Tennessee: Knoxville’s City Council and Open Borders Mayor Begging Governor to Bring Them Refugees

Editor:  This is a guest post by David James who recently explained how the Trump Executive Order will not do what we had all hoped.

 

Knoxville City Council has voted unanimously to beg Republican Governor Bill Lee for cheap refugee labor and directed their open borders mayor Madeline Rogero, “to send a letter to the U.S. secretary of state to share the city’s plans to participate “’in this very worthy program.”’

Will Governor Lee go-along-to-get-along with local city officials such as Mayor Rogero and join a small number of governors (only three!) who have told the White House that they want more refugees for their state?

BTW, Rogero is a BIG supporter of the anti-American TN Immigrant & Refugee Rights Coalition (TIRRC).

Governor Lee would be well advised to not go down the “compassionate conservative” route, remember who put him in office, and carefully study the issues raised in the Tennessee lawsuit.

He should pay particular attention to the long-arm reach the federal government has made into his state budget to pay for the federal resettlement program.

Federal reports have admitted to shifting costs associated with the refugee resettlement program to state and local governments.

Of course these urban lefties see no irony in the fact that the director of the federal contractor who heads up Bridge Refugee Services, was a refugee herself and now gets paid by taxpayers to bring refugees to Knoxville and Chattanooga.

Bridge Refugee Service*** contracts with national VOLAGs Church World Service and Episcopal Migration Ministries and like all contractors involved in the resettlement industry, relies on federal cash flow to keep their pipeline flush. [Church World Service recently joined forces with CAIR to demand that the White House admit more refugees to the US.—ed]

Bridge’s financial reporting has been spotty, but what is available shows what they are really worried about – contractors are paid for each individual refugee they drop into your community – so the fewer the number, the lower the federal payouts. The combined federal and state grants in 2017 and 2018 likely reflect a much lower federal contribution resulting from Trump’s annual lowered refugee arrivals.

The state grants likely refer to money funneled from USHHS to NGO Catholic Charities of TN (CCTN), which USORR designated to replace the state of TN after TN withdrew from the refugee program. Best guess is that CCTN has decided to help keep Bridge afloat knowing that both Knoxville and Chattanooga are true blue cities where open borders groups rule and local governments agree.

2008 – $682,158

2009 – $641,801

2010 – $902,445

2016 – $1,329,939 – 155 new refugees for Chattanooga and 267 for Knoxville

2017 – $839,583 (combined federal & state grants*) – 48 new refugees for Chattanooga and 65 for Knoxville

2018 – $945,165 (combined federal & state grants) -150 new refugees for Chattanooga and Knoxville combined

The reports also show that on average, 50% of the new arrivals are under age 18 – meaning all state taxpayers are paying for their English learner services in school.

You’ll also be heartened to know that Bridge works to make sure that their clients don’t become like backward, hateful, prejudiced conservative Republicans in Tennessee.

Bridge collaborates with an Adventist Muslim Friendship Association which helps arriving Muslim refugees (like Whahab and Jinan profiled in the 2018 report), “overcome differences in language, faith, and culture as well as the prejudice in the community. ‘“We learned you don’t have to change yourself to be like Americans or change Americans to be like you,” says Jinan.”

Wahab has already joined Bridge’s board and no doubt it won’t take long for him to connect with the TN American Muslim Advisory Council which is doing its level best to force its desired change on Tennessee communities.

CCTN well understands that refugee resettlement MONEY is the lifeblood of not only Bridge, but its own organization as well. Take a look at their latest available financials – almost 50% of its operating budget for the entire organization is based on money flow from refugee resettlement program. At the same time, they have drastically reduced services to needy American citizens.

 

That’s the pattern with the open borders, moralizing lefties – needy and worthy American citizens – people with intellectual disabilities, the homeless, and veterans, step aside.

***Editor endnote:  Interesting that Bridge first came to the attention of RRW in 2007 when we first learned that it refused to give information to the FBI about two Iraqi refugees it had resettled. In 2003, Bridge joined the ACLU and Muslim groups to sue the federal government to block the use of the post 911 Patriot Act.

Idaho Senator Wants Special Refugee Program for Syrians and Kurds

“It is the ‘Invade the World/Invite the World’ attitude.”

(A critic of the proposal echoing a common theme of the President)

 

The Senator’s idea is to add thousands to the President’s 2020 refugee cap for those who ‘supposedly’ helped us to defeat ISIS.  He recommends flying them here ASAP.

The Senator is a Republican—Idaho Senator Jim Risch, Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

He is running for a third term, see here.

Thanks to several readers who tipped me off to this news reported by Neil Munro at Breitbart last Thursday:

GOP Sen. Jim Risch Offers Citizenship to Kurdish, Syrian Populations

Sen. Jim Risch (R-ID) is pushing a new bill that would transport many Muslims from chaotic Syria and Kurdistan into America’s schools and workplaces.

The bill creates a refugee program for Syrians and Kurds who claim to have helped U.S.-funded armed groups, such as the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). Risch is the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, so his legislation may pass as soon as this week.

But his bill would provide a “carve-out” in refugee law for Middle Eastern fighters, said a source. Also, the uncapped refugee inflow would include many unvetted and unidentified people because U.S. officials cannot prevent or even detect fraud in the war-torn areas occupied by hostile or corrupt warlords, said the source.

Once people are admitted as refugees, they are put on a fast-track to citizenship.

The program would import Syria’s chaotically diverse cultures and conflicts back into the United States, the official said, adding, “It is the ‘Invade the World/Invite the World’ attitude.”

The legislation reflects the politicians’ starry-eyed support for foreign groups, regardless of the cost inflicted on Americans, the official said. “They care more about Syrians than they care about Americans,” the source said.

[….]

Risch’s bill is titled S.2641 and is named “Promoting American National Security and Preventing the Resurgence of ISIS Act of 2019.” It was introduced October 17.

The bill cuts a hole through current refugee law to allow many Kurds and Syrians to be flown out of the war zone into the United States, providing they claim a connection to groups who were supported or funded by the U.S. government during the last few years….

There is much more, continue reading here.

The driving force for more refugees in Idaho is the ‘need’ for a continuous supply of cheap labor for large industries including dairy and, dare I say, yogurt manufacturing.  Pols are eager to please their industry backers.

 

A 2018 tweet speaks volumes!

 

A trip down memory lane!

I guess the Senator has forgotten the 2015 controversy about the possibility of Syrian refugees being placed in Idaho!  The mere suggestion created a firestorm of public outrage.

Trying to silence the critics, the big paper there called citizens who had expressed fear at the prospect—“paranoid!”

I have an extensive archive on Idaho that new readers might want to visit to get up to speed on what has happened there over the last five years as refugee contractors push for more refugees to ‘welcome’ to the state.

Indeed rumors are swirling that contractors in Washington state have begun to move refugees across state lines into northern Idaho.

Idahoans should take the lead and let their Republican Senator know how they feel about more Middle Eastern (Religion of Peace) refugees coming to Idaho and to America!

Colorado Study: Refugees Living in Cycle of Poverty

No! how can that be?

Over and over again the media spreads the gushing news (fed to it by the refugee industry) about how refugees benefit the economy by helping rebuild cities, paying taxes, and opening businesses (at faster rates than American slugs!).

So, how can refugees be living in a cycle of poverty?

They are, says the new study from the University of Colorado and guess what the answer is to lifting them out of poverty?  You guessed it!

Taxpayers need to pony-up and give them more financial support, build new housing for refugees and not make them go out and work menial jobs as soon as they get here.

Senators Ted Kennedy and Joe Biden designed the Refugee Act of 1980. They promised we wouldn’t be importing poverty! But, they knew that their industry pals needed cheap labor and that people in need of welfare vote for Democrats!

But, supplying cheap labor is why they are here in the first place especially in places like Colorado with its meat packing facilities dotting the state, and Big Meat’s voracious appetite for a steady supply of unskilled labor.

When now deceased Senator Ted Kennedy with the help of ‘Uncle Joe’ pushed through the Refugee Act of 1980  they promised we wouldn’t be importing poverty!  They lied.

Now to the news before my head explodes.

From KUNC:

Colorado’s Refugees Can Become Trapped In Chronic Poverty, Study Finds

(No kidding!)

Between the high cost of housing and shrinking federal funding for local organizations, many refugees resettled in Colorado find themselves stuck in chronic poverty. That’s according to new research from the University of Colorado Boulder, which studied refugee communities across the Front Range.

Xiaoling Chen, a geography doctoral student,wanted to understand why refugees became trapped in low-wage jobs, despite the state and federal resources intended to help them succeed.

The Refugee Industry will not be happy with Xiaoling Chen’s analysis that says refugees are trapped in poverty!

“So we (wanted) to find out why and in order to help the federal government address these challenges,” Chen said in a recent interview.

In her study, published this fall with support from the University of Colorado Denver, Chen explains that, despite their level of education or English proficiency, refugees in the US tend to have lower incomes compared to American born citizens; 50 percent of the refugees she surveyed said their first job in the US did not match their education level.

According to data from the Colorado Refugee Services Program, refugees in Colorado tend to find low-skill jobs in light manufacturing and hospitality, where they earn a monthly household income of around $700 to $999 in their first year.

By their fourth year, their earnings have hardly increased and many said it’s not enough to support their family.

In her research, Chen aimed to identify the barriers faced by refugees in their first eight months in Colorado. What she discovered is that the high cost of housing in cities like Denver have forced refugee agencies to get clients employed faster, often within their first three months in the US. Even though refugees are given financial assistance for the first eight months, those funds are quickly consumed by rent according to several agency workers interviewed for the study.

You can go read the complaints about the lack of taxpayer funding.  Then here (below) we see it is once again Trump’s fault.

Notice Chen does not clearly spell out the fact that the resettlement contractors are paid by the head to place refugees.

LOL! Larger budgets for the resettlement contractors doesn’t trickle down to refugees, but fuels fat cat salaries at the CEO level! The International Rescue Committee has offices in CO and its CEO is raking in a salary of over $900,000 a year. See here.

But, the mainstream media never reports on those exorbitant salaries.

KUNC continues….

Since Chen began her research in 2016, budgets for local refugee agencies have been further restricted as the overall number of refugee arrivals has plummeted under the Trump administration. For the year 2020, the annual cap was recently set at 18,000, the lowest number since the refugee program was created by congress in 1980. These restrictions have reportedly triggered layoffs while other agencies have closed down completely.

Among her policy recommendations, Chen suggests Colorado develop affordable housing for refugees and that the federal agency, Office for Refugee Resettlement, adjust the definition for “economic self-sufficiency***” to reflect actual living standards. In the end, said Chen, these investments would benefit everyone.

Really! Everyone! Even the taxpayers who must shell out more money to a program that already exceeds a billion dollars at the federal level and surely that much or more across 49 states.

“We can see that if the federal government and the state government can give more support to the resettlement community … those refugees can enrich the culture in the US and help to establish our economy,” Chen said.

“Enrich the culture!” “Establish our economy!”  Says who?  A PhD candidate at at Colorado University!  No wonder we are sick of the mainstream media!

Read it all.

Ms. Chen has confirmed what you knew intuitively—that refugees are not bringing economic boom times to your towns and cities!  Her prescription for solving the problem of refugee poverty, by throwing more of your hard earned money at it, must be resisted!

***You need to know that presently a refugee can be getting food stamps, housing help, medical care along with a low wage job and be considered “self sufficient” by the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement.  The contractors take every opportunity to tell the public the big lie—-that refugees are self-sufficient in only a few months.

 

Refugee Contractor/Community Organizer Tells Followers to Get to their Governor

The Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (aka HIAS), as if on cue, sent out an appeal this week to their followers to pressure their governors to support refugee resettlement via a letter to the President.

We just reported two days ago about how the Trump Executive Order , that ostensibly provides for local input in the decision-making process of where to place refugees (decisions right now are made by the US State Department in conjunction with the nine federal refugee contractors), will do almost nothing and is already serving as another means for the contractors to bash Trump.

The governor of Pennsylvania, where HIAS is a lead resettlement agency, has already fired off his letter to the President.  No surprise that he says PA welcomes more refugees.  See where else HIAS has affiliates, here.

Building on that success, HIAS is now urging its followers to pressure other governors.

Here is what they say in an e-mail yesterday:

Dear friend,

Ask your Governor to to Stand Up for Refugees

On September 26, the White House issued an Executive Order that, for the first time, allows states and municipalities to veto refugee resettlement in their communities. This order, the latest in a series of attempts to dismantle the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program, is in effect a state-by-state, city-by-city refugee ban.

Refugee resettlement is lucrative work. As Senior VP at HIAS, Nezer in 2018, according to HIAS Form990, had a compensation package that included $183,498 in salary and an additional $68,836 in related compensation. If this were a truly private organization, salaries would be none of our business, but as a quasi-government organization that received over $20 million from taxpayers that same year, it becomes our business.

Call your Governor now to urge them to continue welcoming refugees to your state.

If the Executive Order goes into effect, it could drastically reduce — or entirely stop — the resettlement of refugees in your community. We need the help of HIAS supporters in every state to make sure that refugees continue to be welcomed to our country.

While the administration is still working out how this order will be implemented, we expect that it will create chaos and confusion about where refugees can be resettled.

[Note how they are helping create chaos by urging governors, ahead of any formal process being put in place to support a continuous flow of paying refugee clients to American towns and cities.—ed]

Already a number of Governors have communicated that they will continue to support refugee resettlement in their states. We need to let all Governors know where the Jewish community stands on resettlement and work together to ensure our states publicly declare welcome for refugees.

Call your Governor now and ask them to take a stand by declaring their support for refugee resettlement in your state.

Thank you for taking action,

Melanie Nezer

Vice President,

Public Affairs

P.S. We recently started using a new system to make calling your elected official simple and effective. All you need to do is click the link in this email and pick up the phone!

The refugee industry is organized and well-funded.  I’ll have more to say about HIAS’s IRS Form 990s in a few days, but check out their system to make it even easier for their followers to quickly fire off a phone call to their governors.

Those of you concerned about your state and community (whether taxpayers can afford more impoverished people and the societal upheaval that comes with them) have no such system to make your voices heard on the issue of refugee resettlement and the unfairness of the whole placement system.  

Frankly, no major immigration-control group has made refugee resettlement a priority.

Republican Senator Marco Rubio “honored” to Receive Award from Church World Service

Church World Service , as I reminded everyone just last week, is one of nine federally-funded refugee contractors.  Its most recent political agitation stunt was to join with the Council on American Islamic Relations on the steps of the Capitol and see its CEO arrested.

Now we hear they have given awards to their great defenders in the House and Senate—Marco Rubio among them!

Just so you know, CWS has received nearly half a billion of your tax dollars over the last ten years, see here.

And, in addition to placing refugees throughout small-city America they oppose the President by promoting open borders, and supporting the continued entry of illegal aliens into the US!  Does “little Marco” know that?

From Florida Daily:

Marco Rubio, Mario Diaz-Balart Honored by Church World Service for International Aid Efforts

On Wednesday night, two members of the Florida delegation were honored for their work on international humanitarian issues.

Church World Service honored U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., U.S. Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart, R-Fla., and eight other members of Congress for “their leadership on humanitarian and poverty-focused international aid and protecting the U.S. refugee resettlement program.”

Diaz-Balart was one of 16 members of the House to tell the President they wanted more than 18,000 refugee admitted this year.

Other honorees included U.S. Sens. Chris Coons, D-Del., Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and James Lankford, R-Okla., and U.S. Reps. Jim Clyburn, D-SC, Kay Granger, R-Tex., Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., Nita Lowey, D-NY, and Chris Smith, R-NJ. Church World Service President and CEO Reverend John McCullough and Board of Directors Chairwoman Reverend Patricia de Jong presented the awards.

[….]

“I am honored to receive this award from Church World Service. I will continue to work to support and uplift communities across the globe, ensuring that all people have the opportunity to fulfill their God-given potential,” said Rubio who sits on the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

More here.

LOL! We should be glad that government contractors give awards like this because it helps us identify who exactly is working against the principle of America First!

For new readers, thank Church World Service for this blog since they were the federal contractor which was quietly placing refugees into my county in 2007.  So frustrated by the local paper which refused to give the citizens in our rural Maryland county any information about CWS or its subcontractor, the Virginia Council of Churches, I decided to investigate myself and publish what I learned.

CWS is a hard Left (taxpayer-funded) political organization (masquerading as a ‘religious charity’) that is changing America by changing the people.

Does Church World Service represent your church, go here and find out! If your church is doing a “crop walk” then you are sending money to CWS.

By the way, surely Senator Rubio sees this award as a political freebie!  If you live in Florida take a minute and tell him that you don’t agree with him on refugee resettlement (by taking this award he signals where he stands!).