The mayors also urged Secretary Pompeo to return this year’s refugee admissions to previous annual levels. The Administration announced the same day that it is slashing the number of refugees who may enter the country in 2020 to 18,000–the lowest since the program began in 1980 and a reduction of nearly 80% from just a few years ago.

The feds and their nine contractors (not elected by anyone!) know best!

The letter states, “The Executive Order would fundamentally change the structure of the U.S. resettlement program by devolving key decisions primarily to the states and ultimately lead to a patchwork of conflicting policies running contrary to the purpose of a national resettlement program….

[….]

In addition to addressing the country’s strong tradition of providing safe haven, freedom and opportunity to refugees fleeing the world’s most dangerous and desperate situation, the letter also cites the positive impact refugees have on the cultural and economic prosperity of cities and the nation as a reason to increase the cap.

The U.S. Conference of Mayors has long advocated for policies that provide adequate support for refugees and refugee resettlement.

The most recent policy adopted by USCM on this issue calls for admitting at least 100,000 refugees per year.

Here (below) is a screenshot of the signatures.  Does your mayor want to cede all power to the UN/US State Department and its contractors to decide how many impoverished people your city will host?

Remember fed’s contractors only are responsible for placing refugees and getting them signed up for their “services.”  Most of their care is on you—local and state taxpayers!

That is what these mayors are asking for—more poverty for your town or city!

They say the list is bipartisan but I don’t have the time to go through and figure out who might be a Republican, so let me know and I will do an update and tell readers which ones are Rs. 

Here is what you should do!

Make sure that your mayor knows that this is not a freebie political position for them!

If you find your mayor on the list, write a letter to the local paper and say that your mayor is advocating for 100,000 refugees for America and stating unequivocally that he/she does not want to have any say on how many are placed in your city.  

The mayors who signed the letter want that decision left up to bureaucrats in Washington along with the nine contractors that monopolize all refugee resettlement in America (below):

 

Governor Ralph Northam Tells the President: Virginia Doesn’t Have Enough Refugees, Will Take More

~ Ann Corcoran ~ 1 Comment

You may remember Democrat Governor Northam because of the “blackface” scandal  he endured earlier this year, one which would have driven a Republican governor from office and into political oblivion.

Gov. Ralph Northam—we want more third worlders for Virginia!

And, surely you recall his cruel words during an abortion debate about letting babies die post-birth.

So it should be no surprise that one friend quipped when told the news, “yes, kill the babies to make room for the refugees!”

Unless I have missed some, Virginia becomes the 5th state to tell President Trump that the state wants MORE third world poverty (eventually more voters for the Democrat party)!

In the right hand side bar here at RRW  I’m keeping track and so far we have PA, OR, UT, and WA as states where the governor has said, send us more!

As I said here, the Open Borders Refugee Contractors are organizing nationally to pressure the President and to get ready for the flood of migrants they expect once Trump is no longer standing in the way.

Your job is to make sure that Donald Trump remains in the White House for another term or we are done!

Here is ABC13 News:

Gov. Northam: ‘We welcome refugee resettlement in Virginia’

RICHMOND, Va. (WSET) — Governor Ralph Northam sent a letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo Monday confirming Virginia will continue to welcome refugees fleeing danger and persecution.

“I have read federal Executive Order 13888, and I write to reaffirm Virginia’s position that we welcome refugee resettlement in the Commonwealth,” he wrote in the letter.

President Donald Trump signed the order in September explaining that the Federal Government will only resettle refugees in those jurisdictions in which both the state and local governments have consented to receive refugees under the Department of State’s Reception and Placement Program.

Two things that jumped out at me from the Governor’s letter indicating that he doesn’t understand the program as it is being carried out by the contractors in the state:

Because of our proximity to Washington, D.C., we are a preferred location for many Special Immigrant Visa holders – Iraqi and Afghanistan refugees who provided services to the U.S. military in those countries, and whose lives and families are in danger because of that service.

What the heck is he talking about?  Why do previous employees of the US military have to live in proximity to Washington, D.C.?  We have brought tens of thousands of Afghan and Iraqi SIVs as separate from the Refugee Admissions Program over the last ten years.

We are never told how the SIVs are divvied up among the contractors and clearly if it is true that more of the Muslim Afghans and Iraqis are being placed near DC (Northern Virginia is mosque-central after all), the contractors have a hand in making that decision along with the feds. The Governor is out of the loop!

If the governor is telling the truth, Virginians should be asking why they are getting a disproportionate share of SIVs.

Virginia Community Capacity Initiative?

And then this:

Virginia helps refugees settle into new homes only in those localities that participate in the Virginia Community Capacity Initiative, which ensures that a community’s elected officials, faith leaders, schools, and other stakeholders are committed to helping refugees build new homes and lives. We work with resettlement agencies that have deep ties to these communities.

“Resettlement agencies” are of course the federal refugee contractors. LOL! and I bet a contractor drafted the governor’s letter.

I had never heard of this Virginia Community Capacity Initiative and when I searched around I found very little, just some verbiage at some Catholic sites about finding housing for refugees.

I doubt the program has any statewide application so for the governor to suggest that all of the communities in the state that receive refugees have already said they can handle more refugees is a stretch (well, a lie!).

I decided to see just how many ‘welcoming’ communities existed in Virginia and so naturally went to the Refugee Processing Center data base.

I limited my search to the last ten years of refugee placement in the state and compiled this list (below) of cities/towns that had refugees placed in their community.

And, you should know that the Afghan/Iraq special refugees are not included in this database. Indeed, I have never found any database which tells us where the SIVs are sent.

Some locations may have only received a handful of refugees, but nonetheless, the list is extensive.  I’m just wondering if the Virginia Community Capacity Initiative was at work in all of them.

Virginia ‘welcoming’ communities:

 

 

And, while I was having fun with the data last night, here are the top ten ethnic groups resettled in Virginia in the last ten years.

11,800 regular refugees (not including SIVs) have been placed in Virginia since October 2009 (a small number compared to some other states). But, again we don’t know how many of the special refugees, SIVs, were provided housing, medical care, and other welfare services in the state.

Virginia’s top ten:

Iraq (3,438)

Bhutan (2,294)

DR Congo (1,328)

Iran (642)

Burma (636)

Afghanistan (536)

Somalia (436)

Eritrea (406)

Syria (361)

Sudan (275)

As I said yesterday at ‘Frauds and Crooks’ …. as Virginia turns blue, we see some very disturbing criminal cases involving ‘new Americans’ of all stripes in the Old Dominion. Check out my posts there.

Refugee Contractors Use Trump September Executive Order to Organize Nationally

~ Ann Corcoran ~ 1 Comment

And, guess what? You, who either don’t want to see any more refugees coming to America or at least want a say in who we are accepting and whether they are placed in your town, are screwed.

Sorry to sound vulgar, but it is true, because the other side is highly organized and you have no national voice helping to guide you on what to do locally to push back.

It is make or break time! You’ve got a few more weeks to get your message to your local mayors, city councils, and governors.

And, locally is where the refugee contractors are making their big move now  (in addition to suing the President over the September EO that supposedly will give states an opportunity to opt-out of resettlement).

I’m not naming names, but for those of you hoping a national immigration control organization located in Washington, DC (or anywhere in America) will focus on the refugee issue and tell you what to do, forget it!

You are on your own.

And, notice where the debate is!  It isn’t on the issue of whether we should be bringing tens of thousands (hundreds of thousands!) of refugees to the US annually from countries that hate us; it isn’t on whether the whole program is unconstitutional and needs to be dumped and rewritten (if we even want more refugees); it is on which of your towns will be changed forever and who gets to decide that!

Trump’s EO was far from perfect, but he is concerned about the secrecy that has heretofore been the watchword of refugee resettlement decision-making in America. The contractors, which have monopolized all resettlement in the US for decades, love calling the shots from Washington and are fighting tooth and nail not to lose that power.

The nine federal contractors*** and their friends throughout the Open Borders Industry are highly organized with an extensive grassroots network, so when Trump opened the door with his September Executive Order about local and state governments having some say in the decision-making process they have turned on their networks and their people have gone to work.

Indeed, they expect Trump to be gone so they can go back to business as usual of changing America one town at a time, their Executive Order pushback has become a key element in their strategy.

I’ve always hated the expression, but since Trump handed them a lemon they are making lemonade!

Here is the first of many examples, Mary Poole the refugee advocate who opened the door to a new resettlement office in Montana says it best.

From the Missoulian:

Missoula refugee resettlement agency wades through Trump order

Missoula is one of roughly 190 communities in the U.S. that resettle refugees. Only a handful of states don’t. So far none has banned further resettlement, and letters of support are reported from city councils in the likes of Decatur, Georgia; and Alexandria, Virginia.

In 2016 Mary Poole successfully pushed for the opening of an International Rescue Committee subcontractor office for Missoula.

Gary Herbert, Utah’s Republican governor, wrote Trump a letter requesting he “allow us to accept more international refugees in Utah.”

Democratic governors Jay Inslee of Washington and Kate Brown of Oregon have voiced support for resettlement, and on Tuesday Republican Gov. Doug Burgum, announced North Dakota would continue to receive refugees “as long as local governments agree to it,” the Grand Forks Herald reported.

Such responses underline what Soft Landing Missoula’s Mary Poole sees as a bright side to the executive order.

“While it makes an additional hurdle and roadblock, and it’s unfortunate, I think what we’re really going to see are people going to bat for (accepting refugees) in a way we haven’t seen before,” she said. “I’m pretty excited to see that visual representation nationwide to show how important this is.”

And so they are!

Their people are pushing local governments everywhere to shove it back at Trump and put in writing that they WANT MORE REFUGEES!

Some examples that have come across my desk in recent days:

In Holland, Michigan, here.

In Lancaster, PA, here.

In Oklahoma, here. (The Oklahoma story is particularly informative.)

In Nebraska, here.

And, in Tennessee the Tennessee Office of Refugees run by Catholic Charities has sent out an e-mail with contact information for TN mayors to make it easier for their anti-Trump EO supporters to weigh in:

Contact your local elected officials to let them know their constituents support refugee resettlement.

Chattanooga City Mayor
Andy Berke
(423) 643-7800
mayor@chattanooga.gov

Hamilton County Mayor
Jim Coppinger
(423) 209-6100
Email: hamiltontn.gov/Mayor/form.aspx

Knoxville City Mayor
Madeline Rogero
(865) 215-2040
mayor@knoxvilletn.gov

Knox County Mayor
Glenn Jacobs
(865) 215-2005
Email: knoxcounty.org/email/email_new.php?email_name=county.mayor

Memphis City Mayor
Jim Strickland
(901) 636-6000
mayor@memphistn.gov

Shelby County Mayor
Lee Harris
(901) 222-2000
officeofthemayor@shelbycountytn.gov

Nashville Metro Mayor
John Cooper
(615) 862-6000

 

You can be sure that information like that is going out in your state too!

Because you aren’t going to hear it from any organization giving you marching orders….

…. my message to you is get to your local government and speak up before they do—a big challenge because they have a huge head start on you!

Contact your governor too!

Even if you think that your voices won’t be heard, tell your local and state elected officials what you think anyway, otherwise they will assume that supporting the idea of more refugees for your town or city is a political freebie for them!

Oh, and if you want to make a big splash—challenge your local elected officials in the next election.  Even if you think you can’t win the first time out, your local media will be forced to report on your platform.

A very simple message to your elected officials is this: care for refugees where they live in the world, and let’s take care of poor and vulnerable Americans here first!

 

***The nine federal contractors listed below have dozens of subcontractors working under them around the country.  So although your local resettlement agency has a name not listed here, you can be sure they work for one of the nine major contractors.

They are all very Leftwing political organizations, but the most actively anti-Trump in recent months are in red. You might argue that the Bishops are very political and they are, but I’ve noticed that they are laying low these days (there are a large number of Catholic Trump supporters) and USCRI has been unusually quiet.

 

Church World Service, One of Three Federal Refugee Contractors Suing Trump Funded from US Treasury

~ Ann Corcoran ~ 1 Comment

Just like the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS), Church World Service, representing some major churches in America,*** do not want you, taxpaying Americans, to have any say in which impoverished third worlders are placed in your towns and cities.

Read all about the lawsuit to put a roadblock before Trump’s September Executive Order that although far from perfect, at least acknowledges that heretofore you have had no say in the demographic future of America.

Nine contractors working with the US State Department make the decisions!

Church World Service CEO Rev. John L. McCullough (far left) was arrested along with CAIR’s Nihad Awad on the Capitol steps last month. https://refugeeresettlementwatch.org/2019/10/13/cair-church-world-service-others-plan-civil-disobedience-at-us-capitol-this-week/

 

As promised yesterday I’ve had a little look into Church World Service’s finances and say once again, if they were a true religious charity, not receiving any taxpayer dollars, we would have no quibble with the sources of their money, or how they spend it.

However, in the case of CWS they are even more heavily funded by you and me than is HIAS and so we have a right to know how our money is being used.  

As I said earlier today, tell your children to grow up to run ‘non-profit charities!’

CEO Rev. John McCullough pulled in over $1 million in compensation in just the last 4 years—lucrative work if you can get it!

Here is a run-down of CWS’s finances from their last four years of Form 990s filed with the IRS.

BTW, for new readers, it was CWS’s activities in my rural county in 2007 that ‘inspired’ me in my investigative work that has become my passion.

And, you should know that CWS also advocates for Open Borders for illegal aliens. (See right)

2015 (Obama year)

$50.1 million from government grants

$25.1 million from other sources of income

Total income: $77.8 million (other smaller sources of income included)(Conservatively 64% federally funded because some of their other smaller amounts of income are from taxpayers too.)

$27 million passed through to other organizations

$16.3 million paid in salaries (salaries do not include other payroll expenses)

$316,714 CEO (McCullough) compensation (includes other compensation from the organization and other related compensation)

 

2016 (Obama’s top refugee ‘welcoming’ year)

$61.3 million from government grants

$24.7 million from other sources of income

Total income: $88.5 million (69% federally funded.)

$29.5 million passed through to other organizations

$15.5 million paid in salaries

$333,626 CEO (McCullough) compensation

 

2017 (Trump takes over 3 and 1/2 month into the fiscal year)

$68.4 million from government grants

$24.6 million from other sources of income

Total income: $95.8 million (71% federally funded)

$41 million passed through to other organizations

$16.3 million paid in salaries

$345,366 CEO (McCullough) compensation

 

2018 (Trump year)

$39.3 million from government grants

$23.8 million from other sources of income

Total income: $66.1 million (60% federally funded.)

$20.9 million passed through to other organizations

$13.3 million paid in salaries

$353,220 CEO (McCullough) compensation

 

Interesting trend line!  Unlike HIAS whose budget is growing via private money under Trump, CWS’s is declining (sharply from 2017 to 2018, no wonder they are ticked off).

However, despite the wailing when Trump came in, CWS had an exceptional year in 2017 when it was 71% federally funded.

But the best fun fact is that as the organization’s resources declined in 2018 (closed offices and reduced staff), the Reverend McCullough’s compensation continued an upward climb.  Hmmmm!  Doing well by doing good!

*** Find out if your church is a member congregation of CWS, see here.

HIAS Sues Trump Again, Contractor Does Not Want Local Citizens to have a Say in Placement Decisions

~ Ann Corcoran ~ 5 Comments

It is as simple as this:  HIAS (Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society) wants to continue to call the shots from Washington, DC about where refugees will be placed in America.

HIAS has been protesting Trump from the moment he was elected. Here CEO Mark Hetfield led a February 2017 anti-Trump rally that featured then Rep. Keith Ellison.  https://refugeeresettlementwatch.org/2017/02/14/breitbart-federally-funded-refugee-resettlement-contractor-hias-organized-ny-rally-against-trump/

You, who live in cities large and small are expected to shut up and let the professionals and experts determine which third world refugees will be resettled in which communities.

Never mind that as we pointed out here, the President’s Executive Order really doesn’t do much and never mind that there are yet no published guidelines from the federal government about how the Executive Order would be carried out, HIAS is nevertheless getting a jump on it by beating their anti-Trump drums and filing a lawsuit.

Clearly they have no interest in listening to what citizens have to say about their community being forever changed by federal contractors working for the US State Department. 

I suspect this new lawsuit is all about raising more money from an outraged constituency and I’ll tell you why I think that after you see what HIAS said yesterday.

Here is Mark Hetfield, HIAS CEO in an e-mail announcing the lawsuit:

Dear Friend,

In September, President Trump issued an executive order (EO) purporting to give state and local governments the authority to block refugee resettlement in their jurisdictions. This state-by-state, city-by-city refugee ban not only violates federal law, but also keeps refugees apart from their families, and prevents willing and able American communities like yours from welcoming people in need of safety. [Cry me a river!—ed]

This morning, HIAS, joined by two other refugee agencies, filed suit to stop this latest attempt to shut down refugee resettlement.

Now here is just some of their press announcement:

Today HIAS, together with two other refugee resettlement agencies, took President Trump to court over his recent executive order giving state and local officials authority to block refugee resettlement in their jurisdictions.

HIAS, Church World Service (CWS), and Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (LIRS) are suing the administration because it is attempting to enact a state-by-state, city-by-city refugee ban.

[….]

The president’s order, signed on September 26, would require resettlement agencies, including HIAS, CWS, and LIRS, to obtain written consent from all localities and states in which they plan to resettle refugees. If written consent cannot be obtained, it could prevent resettlement agencies from maintaining local affiliate offices that provide essential services to refugees already in the area.

According to the complaint, filed this morning in U.S. District Court in Maryland, the executive order violates federal law, which  requires federal agencies to make decisions about where refugees are to be placed within the United States according to a detailed list of factors, leaving no room for state and local governments to veto such decisions.

What factors? What are the detailed list of factors on which the feds (with their contractors) base their placement decisions? Shouldn’t we be given that information? We are the ones paying for it in more ways than one!

HIAS continues…

HIAS sued the Trump administration in 2017, when the president’s executive order called for halting refugee resettlement and banning people from seven majority Muslim countries with an exception for non-Muslim religious minorities.

HIAS, CWS, and LIRS, are represented by the International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP).

[….]

Melissa Keaney, Senior Litigation Staff Attorney for IRAP called the order “a back-door attempt to decimate the refugee resettlement program.” and noted that a single local politician should not be able to stop Americans who have been waiting years to reunite with family members.  [Their willingness to flat out lie is disgusting!  A single local politician could not stop resettlement!—ed]

“Trump’s War on Refugees” as they call it, has been very lucrative for HIAS!

I suspected that HIAS, and maybe some of the other contractors, was financially hurting as the Trump Administration has severely cut back on the number of paying clients (aka refugees) that the contractors are paid to ‘care for’ for a brief time, but I was wrong.

HIAS is better off financially today than it was at the pinnacle of the Obama Administration when refugees were pouring in by the tens of thousands.

We are getting into the weeds here, but hang in there.

I went back to the last four years of HIAS’s IRS Form 990s and guess what I confirmed?  HIAS is richer today than when Obama’s refugee spigot was wide open.

Their federal dollars have fallen only slightly while their private fundraising has mushroomed with the addition of over $10 million to their income between 2015 and 2018.

They are making money hand over fist because Donald Trump is in the White House!

In addition they are paying out more in salaries and giving less to other organizations.

Let me be clear.  If HIAS was a truly charitable organization that was not partially funded by taxpayers, I wouldn’t care about where their money came from, where they spent it, or how large their salaries are, but we, the taxpayers of America, are involuntarily paying for their overtly political activities and thus have a right to know how our money is being spent.

Here is a summary of some key data points on their IRS forms (I’m rounding numbers to make it easier to follow the money!):

2015  (Obama year)

$20.4 million from government grants

$15.2 million from other sources of income

Total income: $40.6 million (other smaller sources of income included)(Conservatively 50% federally funded because some of their other smaller amounts of income are from taxpayers too.)

$8.5 million passed through to other organizations

$12.2 million paid in salaries (salaries do not include other payroll expenses)

$375,000 CEO (Hetfield) compensation (includes other related compensation)

2016 (Obama’s top refugee ‘welcoming’ year)

$24.5 million from government grants

$17.4 million from other sources of income

Total income: $45.3 million (54% federally funded)

$12.2 million passed through to other organizations

$13.9 million paid in salaries

$344,000 CEO total compensation

2017 (Trump takes over)

$20.7 million from government grants

$19.9 million from other sources of income

Total income: $48.4 million (43% federally funded)

$8.9 million passed through to other organizations

$15.9 million paid in salaries

$322,000 CEO total compensation (took a little pay cut)

2018 (Trump)

$19.1 million from government grants (just about what they were raking in during Obama’s 2015!)

$27.4 million from other sources of income

Total income: $50 million (38% federally funded)

$6.6 million passed through to other organizations

$14.9 million paid in salaries

$330,000 CEO total compensation

Bottomline:  HIAS is wealthier today ($10 million wealthier) than they were four years ago and I suspect they are fully aware of how the President, and their campaign against him, has enormously helped their fundraising operations.

The lawsuit will likely bring in gobs more money for them!

And, just so you know, I’ll be looking at the Form 990s of the other ‘religious charity’ partners in this lawsuit.