Do you remember this headline only four short years ago? Probably not. I hadn’t, although I surely wrote about it at the time. It was right after one of those horrible Islamic terrorist attacks in Europe and it woke from slumber some Republican governors for a few minutes.
30 Governors Call For Halt To U.S. Resettlement Of Syrian Refugees
My how things have changed.
They talked tough then (mostly because Obama was in office and they knew they had no voice), but now when the President has actually presented them with an opportunity to put up or shut up and go on record saying NO to more refugees from the Middle East and elsewhere, well now they are worried about their “workforce” and they tuck their tails and run fearing they will be perceived as mean and unwelcoming by the Dems.
Nothing has changed by the way! We bring fewer Syrians these days, but the vast majority of Syrians who do come are Muslims.
And, not just Syrians, but Iraqis, Somalis, Burmese Rohingya and literally tens of thousands of Afghans.
The vetting can’t really be improved because as Senator Marco Rubio said at the time:
“There is no background-check system in the world that allows us to find that out, because who do you call in Syria to background-check them?”
That same common sense applies to most places in the Middle East, Asia and Africa—who you gonna call?
Although I should be writing on all sorts of things on this subject, not to mention that my other blog ‘Frauds and Crooks’ is suffering from lack of attention, I found myself rummaging around Wrapsnet (the Refugee Processing Center) and holy cow!
Four years: 19,514 Syrians!
In the 4 years since NPR posted their story (from November 17, 2015 to today December 11, 2019) we admitted 19,514 Syrians—19,514! 19,195 of those are Muslims!
Although most of those came as Obama was leaving town, 6,413 of the Syrian Muslims came in Trump’s first (partial) year with 602 since.
Here is where the nearly 20,000 Syrians were placed:
GOP governors betraying constituents by pushing refugee resettlement
He linked a list of today’s Republican Governors and so far that we know of (some might be hiding!), Republican governors of Utah, New Hampshire, Arizona and North Dakota are opposing the President (and America Firsters) on the issue of Refugee Resettlement.
Just so you know—most of the country ‘welcomed’ some refugees in the first group of arrivals for FY2020.
Resettlement will continue as it always has until June 2020 when supposedly the Trump EO will be in effect.
As Open Borders Inc. continues on its quest to turn Texas blue, Texas is again numero uno in ‘welcoming’ Africans, Asians and Middle Eastern impoverished refugees to its towns and cities.
If (when!) the contractors convince Texas Governor Abbott to send a permission letter to the US State Department, the contractors will achieve a great victory. So, I sure hope you Texans are working hard!
(See previous post Kansas has thrown in the towel! Taxpayers will pay the price just so some meatpackers will get cheap labor!).
Below is where the US State Department and its nine contractors*** placed 1,488 refugees in the last month.
Nothing I can do about the tiny type. Itold you all herehow to use the Refugee Processing Center data.
The top ten ‘welcoming’ states have a few additions. I haven’t seen Indiana or Minnesota in the top ten in recent times, and Kentucky is climbing up the ladder.
Texas, California, New York, Kentucky, Arizona, Washington, Indiana, Illinois, Minnesota and Florida are the top ten in that order.
Here is the map where 1,488 refugees were placed between November 1 and December 1, 2019:
Below are the top sending countries (in parenthesis after each is the number of Muslims in the group). Take note of the fact that we are only bringing in a tiny number of Middle Eastern Christians from Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria.
There is no Muslim ban.
DR Congo 509 (M: 17) It is maddening when you consider that Obama said more than six years ago that we wouldlimit our intake of DR Congolese to 50,000 and we are now at or near 60,000!
Burma 337 (M:37)
Moldova 94 (M: 0)
Afghanistan 91 (M:82)
Ukraine 78 (M: 0)
Iraq 50 (M: 35)
Syria 37 (M:32) So much for saving the Syrian Christians!
Somalia 31 (M: 31) Sixteen of these went to Minnesota over the last 4 weeks.
*** These are the nine federally funded contractors, all political Leftwing organizations, that at present are deciding where the UN-chosen refugees are being placed in America.
If you didn’t know, I have a category entitled, ‘where to find information.‘ You might find it useful to follow some of my recent posts on the President’s Executive Order.
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.
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.
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.
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.
You are all aware now that the President is about to make a determination for how many refugees from Africa, Asia, and the Middle East will be admitted to the US in FY2020 which begins in less than three weeks.
There had been talk the President could put the number at zero!
And, you also might have seen the news that the President had a win in the Supreme Court that could limit the number of asylum seekers coming into the country illegally and then requesting asylum which means asking for refugee status. (There is a backlog of hundreds of thousands yet to be processed!)
Yesterday we learned that USCIS Acting Director.Ken Cuccinelli linked the two and suggested that potentially fewer asylum seekers would allow for more third worlders from elsewhere to gain admission.
Oh joy! More “humanitarian space” said Cuccinelli!
But, heck, we won’t know for weeks or months if the Supreme Court decision will move the needle at all, but the refugees could be arriving beginning in 18 days.
This is nuts!
I sure hope someone in the White House has already swatted down the asinine idea!
Cuccinelli: Supreme Court ruling may boost refugee admissions
Acting U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Director Ken Cuccinelli suggested Thursday that contemplated reductions in refugee admissions might be scaled back following a Supreme Court asylum ruling Wednesday evening.
In a major victory for President Donald Trump, the high court gave his administration permission Wednesday to implement a sweeping ban on asylum seekers who pass through another country en route to the U.S. The third-country asylum ban is expected to choke off claims by Central Americans and other migrants who transit through Mexico.
With a reduction in asylum cases, Cuccinelli suggested, resources might be redirected to processing refugee claims.Asylum applies to migrants who seek refuge at the border or inside the U.S.; refugee status is sought by applicants from their home countries.
Speaking to several reporters after an event hosted by Axios, Cuccinelli said the court’s ruling could become a factor in discussions over where to set the coming year’s refugee ceiling. Trump cut refugee levels down to the 30,000 in the current fiscal year, a steep decrease over the 110,000 proposed by former President Barack Obama*** before he left office. Trump administration officials have considered slashing admissions again in fiscal year 2020 — possibly even reducing levels to zero.
“It hasn’t necessarily been connected yet, but last night’s Supreme Court decision does affect the humanitarian space,” Cuccinelli said Thursday morning.
***I am so sick of the mediareporting that Obama set the ceiling at 110,000 in his final year in office (in late 2016!) as a way of comparing his numbers in the most favorable light in contrast to Trump’s.
Obama never set a ceiling anywhere near that high in his previous 7 years and only came near that ceiling (aka cap) in a few of those years!
I am so sick of the lazy lying media! Note the ceiling numbers for the last ten years. They cherry-picked the one year that Obama dared to set the ceiling higher than normal in order to show the President’s numbers in the worst light. See the actual admissions column too!
The decision must be made in the next few days, but definitely by the end of September. You must contact the White Houseand let the President know how you are feeling about all of this.
Are we going to simply get more Africans and Middle Easterners when the Central American flow might be curtailed?
How about keeping the “humanitarian space” limited across the board for awhile!
That would mean there would no longer be various migrant categories like refugees, asylum seekers, economic migrants and certainly no more illegal aliens. If the UN-supported planners have their way, anyone can move anywhere effectively, of course, wiping out borders.
The last is what they have been after for eons. No borders.
UN will soon try to enforce open borders as a ‘human right’
German AfD MP Markus Frohnmaier says he is most disconcerted by the latest developments. Piled up on his desk, is a mountain of papers with the headers showing the logo of the United Nations.
“Every MP of Europe, every MEP and even every mayor should be forced to read this”, says 27-year-old Frohnmaier, one of the youngest deputies in the Bundestag.
In September 2017, he was elected to parliament on the list of the Eurosceptic party Alternative für Deutschland (AfD). “If there had not been the AfD in the German parliament, no other political force would dare to criticise this monstrous document.”
The document in question, is the draft text for the so-called Global Compact for Migration for UN member states.It is more or less a globalist project where all signatory states declare their will to abolish the current different categories of migrants in order to declare migration a blanket “human right”.
So far only President Donald Trump and Hungary’s Viktor Orban have said they won’t sign it. Leaders of Italy and Austria are signalling their disapproval of the “human right” declaration and considering not going along with it.
The only leaders unwilling to go along are US President Donald Trump and Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban. They have both declared that they would not sign the Global Compact.
“This document will enforce migration to Europe. It is open-border propaganda on steroids,” says Frohnmaier. The young politician is part of a European alliance of politicians of sovereignist conservatives who have been organising the political opposition against the “crazy concoction” as Frohnmaier calls the final draft of the Global Compact.
AfD’s Frohnmaier: “It is open-border propaganda on steroids,”
Indeed, if this international agreement is implemented by signatory states, it practically means an end to controlled migration and borders as we we know it.
The agreement does not distinguish between refugees and migrants anymore.
Thus even illegal migrants can no longer be deported. In fact, it will be the end of the very notion of an “illegal migrant”. Illegal border crossings will no longer be considered a crime – since migration will be considered to be a “human right”.
[….]
The starting point for the Global Compact was a summit on flight and migration that took place under the aegis of the UN in September 2016, with Barack Obama issuing the invitation.
[….]
The Inter-Governmental Conference to Adopt the Global Compact for Migration will take place in Marrakech, Morocco on the 10th and 11th of December. Most of the European states will sign the document there.
For Americans watching the violent 4,000-strong caravan headed for the US, if this compact were to be accepted as international law, those illegal aliens could keep right on marching to your towns and cities because they would have a human right to be there.
As for Europe, countries like Hungary, Poland, Austria, and Italy better get their fences in place and build their military!
Nothing has changed by the way! We bring fewer Syrians these days, but the vast majority of Syrians who do come are Muslims.
