A couple of years ago, when Obama was considering how many Syrian Muslims to admit to the US, a bunch of far Left Senators sent a letter demanding he admit 65,000 Syrians on top of at least another 100,000 refugees from around the world.
Two Republican Senators (Murkowski and McCain) demand Trump admit more third world poverty to America.
So, friends of mine coined the term ‘Senate Jihad Caucus’ to describe them, see one post here:
I had a good laugh herein September of last year when we saw that the New York Times had picked up our nickname for the group but couldn’t bother to link or even name where they got it!
Now we see that Republican Senators John McCain and Lisa Murkowski have joined that distinguished growing group.
Here is their letter (notice in this anti-Trump PR stunt they can’t even agree on what they think is the appropriate number so have opted for the Left’s favorite word—robust).
Tomorrow or the next day, if you ‘welcome’ the admission of 40,000-50,000 impoverished people (in need of housing, food, and medical care) from Burma, DR Congo, Afghanistan, etc. to begin arriving on Sunday (Oct. 1, the first day of the new fiscal year), all hell is going to break loose for you from the nine major federal resettlement contractors***who will say you are mean and racist because they want at minimum 75,000 third worlders to care for.
Conversely, all those Americans who believed your campaign statements (like the one about how communities should have a say when their town is targeted for resettlement) and who believe 40-50 thousand is way too many, are going to be pretty ticked off.
Here is a compromise!
Checkmate
How about this:
Suspend the US Refugee Admissions Program for right now and send the employees of the nine federal resettlement contractors (they are all quasi-government agencies anyway) to help our people, the poor people of Puerto Rico rebuild their country
Give them some modest remuneration if necessary (travel expenses, food and shelter) and let them put their humanitarian drive to a very good purpose.
So what will they and their friends at the UN say, that you are mean and racist for helping Puerto Ricans?
What will the mainstream media, already raising a ruckus claiming you aren’t doing enough for our own people in Puerto Rico say (that you shouldn’t send so much help to the devastated island!).
***These are the nine major resettlement contractors, each is paid millions from the US Treasury every year to do their charitable good works. Let’s put them to work helping hurricane refugees in Puerto Rico!
In Trump’s new mixed bag, most of the eight countries are not significantly represented in the US Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP).
Editor: By the way, I assume you saw that the Supreme Court has cancelled arguments on the previous travel ban, here. I don’t know yet what that means for the refugee portion of the case.
Other than Somalia, Syria and Iran we don’t see many refugees from the other five countries. And, you should know, for Iran, that the vast majority of those we admit as refugees are Christians and other religious minorities.
As I remarked the other day, we do admit very large numbers of questionable refugees from Afghanistan, Iraq, Burma (Rohingya Muslims) and some additional African countries who will not be getting the extra scrutiny.
I checked Wrapsnet just now to see how many refugees we have admitted between FY07 and FY17 from the 8 ‘travel ban’ countries. But, don’t forget that many others from these countries get in to the US through other legal programs as well as illegally.
Refugees admitted FY07-FY17 (to date). Here is what I found:
Chad (182)
Iran (38,236 but only 405 of those are Muslims while over 20,000 are Christians)
Libya (12)
N. Korea (203)
Syria (21,110)
Yemen (146)
Somalia (67,158)
Venezuela (13)
The new vetting rules may have a large impact on Somalis entering the US….
Check out here where all those Somalis have been planted. Minnesota tops the list with 8,529. But that doesn’t tell the whole Minnesota story as Somalis resettled elsewhere move in large numbers as what the USRAP calls “secondary migrants” to MN.
Alaska welcomed 294, but Hawaii (the state that loves diversity) welcomed zero!
White House Prepares To Announce Huge Cut In Refugee Admissions
Just because Obama set a ceiling of an unrealistically high 110,000 for one of his 8 years (which was not realized), we are supposed to be thrilled about 45,000!
***Update*** Do not fall for the media spin that Trump is cutting numbers in half. I just checked admission numbers for 15 full years following 9/11 and the average admission number is 57,938. I repeat: 45,000 is not a significant drop! Go here for all the numbers.
If the Daily Caller has its facts straight (and this isn’t a head-fake!), Trump’s State Department is proposing a ceiling of 45,000 refugees for FY18 which will do nothing to bring about needed reform.
If true, Trump has been fooled!
It will slow the flow some, and maybe a contractor CEO or two will have to take a pay cut (from their $200,000-500,000 a year salaries); low level staffers will get the boot; and some new resettlement sites might be put on hold—big deal.
Without any reform initiative from the White House, when Trump is no longer in office they will simply boost numbers to make up for lost time.
45,000 is NOT a significant reduction!
Even the sainted Obama had two years when he admitted between 50,000 and 60,000. George Bush had two years between 20,000 and 30,000!
The Daily Caller cites Axiosthat is reporting that Secretary of State Tillerson will go to the Hill on Wednesday to “consult” about their 45,000 refugee cap—a number which is making the career bureaucrats angry, we are told. (Of course, they want a much higher number.)
Axiossays Stephen Miller in the White House wanted 20,000.
We maintained that in light of Harvey, Irma and Maria (American refugees!) the program should have been suspended.
45,000 will not win Trump any brownie points with the Open Borders left, the resettlement contractors, and Chamber of Commerce types, so he should have gone the whole way, suspended the program and told Congress to reform it.
Mark my words….
As soon as Trump is no longer in office, the Dems and the RINO establishment will up the number above 100,000 to make up for lost time and a window of opportunity to review the program will have been lost.
We are still waiting to hear what the Trump Administration is going to do with the Presidential Determination on how many refugees (and from where they will come) starting in 6 days.
Puerto Rico is a US territory and you know we will need to help them! So, on top of that financial burden, is Trump getting ready to invite 40,000-50,000 third worlders to the US beginning next week when so many people in Texas, Florida and Puerto Rico are homeless?
In six daysyou could see a new wave of 40,000-50,000 third worlders begin arriving in your towns and cities as American refugees suffer in the wake of three major hurricanes
Although Trump lumped the two issues together in his first Executive Order….
Don’t get the refugee ‘determination’ confused with this latest so-called ‘travel ban’ issue especially because while adding Venezuela and North Korea (few come to the US anyway!), Trump won’t do extra scrutiny of the refugees arriving in potentially large numbers from Iraq, Afghanistan and Burma (Rohingya!). He even took Sudan off the list!
(See Leo Hohmann at World Net Dailyon the Rohingya, here. And, see Politico on the latest list of countries with new restrictions on travel.)
We are six days away from the new fiscal year!
Where is the State Department report to Congress, where is the consultation with Congress, where is the publication in the Congressional Record of the consultation, and where are the House and Senate Judiciary Committee hearings that are supposed to proceed the final determination (See the steps set out in the Refugee Act of 1980, here.)?
America First!
The politically smart move for Trump now is to suspend the Refugee Admissions Program for FY18, for at least 6 months until American people are back on their feet!
And, he could tell Congress to hold oversight hearings on the USRAP with an eye to trashing the system altogether or reforming it!
