Tag: Refugee resettlement contractors

Refugee News Round-up: Third Week of March 2021

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I’ll begin this week with high praise for Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene who introduced legislation in the House of Representatives that calls for a moratorium on immigration.

One tough brave woman! https://vdare.com/posts/marjorie-taylor-greene-backs-full-immigration-moratorium

It will go nowhere, but she deserves much praise for doing something the Republicans rarely do—she went on the offense!   

The foolish GOP chickens, time and again,  simply react to what the Dems are pushing and virtually never stake out a position that forces the Socialists to counter them.

Trump did it brilliantly and they all hated him for it. And, that is why they want to get rid of Marjorie as well!

I heard Greene interviewed by Greg Kelly on Newsmax and Kelly seemed a bit nervous when he asked her if she meant a moratorium on all immigration and she said, no, just illegal immigration.

Kelly looked relieved.  Although it is simply a guess on my part, I figure that he has swallowed this line and has been repeating it everywhere:

ILLEGAL immigration is bad, but LEGAL is good!

When I hear someone say that, usually a politician, I know that they don’t know what the hell they are talking about (or they think you are too dumb and uninformed to counter them!).

Don’t they know how screwed-up the LEGAL US Refugee Admissions Program is (I have over 9,000 posts archived here to prove it)?

Don’t they know about all the LEGAL temporary refugees who stay here for decades under the ridiculously named Temporary Protected Status label?

Or, what about the LEGAL Diversity Visa Lottery (aka Green Card Lottery) where 50,000 migrants a year are admitted to the US after winning a lottery—a program that exists thanks to the now deceased Senator Ted Kennedy who created it because he claimed we don’t have enough diversity in the US.

Unaccompanied Alien Children (UAC)

And, that brings me to the news that you are all hearing, every day and all day, that the US border is being overrun by child refugees.

First, the “children” are mostly teenaged boys as I reported here recently.

Oops! Biden Administration Faces Immigration Crisis

 

Secondly, readers need to understand that these “children” are NOT refugees. 

Supposedly they plan to ask for asylum which if granted would make them refugees and give them all the rights of refugees we select and bring to America through the US Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP). However they are not refugees when they arrive.  They are illegal aliens.

Finally, most will never even fit the definition of a legitimate refugee who must prove that he or she is being persecuted, has left their country, and cannot safely return to his/her home country.  The UACs are largely economic migrants.

Seeking a better life and/or running from crime are not legal grounds for refugee status.

I think the Open Borders agitators knew that by pushing legislation two decades ago that put the (mostly) teens’ care under the umbrella of the Office of Refugee Resettlement it would (further) muddy media understanding and cement in the public mind that they are refugees.  They are not!

And, as you know, they are eventually coming to a town near you with the help of at least a couple of the nine refugee resettlement contractors.***

Two contractors that are paid to take care of the kids are the US Conference of Catholic Bishops and Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service.

From the Office of Refugee Resettlement:

View the number of unaccompanied children released to sponsors by state and by county.

The Hill reported yesterday that apparently, since Biden’s inauguration in January, the US border has been breached by 15,000 UACs:

Number of migrant children in US custody passed 15,000: report

The number of migrant children in U.S. custody has passed 15,000, CBS News reported Saturday.

Records reviewed by the network showed that the government has about 15,500 unaccompanied migrant minors in U.S. custody. Over 5,000 unaccompanied minors are currently held in a tent holding facility run by Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and other stations along the U.S.-Mexico Border as of Saturday morning.

More here.

And to put that in prospective here is data at the Office of Refugee Resettlement on past years.  See that in the entire FY20, that UACs were at 15,000.

However, there were many Trump years that saw very large numbers of mostly teenaged youths entering the US.

And, btw, I have finally begun hearing commentators on Newsmax say that the “children” are mostly teenagers.  It is about time!

Moving on to other refugee news….

It is a great mystery that as of a couple of days ago there was still no news about Biden signing a Presidential determination to admit 62,500 refugees into the US before September 30th. 

As I reported in the first week of March round-up, refugee plane tickets are being cancelled and the so-called banned Muslim refugees have not begun entering the US. 

Checking the (limited!) data just now at the Refugee Processing Center, I see that we have admitted only 1,779 refugees in the first 5 months of the fiscal year.  The 2020 fiscal year began on October 1, 2020.  That is a long way from 62,500 with only 6 and a half months to go.

It is interesting to note that the cabal at the Refugee Council USA, the Washington, DC based lobbying arm of the refugee industry, is silent about Biden’s (their man!) failure to sign the determination.

Biden is however, getting some negative media attention for his failure to agree to the 62,500 admissions proposal his State Department has already put forth.  See this headline:

Biden wants credit for reversing Trump’s refugee policies. So why has he left them in place?

 

In more round-up news LGBTQ refugees are in need of mentoring.

Vermont is looking for more refugees and so is Arkansas.

 

***  I wrote about one of the nine federal refugee contractors yesterday at Frauds and Crooks:

Refugee Agency Settles Fraud Case with US Department of Justice

In case you are new to RRW, here are all of the contractors.  They worked to ‘elect’ Biden and as taxpayers you pay them millions annually to change America by changing the people.  Americans Last! is their motto!

See my category News Round-up for previous posts.  Round-ups have been sporadic over the years, but I am trying now to do them regularly.

Across Africa and the Middle East, Refugee Plane Tickets to America Canceled

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

“What’s going on? We thought this was going to be a new time for a new era for resettlement. Why are these cases getting canceled?”

(Natalie El-Deiry, International Rescue Committee, describing what refugees are saying.)

 

My headline could have been a headline in the era of (that mean guy) Donald Trump, but believe it or not that is big news in the Biden/Harris era where the team running the country had already told Congress they want 62,500 refugees flown in by September 30th.

Where are the angry protests against Biden?

(Please know that this 62,500 would be in addition to the tens, possibly hundreds of thousands, who will overrun our southern border this year all claiming that they too are refugees.)

Yes the contractors*** are squawking as their “clients” are turned back at airports across several continents, but funny that there are no angry demonstrations against the man, their man, they helped install in the White House.

Here is the Huffington Post with the news.

There are other stories with headlines blaming the mess on policies leftover from Trump!

Hundreds Of Refugees’ Flights Canceled Due To Biden Red Tape

Nearly 300 refugees who had been approved and booked to arrive in the United States last week to begin a new chapter in their lives had their flights canceled at the last minute, according to several resettlement agencies.

With the help of the State Department, resettlement agencies across the country had begun to process and book hundreds of refugees to enter the U.S. in March after the Biden administration announced it would be raising the refugee cap.

Natalie El-Deiry works for the International Rescue Committee overseeing their Utah and Montana offices. The IRC is paid by you to resettle ‘legit refugee’ “clients,” yet they also support the illegal aliens’ run on the border.  Go figure!

The decision was applauded as a crucial first step in rebuilding the refugee system after it was dealt a series of blows by then–President Donald Trump, who spent years demonizing refugees and decimating the resettlement programs.

But nearly a month after announcing the refugee increases and notifying Congress, President Joe Biden has yet to formally sign off on the higher cap.

Without Biden’s signature, refugee admissions are still restricted by Trump’s record-low 15,000 cap for fiscal year 2021 and his decision to exclude refugees from Muslim-majority countries like Syria and Somalia. The delay has forced a slew of canceled tickets and left hundreds of refugees in limbo and resettlement agencies scrambling.

The State Department has canceled flights for at least 264 refugees this month and more cancellations are expected, according to resettlement agencies.

[….]

After Biden was elected president, Wilondja [refugee star of this story] began to feel hopeful again. The new administration launched an effort to overhaul the immigration system, including raising the refugee cap to 125,000 for the next fiscal year (which starts Oct. 1, 2021) and allowing an additional 62,500 refugees to be admitted this fiscal year.

More here. 

To understand how high a number 62,500 is (to be accomplished in less than seven months), here are the high and low years for refugee admissions after the George HW Bush era where he admitted hundreds of thousands over his four years in office.

Clinton’s high year (numbers rounded) was 119,000, and low (for a whole year) was 69,000.

Bush: High year was 69,000, and low was 27,000.

Obama:  High year was 85,000, and low was 56,000.

Trump: High year was 54,000 (because part of that fiscal year Obama was still in office), and low was 12,000.

So you can see that if Chairman Joe pulls this off (62,500 by September 30th and 125,000 next year) he would far exceed the numbers that Obama admitted through the US Refugee Admissions Program, and in the midst of the pandemic no less!

 

***For New Readers  these are the nine federal refugee contractors who worked to put Biden and Harris in the White House, are lobbying for millions of illegal aliens to be transformed into legal voting citizens, and they have succeeded in getting the new administration to promise to raise the ceiling for refugee admissions to 125,000 for next year FY2022—that is the highest it has been in 29 years.

The 62,500 number is for the remainder of FY21.  FY21 ends in less than 7 months. And, again, these numbers are in addition to those fake asylum seekers coming across our borders.

They are largely paid by you, the taxpayer, for their work of changing America by changing the people, and in so doing, are putting struggling Americans last!

Refugee News Round-up: First week of March 2021

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I thought that one of the most interesting articles this week was this one from Politico where the authors suggest that President Trump has permanently damaged the general publics’ view of refugees.

They suggest that, before Trump, the country loved and welcomed refugees in one big bipartisan lovefest, but now, not so much.

It was a myth that the vast majority of Americans welcomed refugees, what Trump did was to speak about it and make it okay for Americans who feel the same to discuss and debate the issue of whether moving the third world to America benefits Americans.

In other words he gave us all permission to speak (LOL! as he does on many topics.)

One Way Trump May Have Changed Immigration Forever

For decades, U.S. presidents have managed a delicate consensus on taking in refugees. Trump blew it up.

 

 

Another piece of information this week is that Biden has so far failed to sign the “emergency” order that would set the ceiling on refugee admissions at 62,500 to arrive in the US by September 30th.

That lack of action has the resettlement contractors*** panties in a wad as refugee flights have been suddenly canceled.

From the Wall Street Journal:

U.S. Refugee Flights Canceled as Record-Low Cap on Admissions Remains

Here we have one of the contractors, the International Rescue Committee, gently chiding their President to get moving to implement the emergency determination.

IRC calls on the Biden Administration to sign an emergency refugee admissions goal for FY21

Then there is the border crisis….

I suspect that the Biden administration is too overwhelmed with the crisis at the border as tens of thousands of migrants are making their way into the country.

Among them are thousands of so-called ‘Unaccompanied Alien Children,’ actually mostly teenagers who come under the care of the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR).

They aren’t really legally defined refugees, but are illegal migrants hoping to prove an asylum case.

Having placed the illegal alien kids (mostly teens) under the care of ORR a number of years ago, the open borders agitators have managed to advance their propaganda about the kids being legit refugees.

Legitimate refugees must prove they are “persecuted” they can’t just be poor and shopping for a new country.

From CBS News:

Biden administration scrambles to expand housing space for migrant children amid sharp increase in border apprehensions

And, from the Daily Beast:

Immigrant Advocates Warn Biden: Don’t Repeat Trump’s ‘Unforgivable Crimes’

Firmly cementing the idea in the public mind that the illegals scrambling across our borders are legitimate refugees, we have a United Nations agency, IOM, helping the migrants enter the US.

From the Federalist:

United Nations Officials Shepherd Migrants Across Southern Border

 

Back to the US Refugee Admissions Program….

Now, just as I showed you in my round-up last week, fluffy refugee stories are being published in many locations where refugees will be distributed by the contractors.  See my earlier post on locations where refugees are likely to be placed, at least at first.

I’ve been posting some of those puff-pieces at my Refugee Resettlement page on Facebook and they have reached thousands; hundreds have weighed-in with spirited comments.

News from Colorado: https://www.dailycamera.com/2021/03/01/refugees-colorado-trump-biden/

Massachusetts: https://www.milforddailynews.com/story/news/state/2021/03/03/experts-say-outlook-brighter-refugee-resettlement-under-biden/6894383002/

Michigan: https://www.lansingstatejournal.com/story/news/2021/03/03/vaccine-priority-food-chain-workers-helps-some-refugees-migrants/6835641002/

Missouri: https://www.komu.com/news/midmissourinews/local-resources-a-valuable-friend-for-refugee-students-during-pandemic/article_0cf117a4-7a02-11eb-93ae-4b3b980e39c8.html

Minnesota:  Don’t miss my post at ‘Frauds and Crooks!’

Will Minnesota be the first Muslim State in America?

One last thing to watch for…

A libertarian think tank is promoting the idea of private sponsorship of refugees.  Now on the surface you might think that is a great idea because the numbers admitted would surely decline because frankly how many people or groups could pull together the enormous amounts of money needed to completely take care of refugee families WITHOUT THE TAXPAYERS.

But that isn’t what they propose.  This new group of privately sponsored refugees would be in addition to the ones that would be admitted through the regular US Refugee Admissions Program where the contractors are paid with your money to resettle refugees.

It is merely an effort to get MORE refugees into the United States.

***For New Readers these are the nine federal refugee contractors who worked to put Biden and Harris in the White House, are lobbying for millions of illegal aliens to be transformed into legal voting citizens, and they have succeeded in getting the new administration to promise to raise the ceiling for refugee admissions to 125,000 for next year FY2022—that is the highest it has been in 29 years.

The 62,500 number is for the remainder of FY21.  FY21 ends in less than 7 months.

They are largely paid by you, the taxpayer, for their work of changing America by changing the people, and in so doing, are putting struggling Americans last!

Trump Initiative to Give State and Local Government a Say in Refugee Resettlement was DEAD Before Biden EO

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I am willing to blame (almost) everything on the newly installed Biden/Harris Administration, but Trump never had support for his effort to give state and local governments a say in placement of refugees.  Why?

First, because the Leftwingers at three federal contracting agencies, the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, Church World Service and Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, had taken the EO to court and had already won!

The contractors have been calling the shots on locations for decades and they plan to keep it that way!

 

An Appeals Court, the day before Inauguration Day, had already put the nail in the coffin on this Trump effort to protect you and give you a say in refugee resettlement site selection.

Court of Appeals Rules: YOU Have No Say in Whether YOUR Town Will Accept Refugees

And….

Republican Governors did not back Trump!

More importantly, governors needed to support the plan and the vast majority, at least 18, Republican governors in the nation opposed the President, except for a handful including DeSantis and Kemp who remained quiet, leaving Governor Abbott of Texas the only Governor in the Nation brave enough to back the plan!

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

White House Supposedly Blindsided as Republican Governors Cave on Refugee Resettlement

….most importantly, the supposed reformers working for the President apparently did not have a firm understanding of how weak most Republican governors are on immigration issues of any sort.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott was the only Republican to support the President’s effort to reform the UN/US Refugee Admissions Program before the resettlement contractors shut it down with a lawsuit. https://refugeeresettlementwatch.org/2020/01/10/breaking-news-texas-governor-abbott-says-no-will-not-accept-more-refugees-in-2020/

For new readers, most Republican governors are weak because they are backed by global corporations and the Chamber of Commerce types who want a steady supply of CHEAP labor!

Hey, and for all of you Kristi Noem fans, she DID NOT SUPPORT THE PRESIDENT on this and I suspect it is because of that big Chinese-owned Smithfield Foods slaughter house in South Dakota and its appetite for cheap refugee labor.

In addition, of course, to the myriad other meatpackers scattered across South Dakota that Noem was obviously not willing to buck. (Not presidential material in my view!)

And, even if Biden left a little (fake) wiggle room as the Breitbart article suggests in its incomplete story, there is NO concern for you from Biden/Harris— for those of you who live in the communities where refugees have been resettled and where tens of thousands more will be resettled.

Biden is aiming to bring in more refugees than any president in three decades.

The US State Department and its contractors*** will be choosing locations for the impoverished third worlders new homes as they have been doing for 40 years.

Here is Breitbart’s story without some of the most important facts!  You can read it yourself, but remember…

As Biden arrived in the White House, there was effectively no longer a Trump EO to protect local citizens and states, and a big part of the blame goes to REPUBLICAN GOVERNORS who did not back the President.

Joe Biden Puts Americans in the Dark by Revoking Ability to Reject Refugee Dumping in Their Communities

Too bad Breitbart isn’t reading RRW!

 

Americans Last!

***For New Readers these are the nine federal refugee contractors who worked to put Biden and Harris in the White House and are lobbying for millions of illegal aliens to be transformed into legal voting citizens, as well as raising the refugee admissions ceiling from 15,000 this year to 125,000.

They are largely paid by you, the taxpayer, for their work of changing America by changing the people, and in so doing, are putting Americans last!

Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society Joyful over Biden Promise of 125,000 Refugees in the Coming Year

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

“We’ll do all we can to help [get to 125,000] — and to hold the administration accountable.”

(Did you get that Joe? A little threat from Melanie Nezer!)

 

I guess they aren’t too annoyed that he isn’t going to flood America with poverty at least for the next few months.  Maybe even Biden is wise enough to know that it would be a bridge-too-far for MOST Americans who are suffering due to the China virus hysterics.

Biden Says He Will Raise Refugee Ceiling “Back Up” to 125,000 as Americans Suffer Joblessness from Chinese Virus Lockdown

Biden’s promise of 125,000 is for next fiscal year (2022) which begins on October 1, 2021.  We haven’t admitted that many refugees since 1992, so Biden will be beating Barack on that score.

Prior to the Trump administration, HIAS and the other eight resettlement contractors*** resettled large numbers of Somali Muslims living in Kenya and chosen for the US by the UN.

 

However, for policy wonks who have followed the Refugee Admissions Program for over a decade, the flow will be creeping in shortly because there is a provision in the Refugee Act of 1980 which allows the Prez to change the cap during the year if he/she sees a need.

HIAS says Biden will follow the law and “consult” with Congress as he makes a case that he should begin raising Trump’s 15,000 cap right now.  Consult does not mean Congress can say no, but they won’t say no anyway.

An astute readers suggested that Biden will use the coming months to send massive amounts of federal money (your money!) out to the contractors so they can get their offices up and running to ‘welcome’ the New Americans.

During Trump’s Presidency Many Refugee Agency Affiliates Closed

 

Here is HIAS yesterday whooping it up!

Biden Administration Announcements on Refugees Are Welcome News

WASHINGTON — In the first days of the Biden administration, HIAS has been encouraged by the new president’s swift and positive actions to welcome refugees. His pledge today to raise the annual refugee admissions cap in consultation with Congress is another much-needed step toward repairing the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program and making our immigration system more humane.

HIAS’s Melanie Nezer. Gee what is that little symbol in the left hand corner of the pic?

The annual refugee admissions cap — also called the Presidential Determination, or PD — was cut during every year of the Trump administration, setting a new record low each time.

For Fiscal Year 2021, the PD stood at just 15,000. President Biden has promised to consult with Congress and raise the PD before the end of the fiscal year on Sept. 30, allowing more people in desperate need of safety to come to the United States as quickly as possible. The administration has said it will fulfill President Biden’s campaign promise to raise the PD to 125,000, its highest level in more than two decades, during FY22.

“President Biden has stated formally and in no uncertain terms that U.S. humanitarian leadership is back,” said Melanie Nezer, HIAS’ senior vice president of public affairs. “Rebuilding the resettlement system the prior administration nearly broke won’t be easy. The refugee resettlement program must bring people to safety, protect national security, and integrate people across the country, all in a contentious political environment and during a global pandemic. Despite these challenges, the president has made clear he intends to get there. We’ll do all we can to help — and to hold the administration accountable.”

More here.

*** For new readers here they are, the America Lasters who want more refugees as the ones they previously resettled are struggling in the Chinese virus lockdown (as are many low income Americans!).