Is your state attracting “secondary migrants?” Minnesota tops the list

Secondary migrants are refugees who were settled first by the US State Department and a contractor in one state, but choose to move usually because they want to be with their own kind of people, or they find employment and/or social services more desirable elsewhere.

When we first began writing this blog in 2007, we were told it was impossible to track the secondary migrants because it’s America and no one has to report where they move to.  Indeed over the last 40 years we have admitted over 3 million refugees, so no one could possibly track them.  So, I was surprised to see that in ‘Key Indicators for Refugee Placement FY2014’ the feds are reporting that they have tracked secondary migrants, but surely (the numbers are so small) it must be the most recently resettled ones that are being tracked.

I don’t know what they mean when they say “states report” (page 9).  Who in the “state” is keeping track, the non-government contractors, or some agency of state government?

  Each year states report on the number of refugees and entrants who moved to a different state outside of their original resettlement location.

Check out the list!

Top five states with the most out-migration are:  Arizona, California, New York, Texas and Pennsylvania  (but as a percentage of the huge numbers resettled in CA, NY and TX these numbers are probably not that meaningful).

States with the most in-migration of secondary migrants are:  MN (by a huge margin), OH, Iowa, FL and OK.

Secondary migrants are surely the reason the St. Cloud, MN Somali population is booming.

Our previous posts on this important document, Key Indicators…., are here.

Someone is selling Wyoming governor a bill of goods!

Wyoming had 5 eligible “refugees” in the state in FY2012 and the Governor thinks they need a federal plan?

This week we reported on Wyoming Governor Matt Mead’s op-ed in which he said Wyoming needed a plan (with the feds and their contractors) to cope with the “refugees” already arriving in Wyoming.  I wondered what the heck he was talking about.

This morning I’m working on another post on the ‘Key Indicators for Refugee Placement FY2014,’ that is the planning document the US State Department and the Office of Refugee Resettlement (in Health and Human Services) are using to determine if your town or city has the “capacity” and the “welcoming” attitude needed for a refugee resettlement seed community.

I wish I could reproduce it here, but see the figures for FY2012 in this table (p.3-4).  It is a state-by-state review of how many refugees/asylees etc. came to your state and what goodies they get there.

By the way, don’t be fooled (don’t start salivating for federal dollars!) by that last column which lists the federal $$$ going to your state—the majority goes to the CONTRACTOR to spend, it is not money that goes into your state or city coffers for your local leaders to decide where to soften the refugee impact.

And, always keep in mind there are NO FINANCIAL AUDITS of the contractors!

So get this Wyoming!

Go to pages 3 & 4 of ‘Key indicators….’  You had a whopping 5 (five!) refugees in Wyoming in FY2012.   And, those were asylees!  Asylees have been granted asylum.  They got into the US illegally (Mexicans are now asking for asylum) or overstayed a visa, claimed they would be persecuted if sent home and were granted asylum.  We recently reported that a Congressional hearing revealed that as many as 70% of those granted asylum may have made fraudulent claims.

For readers new to this subject, the most recent ‘famous’ aslyees were the Boston Bombers!

So Governor Mead wants to turn over Wyoming’s demographic future to the feds for a handful of asylees, another handful of secondary migrants, and a handful of change from the federal taxpayer?   It will be more than a handful of refugees once Lutheran Family Services Rocky Mountains gets its foot in the door.

Residents of Casper and Gillette must speak up before it’s too late!

The feds and contractors need to find more resettlement towns and cities

The ones they have are at the saturation point and so the hunt is on!  (Get it Wyoming!)

It’s been on actually for some time, but last summer the State Department (PRM) and the Dept. of Health and Human Services (ORR) began to spell out what they are looking for in a “welcoming” community.  They published their ‘guidance’  in a boring-sounding report entitled, ‘Key Indicators for Refugee Placement in FY 2014.’  

I had the report, but had filed it away for a slow day, which didn’t come until last week.

Bottomline is that they want to find out where they can get the best goodies for refugees in a welcoming atmosphere!  They have compiled state data for “stakeholders:”

…including state-by-state employment rates, health insurance access, average housing costs and state minimum wages.

They have had eleven meetings since 2011, some are conference calls, but others are site visits like one they described in Minnesota:

ORR and PRM staff conducted a joint site visit to Minnesota and engaged with representatives of a resettlement agency, area service providers and the state and local government to discuss resettlement needs and gauge local support and capacity for new resettlement possibilities.  [They love that word capacity!—-ed]

See the full report, we will have more to say about it in coming days.

See our ‘where to find information’ category for more on reports like this one, statistics etc. that you will need to educate your communities.

What is the population of Middle Eastern and North African immigrants in your state?

I was looking for something else, and I’ll post it when I find it, but the Migration Policy Institute, last fall, published this useful information on MENA immigrants in America.  Who knew that there was even a separate category for them.

Before you read on, just a reminder that the Migration Policy Institute is a pro-open-borders Leftie-funded (Soros et al) ‘think tank,’ (we wrote a lengthy post on them here in 2011), however, since the Left needs this data too (LOL! for voter outreach), I doubt they would mess with stats like these.

MPI says the top 5 states for MENAs are:  California, New York, Michigan, Texas and New Jersey.  It looks like Virginia and Florida are not far behind!

Migration Policy Institute:

Political unrest and violent conflict have displaced millions in Syria and other parts of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) since late 2010, generating significant international interest in immigrants and refugees from the region.

In the United States, the September 11, 2001 attacks and subsequent military intervention in Iraq in 2003 also drew heightened — and sometimes unwanted — attention to the highly diverse MENA immigrant populations in the country, many of whom are Muslim. Yet immigrants from the MENA region have a long history in the United States. As early as 1920, the country was home to at least 50,000 immigrants from the region, primarily from what was then Palestine and Syria, including present-day Lebanon. Their numbers have steadily grown over the past few decades, and in 2012, about 961,000 immigrants from the region resided in the United States, representing just above 2 percent of the nation’s 40.8 million immigrants.

Iraqis are the largest single-country immigrant population from this region, followed closely by Egyptians. The number of immigrants from Saudi Arabia and Yemen has also grown rapidly over the past decade.

[…..]

Compared to other immigrant groups, the foreign born from the MENA region are better educated and tend to have higher levels of English proficiency, but have comparatively lower rates of labor force participation.  [So, are they living off the US taxpayer?—ed]

There are lots of links to follow for more information, here are just two bullet points I followed.  If you have a feeling the speed of their arrival has increased, the answer is Yes!

Forty-five percent of foreign born from the MENA region in the United States arrived in 2000 or later.
In 2011, 45 percent of MENA foreign born had entered the country in 2000 or later, with 25 percent having arrived between 1990 and 1999, 15 percent between 1980 and 1989, and the remaining 16 percent prior to 1980.

MENA men and women don’t like to work!

Immigrant men and women from the MENA region were less likely to participate in the civilian labor force than were foreign-born men and women overall.
In 2011, foreign-born men ages 16 and older from the MENA region were less likely to participate in the civilian labor force (72 percent) than were all foreign-born men (78 percent). Foreign-born women from MENA countries were also less likely to participate in the labor force (42 percent) than were all immigrant women (57 percent).

Among men, Algerians (91 percent) and Sudanese (87 percent) had the highest labor force participation rates, while Iraqis (65 percent) and Saudis (23 percent) had the lowest labor force participation.

Consider that we resettled 19,491 Iraqis in the US in 2013, here, and are on target to admit a similar number this year, it sure looks like the US taxpayer is going to be supporting a large percentage of them.  And, by the way, who the heck are all those (rich?) Saudis getting into the US, and through what legal program?

We have a category here at RRW entitled, ‘where to find information’, and this post will be archived there.

Which refugees came to your state in fiscal year 2012

Just now, when I checked data for how many refugees we resettled from Afghanistan, I came across this data for which states took which refugees in fiscal year 2012.   Although fiscal year 2013 ended on September 30th, 2013, I am not seeing the latest data.

African refugees arrive in Texas. Gee, isn’t this the number one red state the Leftists are aiming to turn blue?

I urge you to visit these Office of Refugee Resettlement state statistics to see from which countries refugees arrived in your state.

The top receiving states were:

Texas:  5,923

California:  5,173

Michigan:  3,594

New York:  3,528

Pennsylvania:  2,809

The states which received the least number of refugees were:

Of course Wyoming with zero and not even on the list (they have wisely stayed out of the program, so far!)

And, this is so interesting Delaware is not on the list either.  Isn’t that funny!  Senator Joe Biden was one of the chief sponsors of the Refugee Act of 1980 along with Ted (don’t-bring-them-to-Hyannis) Kennedy and yet Delaware took no refugees.

Hawaii:  1

Montana:  1

Mississippi:  8

Arkansas:  10

District of Columbia:  14

Go have a look!

Photo is here.