Category: Who is going where

Breaking News! Texas Governor Abbott Says NO! Will not Accept More Refugees in 2020

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I’ve told readers innumerable times that Texas has carried the weight of the most refugees resettled in any state for years, and now given a chance by the President to take a break—Texas Governor Greg Abbott has said enough is enough!

Texas Governor Greg Abbott is the first Republican to support the President’s effort to reform the UN/US Refugee Admissions Program.

His action is incredibly brave in light of the fact that 18 of his fellow REPUBLICAN governors have already caved in to the pressure of the Leftwing Open Borders Inc. and are now facing stiff criticism by a heretofore silent majority of citizens in their states who also agree that enough is enough.

(Big question now is what about Florida and Georgia, the two remaining states which have carried excessively large burdens handed to them by the UN and the US State Department for decades!)

***Update***  All Texas patriots should be sure to thank the governor!  He will be getting some mean criticism from the Left!

Here is Daily Wire with the stunning news:

BREAKING: Texas Governor Abbott Boldly Rejects Additional Refugee Resettlement

According to a letter sent today to U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo that was just obtained by The Daily Wire, Republican Texas Governor Greg Abbott has announced Texas’s refusal to accept any additional refugees for fiscal year (FY) 2020.The letter was prompted by Executive Order 13888, on “Enhancing State and Local Involvement in Refugee Resettlement,” which was issued by President Donald Trump on September 26, 2019.

[….]

“Texas is one of the most welcoming states for refugees seeking to escape dangers abroad,” Abbott begins. “Since FY 2010, more refugees have been received in Texas than in any other state. In fact, over that decade, roughly 10% of all refugees resettled in the United States have been placed in Texas. Even today, the process of resettling continues for many of these refugees.”

“In addition to accepting refugees all these years, Texas has been left by Congress to deal with disproportionate migration issues resulting from a broken federal immigration system,” the governor continues.

“In May 2019, for example, around 100,000 migrants were apprehended crossing this state’s southern border. In June 2019, individuals from 52 different countries were apprehended here. And in FY 2018, the apprehensions included citizens from disparate countries like China, Iran, Kenya, Russia, and Tonga. Texas continues to have to deal with the consequences of an immigration system that Congress has failed to fix.”

“At this time, the state and non-profit organizations have a responsibility to dedicate available resources to those who are already here, including refugees, migrants, and the homeless — indeed, all Texans,” the Republican writes in his denouement. “As a result, Texas cannot consent to initial refugee resettlement for FY2020. This decision does not deny any refugee access to the United States. Nor does it preclude a refugee from later coming to Texas after initially settling in another state.”

“Texas has carried more than its share in assisting the refugee resettlement process and appreciates that other states are available to help with these efforts,” Abbott concludes.

Abbott’s bold stand will please immigration hawks, who have long sounded the alarm on America’s shoddy, loophole-ridden refugee system and our wholly inadequate vetting capabilities for prospective refugees.

[….]

Abbott’s move also follows closely on the heels of at least 15 separate Republican governors [actually 18 caved, see below—ed] who have all affirmatively signed onto more refugee resettlement in their states in the aftermath of Executive Order 13888. Immigration hawk Daniel Horowitz recently excoriated these governors at Conservative Review: “Except for New England, these are all states carried by Trump, some of them by a very wide margin. Trump won every single county in West Virginia and Oklahoma, for example. Why are conservatives with platforms not talking about this? … Who needs George Soros when you have GOP governors endorsed by Trump doing his bidding, along with the help of so-called evangelical groups?”

Governor Abbott will take no shortage of heat for this move, even within the still-reliably Republican Lone Star State. But he should rest well at night, for he has done the right thing for his state.

See which Republican Governors virtue-signaled to Open Borders Inc. and the Refugee Contractors!  An X means that the governor has said, yes, sure send us more poor people to take care of we have run out of vulnerable Americans!

You should know that Wyoming has never participated in the program that was supposed to be VOLUNTARY in the first place, so Texas is just asserting a prerogative that was available when the law was passed in 1980!  Kennedy, Biden and Jimmy Carter all asserted it was voluntary when they pushed it through!

Republican Governors who Consented to Accept Refugees in FY2020 Scrambling to Explain

~ Ann Corcoran ~ 5 Comments

I can’t possibly write an all-encompassing post about all the feedback I’m getting from concerned citizens who are hopping mad that their Republican governor foolishly (and prematurely) jumped on the bandwagon to accept more refugees for their states just so the nine federal contractors*** could get their requests for MONEY into the US State Department ASAP.

Here are the 19 Rs who have thumbed their nose at the President’s effort to rein-in the UN-driven Refugee Admissions Program.

The first wave of governors to pander to the Left are marked in orange, and the second wave is in hot pink.

If your governor hasn’t caved yet, keep up the pressure.  Florida, Georgia and Texas are the big targets for Open Borders Inc.

 

Last night John Binder at Breitbart published a letter from Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson to his legislators who want answers.

Since most of the governors are completely unfamiliar with this 4-decades-old program, we can only assume that someone is feeding them talking points like those in the memo Binder published.

Go here to read it all.

Exclusive: Memo Reveals How GOP Governors are Pitching Refugee Resettlement to Opponents

I want to just focus on a couple of points in the governor’s attempt to explain himself.  First this:

Refugees are eligible for 36 months of case management assistance and financial assistance when they first arrive through a combination of federal and private funds, which Canopy manages. They do not receive any other special financial assistance aside from typical public assistance available to other low-income Arkansans (Medicaid, SNAP, TANF etc.). 100% of refugee households have seen reductions or terminations of this public assistance because of income within the first 6 months of arrival in the state.

LOL!  They don’t get any public assistance other than Medicaid, SNAP (food stamps), TANF, etc!  What is the etc.?

100% have seen reductions in their welfare use?  Where is the data governor? Or is the governor just parroting what the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service SUBCONTRACTOR is telling him.

I also want to bring to your attention this section of his talking points memo.

Who will be placed in Arkansas?

African nations and those countries in which the United States has engaged in military actions and cooperating nationals are at risk.

I would be asking the governor which African nations?  Somalia? And, then he is lumping the Special Immigrant Visas (mostly from Afghanistan and Iraq, but possibly soon Syria) in with the regular refugees.  I told you here that the Trump administration is predicting 10,000 SIVs on top of the 18.000 regular refugees for 2020.

And, get this!  According to the Funding Guidance I’ve been yakking about for days, we will be taking another 10,000 SIVs from Iraq and Afghanistan (maybe Syria!) in the 2020 fiscal year. That is over and above the 18,000 ceiling that the President determined for the year.

The FY 2020 ceiling for refugee admissions established by the President, after consultation with Congress, is 18,000.  In addition, applicants should include 10,000 Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) recipients in their planning. Applicants should assume similar admissions and recipient numbers for performance periods beyond FY 2020.

Note that last bit—the contractors should expect similar numbers beyond 2020.

One more thing, don’t miss LIRS getting direct payola from Tyson Foods!

Starting later today (I hope), I’m starting a new series of posts I’ll call ‘Knowledge is Power’ to go back for many new readers and help you get up to speed on how the UN/US Refugee Admissions Program operates and how you can find out more about your state’s involvement (or lack of involvement) with the program.

 

***For new readers these (below) are the nine federally-funded refugee contractors that operate as a huge conveyor belt monopolizing all refugee placement in America.

A ‘religious’ message from CWS one of three federally funded contractors suing to stop the President’s effort to reform the UN-driven Refugee Admissions Program.

And, they do not limit their advocacy toward only legal immigration programs, but are heavily involved in supporting the lawlessness at our borders.

The question isn’t as much about refugees per se, but about who is running federal immigration policy now and into the future?  

(I plan to say this once a day from now on!)

I continue to argue that these nine contractors are the heart of America’s Open Borders movement and thus there can never be long-lasting reform of US immigration policy when these nine un-elected phony non-profits are paid by the taxpayers to work as community organizers pushing an open borders agenda.

Maine: Writer Says Lewiston’s Somali Makeover is Good for the City; But Was She Completely Honest?

~ Ann Corcoran ~ 5 Comments

Mainer Cynthia Anderson recently published a book about how 6,000 plus Somali refugees are busy resuscitating a supposedly dying Maine city.

No surprise that the Star Tribune, in the heart of Little Mogadishu, MN, reviewed Anderson’s book.  One quote in the review stands out and it makes my blood boil!

“I also think journalists, including me, sometimes don’t push for answers lest they appear insensitive or out of fear they’ll provide ammunition to haters.”

Just think about that, she is admitting she might have pulled some punches so as not to give us (haters! and Islamophobes!), critics of the UN/US Refugee Admissions Program, any ammunition. WHAT THE H***!

If so-called journalists were HONEST, for one thing there would be no need for me to write this blog and secondly if they were HONEST then maybe government programs like this one might be reevaluated, reformed or trashed.

From the Star Tribune:

Review: ‘Home Now: How 6,000 Refugees Transformed an American Town,’ by Cynthia Anderson

“Home Now” by Cynthia Anderson; Public Affairs (318 pages, $28)

“A moving chronicle of who belongs in America.” Guess you can see the bias right there at Amazon.

At a campaign rally in Portland, Maine, President Donald Trump linked worsening crime in Maine to the influx of Somali refugees there. He blamed their large community in Minnesota for straining the state’s social safety net and bringing potential recruits for Islamic terrorist groups.

“You see it happening,” Trump said. “You read about it.”

The above is a reminder to all those wimpy Republican governors who are ‘welcoming’ more Somalis, Iraqis, and Syrians to your states that the President wants to rein-in the program. Duh!

Long before Trump turned refugee resettlement into a national flash point, Cynthia Anderson was immersing herself in Lewiston, Maine, a small white town that came to host one of the largest populations of Somali-Americans in the country, for her timely, richly detailed book “Home Now.”

Anderson grew up in a village 45 miles away and recalled the area’s gradual decline leading up to 2001, when the first Somali refugees arrived in nearby Portland.

She reported on Lewiston’s transformation for more than a decade, moving from seeing Somali newcomers as passive victims traumatized by war to people with complex, resilient trajectories.

[….]

Fatuma Hussein at 2017 Women’s march. “We are the future of Maine. We are the face of Maine.” See one of my posts on the Somali community organizer here in 2014: https://refugeeresettlementwatch.org/2014/01/11/maine-somalisothers-protest-welfare-rule-change-proposal/

Anderson also writes about Fatuma Hussein, a community leader and advocate for Somali women who admires Maine’s civility and is optimistic about relations between natives and newcomers. She speaks out in opposition to Trump’s election, yet she is also forthright about the challenges of merging different cultures in Lewiston.

The town is not prepared to absorb the arrivals so quickly; the mayor draws headlines for saying Lewiston is “maxed out.”

Anderson deftly sums up the tension by noting that the new refugees were not ungrateful but nor were they just grateful.

[….]

Though the book paints a mostly rosy picture of how refugees can revitalize a community, Anderson is honest [?—how honest?—ed] about her qualms.

There is a brief mention of the murder of Donald Giusti killed by a gang of African migrant teens in Lewiston’s city park. https://fraudscrookscriminals.com/2019/04/15/arrests-made-in-lewiston-me-death-of-white-man-at-the-hands-of-a-gang-of-african-refugees/

During debates over a state bill aimed at the Somali-American community to ban female genital mutilation (FGM), she admits to being conflicted. Anderson is initially opposed, and doesn’t want to see the Somali community hurt, but nor does she want harm to come to any Somali girls.

[What woman could possibly be conflicted about the brutal practice of slicing off a portion of a girl’s genitals?—ed]

Anderson also acknowledges that the refugee vetting process warrants examination, noting that records can be inadequate in war-torn countries.

She considers it fair to question how long refugees take to become self-sufficient, finding answers inconsistent and hard to find. [No kidding—this program is run in secrecy! The refugee contractors and the government don’t want anyone to find out how poorly the refugees are doing!—ed]

“I also think journalists, including me, sometimes don’t push for answers lest they appear insensitive or out of fear they’ll provide ammunition to haters,” she admits. “But not asking and not knowing provides fertile ground for rumors to flourish. It’s also patronizing; Lewiston’s newcomers can withstand the scrutiny.”  [Note that she deftly suggests that those of us with concerns are trafficking in rumors!—ed]

Anderson raises these questions through her portrait of Jared Bristol, driven after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks to become an activist against Islamic extremism. Bristol advocates for the FGM bill during a hearing that’s one of the only times Anderson sees Muslims and anti-Islamists in the same place.

Such activists, Anderson writes, “are wrong if they believe I absorbed nothing they and other anti-Islamists said or that my thinking didn’t shift, however incrementally.”  [So what good is absorbing if she then pulls punches?—ed]

Scrutiny comes anew when a man dies of a fatal head injury after being attacked by several teens of African descent.

Nevertheless, and moving right along, the expert concludes:

….that Mainers feel that integrating refugees is worth the effort, even as it has taken time and money.

That is not what I’m hearing!!!

See my extensive, and I mean extensive archive on Lewiston here at RRW (there is more at ‘Frauds and Crooks.’)!

Gee, I wonder if Ms. Anderson used any of the material I’ve compiled over the years?  Did she get the story about the Somali teen who burned down four apartment buildings in 2013 for example? Or the one about the ISIS fighter whose wife lived in Lewiston?  Or the Somali health care scammers?  And, as far back as 2009 Somali ‘youths’ were roaming the streets and attacking people.

Maybe a journalist should write a book!

How Many and Where Did Federal Contractors Place their Refugee Clients in 2019?

~ Ann Corcoran ~ 4 Comments

I meant to post on the numbers and geographic distribution of refugees in 2019 yesterday, but got sidetracked by the feckless GOP governors again.

So here is what I learned about calendar year 2019. 

(We normally talk about refugee data on a fiscal year basis but because this is the time of year for look-backs on the previous year, I thought I would look back at 2019.)

We admitted a total of 27,513 refugees as your new neighbors during the course of 2019.  13% of those were Muslims from a variety of countries.  The others represented many many religions, or none at all.

And, in light of the newest Middle East flare-up you should know that we admitted almost equal numbers of Shiites and Sunnis and so we have invited both of the warring factions to come live among us!

I’ll give you some more interesting data below, but first I want you to see where the federal refugee contractors*** placed the refugees.

Always humorous is the fact that Delaware hardly ever gets refugees, although it was then Senator Joe Biden who joined Ted Kennedy’s team to create the dysfunctional program back in 1979 (Jimmy Carter signed it into law in 1980).

(I love this pic of Joe and Ted! Do you think this pair had our best interests at heart when they figured out how to fund Leftwing ‘non-profit’ groups with taxpayer dollars to distribute refugees around America?  But, of course we can’t expect Republican governors to know anything about the history of the program or how it works! That would be expecting way too much!).

From the Refugee Processing Center:

I know it is hard to read the numbers, but the top five ‘welcoming’ states in calendar year 2019 were Texas, Washington, California, New York and Kentucky (slaughterhouse workers?).

The bottom five were Washington DC with 3, and big fat zeros for Delaware, Hawaii, West Virginia and Wyoming.

The top sending country was the DR Congo by far with 11,152 impoverished, poorly educated and low-skilled Africans delivered to many states (I need to do another post just on the DR Congo).  Obama told the UN we would take 50,000 over five years and we are way beyond that number now.

Burma (4,681) and Ukraine (4,013) were the next two big senders.  I need to look into this Ukraine conveyor belt because now that we have confirmed that refugees are used as pawns/bargaining chips for other purposes of the State Department, I’m wondering if that is driving that resettlement.

Of the 4,681 Burmese, 689 are the Muslim Rohingya which gets me to the point I made recently.

If you think that we are saving Middle Eastern Christians and other minorities from the three largest distribution centers in the Middle East—Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria—we are not.

During 2019 we admitted 1,364 Afghans and 1,290 of those were Muslims.

We admitted 631 Syrians and 565 were Muslims (so of course CAIR is cheering Maryland Governor Hogan).

We admitted 512 Iraqis and 385 were Muslims.

But that ain’t all!

Coming to you at the rate of about 10,000 a year, Afghan and Iraqi men (and families) who supposedly helped us. I think this is another of those bargaining chips we have been hearing about!  Their numbers help keep the refugee contractors financially afloat we are told.  https://fraudscrookscriminals.com/2019/05/31/special-immigrant-visa-holders-coming-in-by-the-thousands-from-afghanistan-but-iraqi-flow-has-slowed/

 

In addition to the 27,513 regular refugees we admitted in 2019, another 9,561 Special Immigrant Visa holders from Afghanistan and Iraq arrived.  You can bet they are all Muslims and are treated just like regular refugees in that they can access social services and bring their families!

So we can safely say that in calendar year 2019 we admitted 37,000 refugees/SIVs and that approximately 38% of the total are Muslims.

And, get this!  According to the Funding Guidance I’ve been yakking about for days, we will be taking another 10,000 SIVs from Iraq and Afghanistan (maybe Syria!) in the 2020 fiscal year. That is over and above the 18,000 ceiling that the President determined for the year.

The FY 2020 ceiling for refugee admissions established by the President, after consultation with Congress, is 18,000.  In addition, applicants should include 10,000 Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) recipients in their planning. Applicants should assume similar admissions and recipient numbers for performance periods beyond FY 2020.

 

***For new readers these (below) are the nine federally-funded refugee contractors that operate as a huge conveyor belt monopolizing all refugee placement in America.

Church World Service poster girl!

For decades they have decided in secrecy where to place refugees and they don’t want to lose that power because even as they pontificate about their religious convictions and humanitarian zeal, they are Leftwing political activist groups working to change America by changing the people and using your money to do it!

And, they do not limit their advocacy toward only legal immigration programs, but are heavily involved in supporting the lawlessness at our borders.

The question isn’t as much about refugees per se, but about who is running federal immigration policy now and into the future?  

(I plan to say this once a day from now on!)

I continue to argue that these nine contractors are the heart of America’s Open Borders movement and thus there can never be long-lasting reform of US immigration policy when these nine un-elected phony non-profits are paid by the taxpayers to work as community organizers pushing an open borders agenda.

(If you are new and are confused because your local resettlement agency doesn’t have one of these names, just know that they are a subcontractor of one of the nine and you can usually find out which one by going to their website.)

 

 

Three More Republican Governors Turn on Trump, Cave to Leftists on Refugee Program Reform

~ Ann Corcoran ~ 8 Comments

Since I posted the dumb 15 REPUBLICAN governors who rushed to tell the President that they oppose his efforts to rein-in the dysfunctional Refugee Admissions Program designed by Senators Ted Kennedy, Joe Biden and Jimmy Carter in 1980, we have three more who are welcoming more third world poverty to their states:

Governor Brad Little of Idaho, Mike Parson of Missouri and (never-Trumper) Larry Hogan of my home state of Maryland.

Republican Governors tell the President that they don’t want to slow the flow of refugees from the Middle East, Africa and Asia into their states. In so doing they are saying NO to one of the President’s signature campaign promises of 2016, and are inviting more poverty for state and local taxpayers to support.

Why do I call them dumb—first they clearly know nothing about how the Refugee Admissions Program works, but secondly because they obviously didn’t read the Funding Guidance or they would have known that they didn’t need to jump into this—there is plenty of time to consent (or opt-out).

(We expected Dem governors to go against the President, after all they will ultimately be getting more voters for the Democrat party.)

One can only conclude that the Rs don’t mind going against the President to make Open Borders Inc. happy (not to mention the globalists who want the cheap labor!).

Here is the latest line-up of REPUBLICAN governors against Trump on immigration reform (originals are in orange, new fools are in hot pink):

 

They all had many weeks before they were expected to make their decisions.

And, don’t forget, the contractors*** have filed a lawsuit  seeking to enjoin the entire reform effort by the President that will be heard before a friendly-to-the-contractors judge next week.

Smart governors are waiting!

Clearly these RINO REPUBLICANS are dissing the President and sucking up to the Leftists who run the Refugee Admissions Program as a kind of shadow government agency that you pay for with your tax dollars while they then dictate which refugees go where in America.

 

***For new readers these (below) are the nine federally-funded refugee contractors that operate as a huge conveyor belt monopolizing all refugee placement in America.

Church World Service poster girl!

For decades they have decided in secrecy where to place refugees and they don’t want to lose that power because even as they pontificate about their religious convictions and humanitarian zeal, they are Leftwing political activist groups working to change America by changing the people and using your money to do it!

And, they do not limit their advocacy toward only legal immigration programs, but are heavily involved in supporting the lawlessness at our borders.

The question isn’t as much about refugees per se, but about who is running federal immigration policy now and into the future?  

(I plan to say this once a day from now on!)

I continue to argue that these nine contractors are the heart of America’s Open Borders movement and thus there can never be long-lasting reform of US immigration policy when these nine un-elected phony non-profits are paid by the taxpayers to work as community organizers pushing an open borders agenda.