Neil Munro writing atBreitbartyesterday confirms what we know, the refugee industry does not want local citizens to have a say when their towns and cities are chosen by federal resettlement contractors and approved by the US State Department as new homes for impoverished third worlders.
Remember that when Obama left office in 2016 his State Department and the resettlement contractors (Volags) were busy identifying nearly 50 new sites in which to expand their efforts to change America by changing the people.
In fact they had produced a guide that could be used by local open borders activists (without public input) to identify and put in place the necessary amenities that could then be submitted in an application to the State Department for approval of the town or city.
If Biden/Harris are installed in the White House look for them to be dusting off a plan to secretively identify new sites.
Below is a bit of what Munro said yesterday, but please read the whole thing.
FromBreitbart (thanks to several readers who sent it my way):
Foreign Refugee Managers: Keep Americans in the Dark
Nearly all managers in taxpayer-funded, refugee-delivery organizations say the public should have no say about the delivery of unskilled refugees into Americans’ neighborhoods, job markets, and schools, says a survey by refugee groups.
The 61-page surveywas released December 8 by the Refugee Council USA [That is the lobbying arm for the refugee industry in Washington, DC–ed] and the Center for Migration Studies, as the refugee groups cheered Joe Biden for his campaign-trail promise to dramatically expand the flow of low-wage refugees into Americans’ workplaces.
The number Biden is promising is 125,000 in the first year. See my post yesterday.
Just 15 percent of managers in refugee agencies, and just 14 percent of refugee officials in state governments, said that “neighborhood associations” should be “given a voice in the Refugee Resettlement process,” according to a chart on page 27 of the survey.
Once warned, many neighborhood groups protest against the delivery of refugees by the groups, which are dubbed VOLAGs because the official government term is a “Voluntary Agency.”
Most VOLAG respondents also argued that the federal government should not give a voice to Americans’ local governments:
Fifty-eight percent of survey respondents believe that the federal government should consult with state and local officials about resettlement but should not be required to obtain their consent before refugees are resettled. Smaller percentages believed that state and local officials should neither be consulted nor required to consent (19 percent).
Bartlett is standing in front of a map of refugee resettlement sites across the country. It is a map you cannot find anymore. Likewise as we reported recently it is no longer possible to get real time refugee arrival numbers or to learn where they were dropped off upon arrival.
Former Director of refugee admissions at the State Department, Lawrence Bartlett, the author of the introductory letter (below) to the New Site Development Guide had been pushed aside in the early Trump years, but by 2018 he was backat Population, Refugees and Migration.
I assume he is still there, but even if he isn’t, you can be sure that his deep state pals are all in place and ready to push forward if Biden succeeds in stealing the Presidency.
So we soon could be back to where we were in 2016 BT (Before Trump), having to fight in our own communities through grassroots skirmishes against Washington and its fake non-profit resettlement contractors.
And don’t expect help from Congress where the Republican chickens who rule the roost are provided their chicken scratch by massive global corporations always on the hunt for cheap migrant labor.
Don’t think for a minute that you, citizens and taxpayers, are “stakeholders!” You do not have a say!
For new readers these are the nine fake non-profits that will be making the primary decisions about how your town or city will be changed. From page 6 of the New Site Guide:
This is too funny! They are worried that they will not be able to whip up a public frenzy to demand more migration to American towns and cities once they have installed their man—Joe Biden—in the White House.
This is just one of many stories I’ve read in recent days in which the Socialist Dems worry that either Biden can’t possibly unwind all of the changes the Trump Administration made to our immigration system that slowed the invasion at the border, increased vetting for refugees, limited refugee numbers to help American low wage workers***, restricted the flow of migrants possibly carrying the Chinese virus, and saw the deportation of criminals who should not have been here.
What will Biden do when this happens? And, it will!
And, they are in a pickle if the flow across the border picks up (it has already started). Images of border wall crashers will be a public relations nightmare for the Biden team. The vast majority of Americans do not want to see an invasion repeat.
If Biden can’t or won’t act quickly to reverse what Trump has done to limit immigration, how on earth are they going to whip up a public frenzy after they destroyed our election system to get their candidate installed in the White House?
Here is a story that had me rolling on the floor laughing….
Let me be clear this is about Leftwing Jews! Just as there are Leftist Catholics and conservative Catholics, there are many conservative Jews who do strongly support the Trump Administration’s immigration restriction stance.
Jews rallied behind immigrants under Trump. Will they stop once Biden is president?
Alain Mentha, co-chair of the New Jersey Jewish Coalition for Refugees, watched with dismay last week as the board of Hudson County voted to extend a contract to hold Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainees at the local jail. The board consists entirely of Democrats, many of whom had pledged to stop working with ICE during the Trump presidency, and yet it approved the extension in a 6-3 vote.
Mentha’s frustration with the vote mirrors the concerns of some immigration advocates across the country who were heartened by Joe Biden’s victory in the presidential election, but fear it may not be enough to reverse Trump-era policies — especially if the public pressure over the issue dies down.
“I’m very worried, to be honest,” Mentha said in an interview. “I don’t want to be cynical or pessimistic, but I think it’s fair to wonder whether our elected officials are going to become complacent or suffer from inertia.”
Or, is it possible that even Democrat elected officials know that the general public will not tolerate loosening immigration policy!
The Trump administration took more than 400 executive actions over the last four years to break apart and reconstruct the nation’s immigration system, the Migration Policy Institute said in a recent report.
Liberal Jewish groups mobilized in opposition to these changes, which included the practice of separating children from their parents at the Mexican border, and the decision to make asylum-seekers wait in Mexico for their court hearings. Many advocates are optimistic that President-elect Biden will follow through on his campaign promises to reverse these policies, but they also fear that a Democratic administration may not face the same scrutiny that turned arcane border and refugee policy into frontpage news over the last four years.
What they are really saying is that they won’t have the orange monster to beat up (with the help of the media) and how on earth are they going to beat up Biden!
“There is that possibility that in January people feel like, ‘OK, everything is back to normal,’” said Melanie Nezer, a senior vice president at HIAS, the leading Jewish immigrant aid group.“We really have an opportunity here, but it won’t happen without intense pressure.”
Biden has pledged to resettle 125,000 refugees per year, more than in all but seven years since the program began in 1980 and well above average of 70,000 per year under President George W. Bush and 80,000 per year during the Obama administration. The ambitious goal would also be 10 times the 12,000 allowed to enter the United States during the past year.
He has also committed to end the current policy requiring asylum-seekers to await their hearings in Mexico; restore the program that allows undocumented immigrants who arrived in the country as children to receive legal residence; and prioritize the deportation of people who have committed crimes unrelated to their immigration status.
But Nezer said the immigration system has been so thoroughly altered by Trump and his senior adviser, Stephen Miller, that it will take years to repair. [LOL! She is lowering expectations to protect Biden.–ed]
No kidding!
Mentha said he fears that Biden may not prioritize immigration policy early in his term, as the country continues to grapple with a public health and economic crisis that could make Americans skeptical of allowing in foreigners.
“I’m very concerned that the climate as a whole isn’t very receptive,” he said.
It’s certainly not all doom and gloom for those active in the Jewish immigration-rights world, most of whom are optimistic about the next four years. Several activists interviewed cited Biden’s nomination of Alejandro Mayorkas, who arrived in the United States as an infant, to serve as secretary of the Department of Homeland Security.
Mayorkas, who is on the board of HIAS, comes from a family of Cuban-Jewish refugees. He helped craft DACA while serving in the Obama administrationand pledged after his nomination last week to protect “those who flee persecution in search of a better life for themselves and their loved ones.”
*** Here is one storyfrom recent days about how difficult it is going to be to unwind Trump’s policies.
Refugees under the Obama Administration were coming in in vast numbers to supply low wage workers for big business and the service industry (you know maids and janitors). But, the Chinese virus crisis has limited those jobs and here we see former Obama refugee honcho make that point:
“There are challenges that were not present during the Obama administration that are going to complicate or present obstacles to expanding the program,” Carey said. “And I think refugees generally enter entry-level jobs in the service industry, and that’s an area that’s been particularly hard hit in the economic downturn.”
So will Biden (if he makes it to the White House!) just bring in larger numbers than we have seen admitted for decades and simply put them all on welfare?
If you are new to RRW, you might want to learn more about the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society. I have an extensive archive on the federal government contractor (taxpayers pay them millions for their ‘work’) that has probably worked the hardest of the nine federal refugee contractors to remove President Trump from the White House.
The point you should take away from this story is that in addition to new refugees being illegally housed (newly arriving refugees are required to be placed in their own apartments or homes upon arrival, not placed in hotel rooms) is that the Michigan Lutheran refugee resettlement agency was working with the Muslim hotel owner who the city says was already in violation of fire and other safety codes.
For newcomers to RRW, there are nine federal resettlement agencies largely funded by you, the taxpayers, who work for the US State Department.
Each of those has many subcontractors. Your money flows through the nine down to hundreds of smaller organizations (like this Michigan subcontractor) making it very confusing for concerned citizens to know who it is that is changing their communities and it makes it almost impossible to follow the money.
Sterling Heights hotel in dispute with city alleges anti-Muslim, anti-refugee bias
The owner of a Sterling Heights hotel who is Muslim and of Pakistani descent alleges in a lawsuit filed Monday that city officials targeted and drove him out of business because of his faith and ethnicity and because he had housed about 200 Syrian refugees.
But on the same day, a Macomb County judge ruled against the hotel in a separate lawsuit that had been filed by city against the hotel, agreeing with the city that the hotel had failed to meet safety regulations.
Asad Malik, the owner of Wyndham Garden on 15 Mile and Van Dyke and president of the Pakistani Association of America, says in a lawsuit filed Monday in federal court in Detroit that after he started housing Syrian refugees in 2016, the city started to slap him with citations for violations of fire codes that he said other hotels with similar problems were not receiving. The hotel closed in September.
Malik purchased the hotel in 2014. He is an active member of the Muslim community in metro Detroit as a leader with the Islamic Association of Greater Detroit in Rochester Hills and meets with elected officials who have visited the mosque over the years.
The hotel was “opening her arms to refugees escaping from their war torn country,” his attorney Shereef Akeel, who filed the lawsuit on behalf of Sterling Hotels, told the Free Press. “The last thing you would think is then one of our own cites shutting the door on them. And now, my client has had to pay dearly for their act of generosity.”
The hotel started taking in Syrian refugees in November 2016 [during the big Obama flood of refugees—ed] working with Samaritas, formerly known as Lutheran Social Services of Michigan, which helps resettle refugees.
Malik said he then received an email from the Sterling Heights city manager asking him: “Are there any Syrian refugees being housed at the Wyndham? A resident is alleging such at our council meeting.”
The targeted harassment started after that….
Keep readingto learn more about the complaint. The fallback position for a certain group of people is to cry DISCRIMINATION!
So where else is LIRS working to change America by changing the people?
This is something I need to do every time I write about a resettlement agency funded by you, in this case Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (the mothership) that passes its case loads to subcontractors like Samaritis.
Hereis where you can find out if a refugee agency in your city is affiliated with LIRS.
Below is a screenshot ofthe full list of subcontractors. Note how some have dropped the word “Lutheran” from their names.
“Tragically, in the last four years, we have seen this program become politically divisive and a lightning rod for no good reason, except for scoring political points.”
(Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, president and CEO of LIRS)
And, one of their planned new (?) tactics is to tell more refugee stories for media consumption! Hire more communications personnel! Tell more stories!
When I began writing this blog in 2007, that was one of the things that fired me up!
Every time you turned around there were emotional tear-jerking stories in local and national media about how a struggling refugee came to be in America and how great life was now that he/she lived in some American multi-culti slum!
I called the stories, ‘refugees see first snow’ stories when what I wanted was real reporting on the pros and cons of placing refugees in unsuspecting communities.
My refugee alerts these days are filled with articles like this one from Sojourners(a ‘religious’ Left publication):
UNDER A NEW ADMINISTRATION, CAN REFUGEE RESETTLEMENT BE DE-POLITICIZED?
On Nov. 12, at a virtual event celebrating the 40th anniversary of Jesuit Refugee Service, President-elect Joe Biden doubled down on his promise to increase presidential determination for annual refugee admissions to 125,000. That pledge marks a big increase from the record low of 15,000 refugee admissions President Donald Trump had set for the 2021 fiscal year.
[….]
Forty years later [Refugee Act signed into law in 1980 by Jimmy Carter.—ed], the all-time low numbers of refugees resettled in the United States is concerning. But, according to refugee resettlement experts, that number is a symptom of a larger, more alarming problem: Refugee resettlement has become a partisan issue.
You know why it has only in recent years become a hot potato issue? For 30 of the last 40 years no one had any understanding of what the hell these contractors had been doing. I like to think I helped educate the public about the refugee industry!
“Tragically, in the last four years, we have seen this program become politically divisive and a lightning rod for no good reason, except for scoring political points,” said Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, president and CEO of Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (LIRS). “… My hope is that we can have a serious discussion that could help insulate the program from the political whims of a future executive branch that would once again seek to use refugees as a political cudgel.”
Watch for it! This is what they want—a refugee floor—so that no future President could dramatically reduce the number of refugees because those refugees represent the contractors’ income. Fewer refugees means less money for their coffers.
“Part of the discussion we need to have in the coming months and years ahead is how do we create a more predictable and bipartisan system that potentially sets a refugee floor, in addition to allowing the president to establish a ceiling,” said Vignarajah, who came to the U.S. with her family as a refugee in the late ’70s.
[….]
LIRS CEO Krish O’Mara Vignarajah previously worked for Michelle Obama, so can we really expect “depolitizing” of the refugee issue?
Along with the eight other organizations that contract with the State Department to resettle refugees in communities across the country, LIRS is taking steps to make bipartisan support of refugee resettlement a reality, in part, by doubling its communications staff in an effort to dispel myths around resettlement.
Think about this! Your tax dollars pay for big salaries so they can tell their “stories” to the media!
“We’re in the business of storytelling so people understand who a refugee is, and why they pick up with the limited belongings they have and come halfway across the world,” Vignarajah said. “In this kind of environment, we need to do a better job of communicating who we are and what we do and who refugees are.”
According to Naomi Steinberg, vice president of policy and advocacy at Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS), the conversation around refugee resettlement has become “toxified” over the past four years.
[….]
Among their requests of the incoming Biden administration:
Inform Congress of their intent to welcome 125,000 refugees and deliver a report to Congress that makes a case for increased appropriations for refugee resettlement.
Set the presidential determination with slots allocated according to regional needs, which allows the resettlement effort greater flexibility in meeting refugees’ needs.
Invite experts at the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security into the larger discussion on refugees.
Appoint a senior-level White House coordinator for refugee resettlement.
Immediately signal to the United Nations the intent to resume United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees referrals domestically and internationally so that they can devise a process quickly and efficiently.
It’s been awhile since I checked the income and salaries of the story tellers at LIRS.
Here is a page from the most recent Form 990 I could find (2018). Under Trump they are 87% federally funded (down about $10 million in federal grants since a top Obama year).
To listen to them whine you would think Trump made them find PRIVATE charitable money.
And here is the same page for 2015 (under Obama they were 95% federally funded):
Now have a look at the salaries.
But, first here is a headline of apost I wrote in February 2018. There has never been any adequate explanation for Hartke’s sudden departure.
Lutherans announce departure of CEO Hartke amid claims of financial irregularities, poor management
Former CEO Hartke
You will see here (below) when comparing the salaries reported to the IRS for 2015 and then 2018, that Hartke did exceptionally well in her last year at LIRS.
We do not yet have any record of the salary the new CEO—Krish O’Mara Vignarajah—is getting, but must assume it is in the same pay range as the salary of Ms. Hartke.
Here are the salaries for top execs at LIRS in 2015:
Here are the salaries for those who survived the inner turmoil that shook LIRS in 2017/2018. See that Hartke’s salary jumped about $100,000 in just three years as she walked out the door!
And, on your taxpayer dime!!!
Doing well by doing good! Tell your kids to grow up to be charitable execs at ‘religious’ non-profits funded by the US taxpayer!
As I have been reporting, September is the month when the President normally sends a “determination” to the Hill (for consultation only) in which he reports what the refugee admissions ceiling will be in the upcoming fiscal year which begins October 1. However, he is not required by law to agree to admit any refugees.
There are rumors that President Trump will simply not send anything to Congress effectively signaling a suspension of the program.
Editor: BTW, regular readers of RRW might be interested in seeing two posts at Frauds and Crooks that could easily have been posted here because they are refugee related. See hereand here.
Below we havenews from ABCabout a letter to Pompeo from mostly a bunch of people you (or I) have never even heard of who participated in changing America by changing the people for decades.
Trump admin urged to accept refugees amid concerns it will indefinitely delay admissions
A group of prominent former U.S. officials is joining state and local governments, U.S. lawmakers, religious leaders and resettlement agencies in urging the Trump administration to increase refugee admissions in fiscal year 2021 amid historic need around the world.
The administration is supposed to consult with Congress and make a decision by the end of the fiscal year, in one week. But there is growing concern that President Donald Trump will decide to zero out refugee admissions, delay them indefinitely, or reduce the admissions cap even further.
[….]
A State Department spokesperson declined to comment on Trump’s cap and “the internal discussions or the timeline related to its development,” but told ABC News it was ultimately the president’s decision.
Reutersreported earlier this month that the administration is considering postponing or further cutting admissions.
Seven former U.S. officials who ran the refugee admissions program under both Republican and Democrat administrations urged Secretary of State Mike Pompeoto express alarm at such a suspension and call for a “substantial increase” in admissions.
Do we believe for a second that this letter will hold any sway with the President?
Here is the nothingburger letterand the signatories (Purcell and Dewey are reportedly Republicans):
The Honorable Frank Loy
Former Director of the Bureau of Refugee Programs (1980–1981) Former Undersecretary of State for Global Affairs
James N. Purcell, Jr.
Former Director of the Bureau of Refugee Programs (1982–1986) Former Director General of the International Organization for Migration
The Honorable Phyllis Oakley
Former Assistant Secretary of State for Population, Refugees, and Migration (1994–1997) Former Assistant Secretary of State for Intelligence and Research
The Honorable Arthur Dewey
Former Assistant Secretary of State for Population, Refugees, and Migration (2002–2005) Former United Nations Deputy High Commissioner for Refugees
Samuel Witten
Former Acting Assistant Secretary for Population, Refugees, and Migration (2007–2009) Former Deputy Legal Adviser for the U.S. Department of State
The Honorable Eric Schwartz
Former Assistant Secretary of State for Population, Refugees, and Migration (2009–2011) Former NSC Senior Director for Multilateral and Humanitarian Affairs
The Honorable Anne C. Richard
Former Assistant Secretary of State for Population, Refugees, and Migration (2012–2017) Former Director of the Secretary’s Office of Resources, Plans, and Policy, Department of State
“There is that possibility that in January people feel like, ‘OK, everything is back to normal,’” said Melanie Nezer, a senior vice president at HIAS, the leading Jewish immigrant aid group. “We really have an opportunity here, but it won’t happen without intense pressure.”
