Tag: Honduras

Trump Administration Cuts $500 Million from Central American NGO’s Budgets

~ Ann Corcoran ~ 3 Comments

Holy cow!  Who knew! Not only do millions of your tax dollars go to the nine federal refugee contractors*** in the US, but we send apparently billions to supposedly Christian social justice groups in places like Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador.

Let the wailing begin as the groups claim that they use our millions to keep citizens of those countries from fleeing toward our southern border, so cutting them off is wrong they say.

It is pretty clear for all to see that even with billions of dollars over the years they have failed spectacularly in stopping the invasion and I assume the State Department has pretty much figured that out.

 

Honduran migrants on the way to the US in 2018

 

I wish I had time today to take a deep dive into past funding for the groups that include, Proyecto Aldea Global, Association for a More Just Society, International Justice Mission and World Vision, but I don’t.

Here is the story at Christianity Today:

Christian Nonprofits Reeling from Trump Cuts to Foreign Aid

Christian ministries in Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador know they are in for a tough year. The US government has drastically cut aid to the three Central American countries in response to the large number of refugees who have fled north to seek asylum in America. Some of the more than $500 million of US taxpayer money was going to Christian nonprofits working on economic development, anti-corruption efforts, and helping children in poverty in the three countries. Those ministries will have to lay people off, reduce services, and scramble to find other funds.  [Just call George Soros and ask him to supply the funds—ed]

“The Trump administration shot itself in the foot with these cuts,” said Chet Thomas, director of Proyecto Aldea Global in Honduras, which has been forced to stop a job training program that gave teenagers alternatives to working for criminal gangs. “These projects are designed to … reduce the number of people migrating to the US.”

US foreign aid flows through various channels. In many cases, it ends up funding nongovernmental organizations, including Christian relief organizations in the area of Central American known as the Northern Triangle. Many of these address the conditions that cause people to flee their homes and seek asylum, leading to a crisis at the US border. Some ministries work directly with host governments to train national staff and increase the effectiveness of state institutions. Others focus more on community development, often building connections with local churches that don’t trust their government and don’t have many of their own resources.

Governments must do their jobs!

Justifying the cuts, the State Department appeared to downplay the role of nonprofit groups in addressing migration. “We expect the governments of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras to keep their commitments to stem illegal immigration to the United States,” it said in a statement.

More here.

Sure looks to me that the State Department calculated that based on the hordes flooding to the US border, we weren’t getting our money’s worth from these ‘Christian non-profits’.

However, some US ‘religious charities’ are not seeing huge funding cuts!

*** Here (below) are the nine federal refugee resettlement contractors.

I’m not posting my usual spiel, but only want to say that in my analysis of funds received by three contractors (so far) since Trump took office, only the US Conference of Catholic Bishops has taken a large cut in its federal funding.

Church World Service and Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service are still about on par with federal funding as they were under Obama.

I’ll have more to say when I’ve been through all nine.

 

Trump has a plan to stop the migrant caravan, will announce Tuesday

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I have to say: this is the newest news I’m seeing.  Since the whole issue is in flux (and perhaps more so after the shooting at the synagogue in Pittsburgh where we heard the shooter may have been angry over the caravan as well as HIAS’s role in it), things could change any minute.

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Ready or not, here we come! Photo: Time magazine   http://time.com/5435748/border-patrol-wont-shoot-caravan-kirstjen-nielsen/

 

But, here is what Neil Munro reported at Breitbart yesterday:

WashPo: Trump Will Announce Anti-Caravan Plan on Tuesday

 

President Donald Trump will announce Tuesday how he will use his extraordinary powers over legal immigration to block the caravan and other asylum-seeking economic migrants, according to the Washington Post.

“A draft of the proposal reviewed by The Washington Post says the president can use his authority under Section 212(f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act to declare certain migrants ineligible for asylum for national security reasons,” the Post reported.

The little-used powers are in Section 212(f) of U.S. law, at 8 U.S. Code § 1182:

Suspension of entry or imposition of restrictions by President

Whenever the President finds that the entry of any aliens into the United States would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, he may by proclamation, and for such period as he shall deem necessary, suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants, or impose on the entry of aliens any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate.

But pro-migration advocates say that 212(f) clause cannot stop illegal migrants from jumping over the border wall into the United States and then use U.S. and international law to apply for asylum.

These advocates say migrants — even those with invalid cases — are protected by the constitution’s Fith Amendment once they get onto U.S. territory. The clause — “No person shall be … deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law” — allows migrants to get court hearings, despite Presidential opposition, the advocates say.

However, U.S. law does not require that asylum applicants be allowed to stay in the United States while their legal claims are considered by the courts, countered Christopher Hajec, the litigation director for the Immigration Law Reform Institute.

President Trump has the legal authority to deport classes of migrants to an outside location where they can safely live until their appeals are heard, he said. Migrants would be allowed to appeal for asylum in court cases conducted via video, he told Breitbart News. “Some might get asylum,” he added.

Much more here.

Remember readers that asylum is the other side of the refugee coin.  The only difference is the means of getting here.

If we fly them they are called refugees, if they get here on their own steam they must apply for asylum (refugee status).  Then, if the migrant is granted asylum, he/she gets the benefits that refugees we transport here receive.

Conservative Review: Trump already has the power to stop anyone at our border

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Daniel Horowitz at Conservative Review lays it out for us.  President Trump already has all the power he needs to close our borders.

Presumably inspired by all the news about a now 4,000-strong migrant caravan heading toward Mexico with the apparent aim to assault our southern border (see my post yesterday), Horowitz says this (emphasis is mine):

 

President Trump has full constitutional power to stop the border invasion – even without Congress

 

Just as President Reagan is remembered for ending the Cold War, President Trump can be remembered as the one who ended the war on our sovereignty. Will he rise to the occasion?

trump wall thumbs up
The wall will be meaningless if we continue to allow fake asylum seekers in through the gates!

Here’s the stone-cold truth about our border: We could construct a border wall as high as the stratosphere, and it won’t help much if we continue our self-destructing policies of allowing bogus asylees to come through our front door and legitimizing the opinions of sanctuary judges who “make denizens of aliens.”

President Trump publicly warned the governments of Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala that if they don’t take steps to stop the latest caravan of bogus asylum invaders, he will cut off aid to the countries. While this is a good first step, it won’t deter the invasion unless we stop admitting the invaders and implementing catch-and-release under orders from illegitimate court rulings, as we did with the previous caravan and countless tens of thousands of others coming in with less pomp. And that would hold true even with a border wall. They just come to our points of entry, surrender themselves, get released into our communities, and never show up to their hearings until and unless they wind up committing crimes.

Moreover, the caravan is already in Guatemala and headed for Mexico. Thus, the Honduran diplomacy is moot at this point. And this is much bigger than one caravan. We must first dissect what is actually happening at our border.

This is nothing short of an invasion

Earlier this week, KTAR news in Phoenix, Arizona, sat down with ICE’s Phoenix field director, Henry Lucero. What he revealed should disturb all of us:

See the revelations here.

Then this…..

Thus, it all boils down to bogus asylum and catch-and-release. Either Trump ends those, or everything else is just talk. While Trump is right to ask Congress to step in, we’ve noted before that our statute is already clear that these people do not qualify as asylees and that the unaccompanied teenagers do not qualify as refugees.

With this background in mind, it’s easy to understand why Lindsey Grahmanesty’s idea of trading amnesty for a border wall is so counterintuitive. We only have this border invasion because of the magnet of amnesty, and the magnet of amnesty allows them to come to the entry points, demand asylum, sue for rights, and never get deported. A wall only helps a country that has a strong spirit but a weak frontier; it doesn’t help a weak political system that willingly commits national suicide.

Anyone who tells you that the president doesn’t have the authority to exclude anyone for any reason doesn’t deserve to live in a sovereign nation.

Sovereignty trumps everything. There is nothing in our statutes that forces the president to admit anyone he feels is a problem. In fact, as we’ve noted before, he has inherent executive powers from Article II, as well as delegated authority from Congress under existing law, to stop taking in immigrants at the border or through visas for as much time as he deems necessary.

There is much more here as Horowitz lays out the case.

Conservative Score Card

If you have never seen it, don’t miss Conservative Review’s Congressional score card and see how your representatives rank on issues you care about.  Go here.  You might find that an elected official you thought was conservative might not be voting that way once he or she got to Washington!

Trump must put pressure on Mexico to block migrant caravan from Honduras

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

In an interview with Breitbart radio, Jessica Vaughan of the Center for Immigration Studies gives the President sound advice.

 

Migrant caravan 2
Honduran government begs the migrants to turn around.    https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/oct/16/honduras-begs-migrant-caravan-turn-back/

 

I’m writing about this story again today because I noted how interested you are in it after my post yesterday, and because it is an opportunity to inform more of you about the other part of our US refugee system—namely the asylum process.

Just recently, here, I told you about asylum and how it is part and parcel of the Refugee Act of 1980, but is being scammed and abused by thousands in recent years.

Simply: refugees are selected abroad as supposedly persecuted people and flown here (that is what all this 30,000 cap business is all about).  The Hondurans and others who ask for asylum are not part of that cap.

Asylum seekers get to America on their own steam and then claim they will be persecuted if returned home. 

If granted asylum they are then considered refugees. However, most of those headed our way are what are called economic migrants in migration lingo.

From Breitbart:

Jessica Vaughan: Trump Should ‘Put Pressure on Mexico’ to Block Migrant Caravans

Jessica Vaughan

Jessica Vaughan, director of policy studies at the Center for Immigration Studies, advised the Trump administration to pressure Mexico against allowing entry to caravans of migrants seeking passage to the U.S.

Vaughan offered her remarks in a Monday interview with Breitbart News Editor-at-Large Rebecca Mansour on SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Tonight.

Vaughan described existing U.S. refugee asylum policies as incentivizing foreigners to seek entry into the homeland via their humanitarian provisions, recalling previous analyses offered on an earlier migrant caravan’s access to America.

“It’s really our policy that is enticing them to come, and I am surprised it took this long,” said Vaughan. “This is not the choice of the Trump administration. It certainly does not want to entice people to take this dangerous journey, and when you look the pictures, it is a lot of young men, but it’s also some kids coming, too. It’s dangerous for them, but it now has this aura of an adventure that people are taking, like the gold rush or something.”

Vaughan said aspiring migrants are advised to travel to America by both smugglers and ostensibly humanitarian groups based in the U.S.

“[Migrants] are being told by the smugglers — who I’m sure are among them, or the organizers, I mean they’re really almost the same thing — to [travel to the U.S.].

Certainly they’re being egged on by the humanitarian groups and even by groups within the United States.”

In April, Left-wing American lawyers offered migrant caravan travelers “legal training sessions,” advising migrant what to say to improve their likelihood of obtaining entry to the U.S. in their dealing with immigration judges and asylum officers.

[….]

Vaughan added, “Why wouldn’t it [the caravan] grow? They are realistically optimistic that they will be let into the United States. At some point, the Trump administration, the best possible solution is for them to say, ‘No.’ Or put pressure on Mexico to not issue them transit visas. They have no basis to enter Mexico unless Mexico is going to give them asylum.”

BP
Former Senator and now Attorney General Jeff Sessions has ordered asylum judges to stick to the legal definition of persecution when weighing asylum claims.  Running from gang violence, abusive husbands or looking for work are not grounds for admission.

Vaughan described Attorney General Jeff Sessions’s new directives to immigration judges and asylum officers.

“Claiming to have witnessed violence or to have come from a violent place is not good enough to get you into the country to make an asylum claim, to pass your ‘credible fear’ test,” stated Vaughan. “They’re expected now to show that the persecution that they claim was carried out by the government, or with the government’s blessing. General violence is not going to cut it.”

[….]

Vaughan said, “The best possible solution is to not let [caravan migrants] enter,” adding that “it is obvious to everyone” that the caravan migrants’ motivations are “economically based.”

Vaughan explain, “The goal should be to have people not get across, at all, because then it’s a whole different story once they set foot in the United States, whether they’ve been admitted or paroled or whatever. As soon as we let them across, that’s when it becomes extremely difficult to remove them and return them to their home countries.”

There is much more here.

Temporary Protected Status connection?

I wouldn’t put it past the Open Borders activists to ultimately use this caravan PR campaign to try to get the Trump administration to reverse its decision to rescind the Temporary Protective Status for Hondurans already in the US. See here, and here.

How can the President be so mean as to return thousands of Hondurans already in the US to a country where so many are trying to escape, they might say.

Will the migrant caravan headed north from Honduras have implications for US midterm elections?

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I think, yes, if they continue northward.

Yesterday, the migrants numbering between 1,600 and 2,000, chanting “We have rights,” crossed the border from Honduras into Guatemala with the intention of illegally crossing in to Mexico.

 

Migrant caravan
Yikes! the caravan is made up of mostly young men! It looks just like the European invasion!

 

Just a reminder to all, these are not refugees.

(See my most recent discussion about the misuse of the word ‘refugee.’)

They are mostly economic migrants, but the Leftwing Open Borders advocates will say they are seeking asylum from persecution for their race, religion, political view, and will call them refugees.

If that is the case, they are required to ask for asylum in the first safe country they enter.

I know you are saying as you read this that Mexico isn’t safe, but indeed it is considered so for the purpose of asylum.  It will be a real test of the new Mexican government if they permit the movement of the Honduran caravan across Mexico and to the US border.

Just as Elizabeth Warren’s Indian heritage stunt isn’t good for the Dems three weeks out from the mid term elections, neither is this migrant caravan should it reach our border.

It will just be one more argument in favor of President Trump’s hardline immigration stance.

Here is the AP at the Chicago Tribune yesterday:

Honduran migrant caravan crosses Guatemala border, US-bound

 

Hundreds of Honduran migrants surged over the Guatemalan border under a broiling sun Monday hoping to make it to new lives in the United States, far from the poverty and violence of their home nation.

Police stopped the migrants at a roadblock outside Esquipulas for several hours in the afternoon, but the travelers refused to return to the border and were eventually allowed to pass.

They arrived in town as night fell, exhausted by the day’s heat, hobbling on blistered feet. Few carried food and some local residents began to organize to help feed them. Some migrants asked for money, others passing a bakery were handed bread.

map honduras etc
They crossed from Honduras and into Guatemala yesterday.

Earlier in the day, the migrants arrived at the Guatemalan border singing the Honduran national anthem, praying and chanting, “Yes, we can.” The group estimated at 1,600 or more defied an order by the Guatemalan government that they not be allowed to pass.

“We have rights,” the migrants shouted.

[….]

Local media coverage prompted hundreds more to join, and Dunia Montoya, a volunteer assisting the migrants, estimated Sunday that the group had grown to at least 1,600 people. Police gave their own estimate of around 2,000 on Monday.  [Find out who the “volunteer” works for and find out who organized the march. Could it be the Catholic Church?—-ed]

The caravan formed a day after U.S. Vice President Mike Pence urged the presidents of Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala to persuade their citizens to stay home and not put their families in danger by undertaking the risky journey to the United States.

In April, President Donald Trump threatened in April to withdraw foreign aid from Honduras and countries that allowed transit for a similar caravan that set out from the Central American country. That caravan dwindled as the group approached the U.S. border, with some giving up along the way and others splitting off to try to cross on their own.

Historian Dana Frank, an expert on human rights and U.S. policy in Honduras, said the caravan could have political implications in the United States less than a month before the midterm elections.

More here.

Yes, it surely could and my prediction is that the impact will favor Republicans who support Trump’s stronger border initiatives.

You may have noticed that the Dems are campaigning with no mention of immigration (if they can avoid it).

So, make sure you send this news to everyone you know!