***Update***I just went back after a few hours to see if any national media has picked up the news, and nope, nothing yet. A few more bits of news by the protesters themselves, like thisCatholic news outfitcrowing that the Catholics (not to be left out!) were there too!
Okay, so yesterday was the big protest dayfor Church World Service and the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) so I figured surely there would be gobs of media reports on the success of their anti-Trump protest especially since they succeeded in getting arrested!
Where is the WaPo? Where is CNN? Anyone see any coverage?
By the way, who comes up with this hokey stuff?
The only news I found so far comes from organizers Amnesty Internationaland another Lefty outfit called Common Dreams.
Is this goofy or what! That is the Rev. McCullough of Church World Service on the far left. He pulls in an annual salary and benefits package of nearly $300,000 from the quasi-government CWS. Looks like Anne Richard, Obama’s refugee chief next to him, and then of course CAIR’s Nihad Awad fourth from the left.
18 LEADERS ARRESTED TODAY AT THE CAPITOL WHILE PROTESTING TRUMP ADMINISTRATION’S DESTRUCTION OF THE REFUGEE RESETTLEMENT PROGRAM
In response to the Trump Administration’s continued assault on the U.S. refugee resettlement program, 18 leaders from the nation’s leading faith and human rights organizations, as well as a former State Department official, were arrested on Capitol Hill as part of the first ever act of civil disobedience in the name of refugee resettlement.Those 18 arrested represented the 18,000 refugee cap set by the Trump administration – the lowest in the history of the resettlement program.
Continue reading hereif you want to see what each of the protesters had to say. If not, see who sponsored the publicity stunt:
Today’s protest was cosponsored by: Church World Service, Sahloul, Franciscan Action Network, Asian Americans Advancing Justice, Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns, Center for Victims of Torture, Leadership Conference of Women Religious, NETWORK Lobby for Catholic Social Justice, Southeast Asia Resource Action Center, Amnesty International USA, Disciples Refugee and Immigration Ministries, American Arab Anti Discrimination Committee, Congregations Action Network, Presbyterian Church USA, United Church of Christ, Sojourners, NOVA Friends of Refugees/One Journey.
Where is HIAS I wondered, they usually love to protest in Washington?
For new readers, Church World Service is one of the nine federal resettlement contractors with subcontractor office spread throughout the US. They receive millions of federal dollars amounting to 62% of their entire budget from you—the US taxpayer.See here.
Here they plan to join the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) on the Capitol steps looking to get arrested in a protest of the President’s refugee policy.
FAITH LEADERS, HUMAN RIGHTS GROUPS, AND FORMER ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF STATE STAGE CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE FOR REFUGEES
On Tuesday, October 15th, 18 protestors–including heads of Amnesty International USA, America’s Voice, CAIR, and Church World Service, as well as a former Assistant Secretary for the Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration–will risk arrest on the steps of the U.S. Capitol. The leaders will wear life vests symbolizing the life-saving refugee resettlement program.
Faith communities, human rights groups, clergy, refugees, and refugee agencies will hold a major action on Capitol Hill as Secretary Pompeo meets with Congress to finalize the administration’s 80% cut to the refugee admissions program.
WHAT: Protest and Civil Disobedience Responding to Decimation of Refugee Resettlement
WHERE: Capitol Lawn Area 9, Constitution and First St NE
WHEN: Tuesday, October 15th at 1:00 PM
DETAILS: 18 protestors–including heads of Amnesty International USA, CAIR, America’s Voice and CWS–wearing life vests symbolizing the lives that could be saved or lost through the resettlement program will risk arrest on the steps of the US Capitol. Supporters will hold 95 photographs of refugees, a nod to the historic average refugee cap of 95,000.
LEADERS RISKING ARREST INCLUDE:
Anne C. Richard, Former Assistant Secretary of State for Population, Refugees, and Migration (PRM) [She’s back!—ed]
Margaret Huang, Executive Director, Amnesty International USA
Rev. John L. McCullough, President and CEO of Church World Service
Nihad Awad, National Executive Director, Council on American-Islamic Relations
Frank Sharry, Founder and Executive Director, America’s Voice
Sarnata Reynolds, former counsel for the House Judiciary Committee
OTHER SPEAKERS:
Sami Muya, a Refugee from Somalia separated from family members by anti-refugee policies
Endnote: I am so happy to have RRW backso history isn’t forgotten and images like those above can continue to be available for all to see.
You should take a minute and have a look at the church member congregations Church World Serviceis representing (see this post). Is your church among them?
The Philadelphia Inquirer’s esteemed foreign affairs columnist Trudy Rubinhas penned an opinion piece dripping with venom and bias against the President (and White House aide Stephen Miller) claiming we still owe US citizenship to thousands more Iraqi and Afghan “translators” who supposedly all helped the US military.
Trudy Rubin says we must admit thousands more Afghan and Iraqi ‘interpreters’ to America! I want to know when is enough enough?
The war in Iraq ended in 2011, so first let me ask why after 8 years we still must be giving anyone from Iraq (maybe with an exception for truly persecuted Christians) a taxpayer-funded new life in America?
We spent enormous blood and treasure giving Iraqis new leadership and a fresh chance at governing themselves, why must we move tens of thousands of the newly freed Iraqis (mostly Muslims) to a town near you?
Just a reminder here, dear readers, that when we go to war in a Middle Eastern country the Leftists will claim, now and forevermore, that we are morally bankrupt if we don’t bring that country’s nationals to America!
To hear Ms. Rubin you would not know that since the fall of 2006 through last week we admitted the following astronomical numbers from these two countries.
Afghanistan:
11,142 refugees and 59,104 SIVs (those that supposedly helped us)
(Below I’m going to show you all where Ms. Rubin can find accurate numbers so that maybe next time she won’t get all her facts from refugee contractors who make fat salaries off the US taxpayer and thus have a pecuniary interest in ever-growing refugee numbers.***)
So I guess Trudy Rubin doesn’t think we have already done enough!
And, by the way, by highlighting a sympathetic case she deploys the sob story method to play on her readers’ emotions. I can do that too….learn moreabout the convicted rapist Jasim.
For extra added measure she throws in the canard that our population is declining in America so we need all these new people to pay taxes.
Another Trump scandal: Blocking visas for Iraqis who saved American lives
Apart from Ukraine-gate, another White House scandal revved up recently, almost unnoticed.
The White House effort to block legal immigration shifted into overdrive. The State Department announced last week it would slash the already shrunken U.S. refugee program almost in half, to 18,000 admissions over the next 12 months, nearly eliminating America’s historic role as a safe haven. [I’m questioning why America always has to be a safe haven!—ed]
And the Trump team is trying to limit the impact of a recent D.C. District Court ruling that it end years-long delays in granting special immigrant visas (SIV) for thousands of Afghans and Iraqis who helped the U.S. military – as mandated by Congress.
The SIV mandate is a joke. Then Sen. Ted Kennedy added the provision for SIVs to a defense authorization bill and so there was never a Congressional debate on Iraq and Afghanistan SIVs.
What kind of moral bankrupts try to shut our doors to those who saved American lives?
Cry me a river!
Look who is talking!
“With one final blow, the Trump administration has snuffed out Lady Liberty’s torch and ended our nation’s legacy of compassion and welcome,” says the Rev. John L. McCullough, president of Church World Service,a cooperative ministry of 37 Christian denominations.
Just a cooperative ministry of 37 Christian denominations?
John McCullough pulls down a salary of over $300,000 a year as President and CEO of Church World Service, a federal refugee contractor that got over $40 million in federal tax dollars in a recent year to place refugees throughout America while acting as a leading far left Open Borders political agitation group!
(Ms. Rubin might want to have a look at CWS’s Form 990 here.)
Even more shocking is the White House willingness to betray Iraqis and Afghans who are at risk because they helped the U.S. military.
[….]
Administration callousness beggars belief. Many of these applicants and their families have been hiding for years under death threats.
Meantime, State Department data show that only 1,649 Afghans got SIV visas in 2018, a 60% drop from 2017.
See how she cherry-picks the numbers to put Trump in the worst light! Is it possible that maybe, just maybe, it is time to stop the SIV program? Haven’t we brought enough already? Isn’t 59,104 enough already!
As for Iraqis, the situation is far worse. Those in greatest danger – such as military interpreters and their families – have been tossed into a huge pool of applicants also entitled to visas because they worked for U.S. civilians. That backlog has reached 100,000.
Under Stephen Miller, only 51 Iraqis were admitted in 2018 (as compared with 10,000 in 2016). [LOL! Of course, gotta get their boogey man Miller in here. Don’t they call this dog whistling!—ed]
“They [the SIV applicants] served bravely in support of our missions abroad, and we promised them a pathway to safety in return,” points out Deepa Alagesan, the supervising attorney who brought the successful court case on behalf of the International Refugee Assistance Project.
Under pressure from Congress, 4,000 [more—ed] of the rare refugee slots will supposedly be reserved for Iraqis who worked for the U.S. military. But will they ever receive them?
161,665 refugees and SIVs moved to America isn’t enough?
Was our blood and treasure squandered for a country that eight years after the war ended isn’t safe enough according to the refugee industry agitators?
Are we expected to bring Iraqi ‘refugees’ to our American towns for the next ten years and ten after that?
*** For inquisitive readers, lazy reporters and for Ms. Rubin, hereis where you can find accurate numbers. This is the State Department’s Refugee Processing Center.
These particular data bases for Iraq and Afghanistan show placement for each state for refugee numbers vs. SIV numbers.
The refugee resettlement contractor has apparently, according to news reports, been shuttered for a couple of years, but now its former Board Chairman, a former deputy sheriff, has been indicted for taking money from the publicly-funded charity.
DENVER, CO — A fired former division head of the Denver Sheriff’s Office and a former president of the state Fraternal Order of Police was indicted by a grand jury in Denver earlier this month for allegedly pocking $50,000 from an Aurora refugee charity.
Franklin Gale, 55, of Denver was indicted by a Denver grand jury in connection with the alleged diversion for his own use of multiple checks paid to Ecumenical Refugee And Immigration Services, a non-active refugee resettlement agency that closed under a cloud in 2015 after another embezzlement scandal.
Gale is charged with money laundering, theft, attempting to influence a public servant forgery and vehicle theft. The indictment was handed down Oct. 3 and Gale turned himself in to the Longmont Police, a statement from the Denver District Attorney’s Office said.
[….]
Gale was serving as a non-compensated board member of ERIS in 2015 when the charity was closed down following a 2014 criminal investigation by the Aurora Police Department that resulted in embezzlement and theft charges against two staffers, Genevieve Marie Cruz and Adam Cole Shryock.
See that Charity Navigator has given ERIS its High Concern Advisory rating.
According to the indictment, Gale was a friend of Cruz, who was brought onto the board initially as a consultant. He ended up the president of the board as the organization closed down.
ERIS had received public funds to assist with refugee resettlement through the CARES branch of the Colorado Department of Law Human Services. Those funds were revoked after Cruz and her colleague were charged.
In May of 2015, Gale was elected president of the board of directors and the organization closed its doors.
When Cruz and Shyrock pleaded guilty in 2016, they were ordered by the court to pay $50,000 in restitution to the agency, the indictment said.
According to the grand jury indictment, about a dozen checks were sent to the defunct agency in care of Frank Gale at his Denver home address.
The indictment alleges that between November 2015 and April 2017, Gale wrote $48,668 in checks to himself from the ERIS account and deposited them into an account he established for his minor son. Gale would then make bank account cash withdrawals, ATM withdrawals, and/or transfer the funds from his son’s account to other accounts under his control, thus laundering the money, the indictment alleges. The actions ultimately added up to the theft of $50,000, the DA’s office said in a statement.
Gale is also accused of forging the name and signature of the former board director on a motor vehicle title for a truck owned by ERIS and then getting a new motor vehicle title in his own name.
Gale is expected to appear in court on Monday, see here.
I was surprised to find that the website is still up for ERIS here.
And, I learned from that site that it was a subcontractor working for two of the nine federal refugee resettlement contractors:
Ecumenical Refugee and Immigration Services (ERIS) helps to resettle refugees and asylees who are legally in Colorado (by Church World Service and Episcopal Migration Ministries), by providing them assistance with educational needs, family and social services, medical attention, employment, and cultural orientation.
There needs to be much more scrutiny than there is at the present time of non-profits benefiting from state and federal tax dollars.
Update September 23rd: 30,000 may not be final number, here.
Update September 19th: One more reason the Trump Administration could have gone with a ZERO cap this year—320,000 migrants already in US looking to get refugee status, here.
Update September 18th:See why I think a cap of 30,000 was a bad decision, here.
So, I guess Church World Service can get off its “pins and needles!”
The President with Secretary of State Pompeo
It was only this morning that we reportedthat a Church World Service employee announced that there would be no CEILING (aka CAP) announced until December. They sure seem to have gotten their facts wrong, or did they?
There will be much wailing from the usual contractor gang (they wanted the number to be 75,000!), but remember readers that we are under 30,000 this year—we should come in at less than 25,000. (Update: as of today we have admitted 20,919 refugees with only 2 weeks to go in the fiscal year.)
Here is the brief news posted a little over an hour ago at Politico:
Trump administration intends to slash refugee cap
The Trump administration will admit no more than 30,000 refugees to the U.S. in the coming year, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said, down from the current cap of 45,000.
Pompeo announced the lowered ceiling during a press conference Monday at the Department of State headquarters in Foggy Bottom.
Pompeo said the 30,000 cap “must be considered in the context of the many other forms of protection and assistance offered by the United States” and should not be “sole barometer” to measure the country’s humanitarian efforts.
The hawkish turn demonstrates President Donald Trump’s willingness to push hard-line immigration policies in the run-up to the November midterm elections ….
When Trump took office, the refugee cap stood at 110,000. He lowered that to 50,000, and subsequently to 45,000.
It is my opinion that the program won’t be reformed as it should be until the number is ZERO with the understanding that Congress and the Administration must reform the entire program during a moratorium.
Without real reform, as the Lancaster, PA Church World Service employee said: they will just wait out this president and claim they need huge numbers in 2021 or 2025 to make up for Trump’s lost years.
Will the Administration and Congress follow the law in the next few weeks?
The Refugee Act of 1980 requires the US State Department, in conjunction with the President, to present a detailed Report to Congress explaining how many refugees they would like to admit and from where they will come.
The report should arrive in Congress weeks before the end of the fiscal year (September 30th) and BEFORE refugees begin arriving in the new year. The House and Senate Judiciary Committees are supposed to hold PUBLIC hearings and “consult” with the Administration on that report.
Where is the report? Has it been made public? How can they go forward with resettlement on October first with no guide as to which refugees will get priority?
After consultation with Congress about The Report, the President then is supposed to make his final determination.
Of course they haven’t been following the law for years, so it remains to be seen if they will this year or not.
We will be waiting with great anticipation to see if the first of the new batch of 30,000 begins arriving on October first (2 weeks from today!).
Just a cooperative ministry of 37 Christian denominations?
