Tag: Syrian refugees

President to decide on refugee quota for FY2016 NOW! Will Congress lift a finger to protect America?

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

It is September and as we speak, the Obama Administration (US State Department) is putting its final touches on their annual Determination Letter and accompanying report to Congress.

Obama shushing
Don’t tell Congress and let’s slip this by them again—maybe this time with 65,000 Syrians!

The new fiscal year begins on October 1 and by the 30th of this month Obama will send to Congress for “consultation” a document which states how many refugees and from what regions of the world we will be “welcoming” refugees to America.
This so-called “consultation” with Congress is a legal requirement. However, it is common knowledge that the House and Senate Committees responsible for analyzing this information have in the past been silent.
In fact, Ken Tota (who recently served as the interim director of the Office of Refugee Resettlement) was overheard saying that “in his entire almost 30-year career, Congress has never questioned the numbers.”
State Department scoping meetings
For our many new readers, this year there was no US State Department hearing on the “size and scope” of the refugee program (or, LOL! they kept it very secret!).  We can only assume that was because in the three previous years they heard testimony that they didn’t like from citizens that were concerned about the program.  Here is one post of dozens on the topic.  Readers of RRW had flooded the State Department with negative testimony about the program.  In fact, we testified that there should be a moratorium on the program.  See my 2014 testimony here.
I mention this because the Presidential Determination being prepared now is the culmination of the annual process that began with those late spring ‘hearings’ (and again there was no public opportunity to comment this year that we were aware of).
Also, regular readers know that we have been discussing, and attempting to obtain, R & P abstracts the subcontractors located around the country prepare for Washington—those are part of the process as well. Just as taxpaying citizens had no opportunity to testify to the State Department this year, taxpaying citizens have no input in the abstract preparation process either.
Presumably one final check in the system to protect America is the “consultation” with Congress in September of each year.

However, if this year is like all others, our elected representatives in Washington will not lift a finger to question the size and scope of this year’s proposed refugee quota!

And, this could be the year that plans to resettle tens of thousands of Syrians will be announced!
Click here for last year’s Presidential Determination, and here for the lengthy report which was sent to Congress on September 18th last year.  The report begins:

This Proposed Refugee Admissions for Fiscal Year 2015: Report to the Congress is submitted in compliance with Sections 207(d)(1) and (e) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA). The Act requires that before the start of the fiscal year and, to the extent possible, at least two weeks prior to consultations on refugee admissions, members of the Committees on the Judiciary of the Senate and the House of Representatives be provided with the following information….

Note that the report goes to the House and Senate Judiciary Committees.  Chairmen of the full committees are Bob Goodlatte and Chuck Grassley respectively.  Subcommittee Chairmen responsible for Refugee Resettlement are Trey Gowdy and Jeff Sessions.
Will those chairmen help protect America this year by holding hearings when the Presidential Determination for FY2016 arrives on the Hill which by law should be in about two weeks!  Or, will they (yet again!) simply rubber stamp what Obama wants?

US Ambassador: 17,000 Syrians in pipeline to America

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

If you are getting confused about just how many Syrians you will be expected to ‘welcome’ to your towns and cities, that is probably the Administration’s plan—to confuse you.
Just recently we heard the number 8,000 bandied-about for next year.  We know the refugee resettlement contractors want 65,000!  And, as a wise observer recently noted, they may be throwing the 65,000 number out as a ‘head fake’ so that you will give a sigh of relief over the comparatively smaller 8,000-17,000.

UNHCR camp
The vast majority of Syrian refugees who will be admitted to the US are in UN camps which house mostly Sunni Muslims. As of early July, 94% of all Syrians entering the US as refugees were Muslims. https://refugeeresettlementwatch.org/2015/07/09/update-us-syrian-refugee-resettlement-numbers-pass-the-1000-mark-disbursed-to-36-states-94-are-muslims/

Here is CNS News.  Did you know that resettling refugees was involved in Obama’s plan to defeat ISIS (huh?):

(CNSNews.com) – U.S. Ambassador Brett McGurk said that 17,000 Syrian refugees have applied to enter the U.S. and that the nation will likely take in “more” of them next year.

“We took in about 1,500 last year. We think we’ll take in more next year,” McGurk, who serves as the deputy special presidential envoy for the Global Coalition to Counter ISIL, said Sunday on Meet the Press with Chuck Todd.

McGurk’s comments came in response to Todd’s question about whether the U.S. would increase the number of refugees it takes in from Syria.

“The United States takes in more refugees than any country around the world. We took in about 70,000 refugees last year, 20,000 asylum seekers. We have about 17,000 Syrian refugee applicants now to come into the U.S.,” he said.

“We took in about 1,500 last year. We think we’ll take in more next year,” he said.

 McGurk went on to discuss the refugee issue as part of a broader effort to counter the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

Warning!

In just a few weeks, by the end of September, the Obama Administration will be sending its FY2016 Presidential Determination Letter to Congress for “consultation” (I understand that in the past the pertinent committees simply rubber stamp the President’s refugee admissions plan). They will send it to Congress around Sept. 30th since FY2016 begins on October 1.   I am very concerned that instead of the usual 70,000 refugees the Obama Administration has been bringing in each year, that they will dramatically increase the number for 2016 to accommodate an extremely large number of Syrians that the United Nations wants us to take (even 8,000 will be a large number!).
The reason I suspect a rat is that it has been very very quiet ever since the Jihad Caucus wrote to Obama to demand the admission of tens of thousands of Syrians.   I’m guessing Obama/Kerry told them to hush-up for now because something is in the works!  
Watch for it!
We will be watching to see if any Member of Congress or US Senator has the spine to speak up if Obama does what we fear he will do!

Twin Falls, ID: Article tells us why you must demand answers BEFORE refugees begin arriving

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

….of course the trick will be trying to figure that out!
Twin Falls, Idaho has developed a very active and competent ‘Pocket of Resistance’ in spite of the local media’s effort to denigrate opponents of the UN/US State Department plan to further seed the community with third world refugees.  This round of controversy began in earnest back in April when the local resettlement contractor bragged to the media that Syrian (mostly Muslim) refugees were coming to Idaho.

Jessica Lilley
Jessica Lilley, USCRI field representative, obviously traveled to Twin Falls from USCRI’s Arlington, Virginia headquarters to help organize against the growing ‘pocket of resistance’ that has developed in Twin Falls. Photo: https://www.linkedin.com/pub/jessica-lilley/15/308/3b0

You will have to read the whole article from Friday, here at MagicValley.com for details on the latest news.  I can’t post much of it or the editor will have his lawyers send me another letter, but there is one important thing I want you to see.
First, here are the opening paragraphs:

TWIN FALLS • A refugee center in Twin Falls isn’t likely to go away even if the College of Southern Idaho stops sponsoring its program, officials say.

A local group — the Committee to End the CSI Refugee Center — wants a measure to shutter the center on ballots by May, says the group’s leader, Rick Martin, a widely known right-wing activist [LOL! bias alert!—ed]. They also want to recruit candidates to run for the college’s board of trustees in November 2016 with the goal of phasing out the center.

The group submitted its measure this week to the Twin Falls County Attorney, a preliminary step before the group can begin gathering signatures to get it on the ballot.

Then this!  Once they get a program up and running in your town, it becomes almost impossible to shutter it later because they are in the process of admitting family members of the first group they brought in.  The contractors are usually gleeful to shove that bit of news into critics faces.

Jessica Lilley, a program officer with the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants [USCRI—ed], addressed the topic Tuesday during a meeting with the Magic Valley Refugee Advocates, a group formed this summer to support the local program.

“You already have a community of refugees here” with family members still oversees, she said, and the U.S. Department of State will want an agency in Twin Falls to fill the gap as the relatives of refugees resettle in the United States.

She goes on to threaten that they will just drop them off in neighboring towns, but they will end up in Twin Falls anyway.
Continue reading here.

This is why any of you wondering if you might be a target for refugee resettlement need to do your sleuthing and demand a public discussion of the plan coming from Washington BEFORE refugees arrive.

Remember you have a right to know what the UN/US State Department has in the works for your community and they will not be giving your town any advance warning!  It will be up to you to expose the plan.

How might you learn that refugees are (secretly!) destined for your town or city?
First, go here and see if you are located anywhere near the 190 resettlement offices.  If you are anywhere within a hundred miles of one of the government contractor offices, your town is fair game.
If you know anyone in local elected government, call them now and ask if they have heard any news about refugees coming (the feds are getting desperate for fresh territory!).  By law, the resettlement contractor is supposed to “consult” local elected officials, but it might be the most cursory of contacts.
Then you need to check with two local agencies—the health department and the school system—the first two places, especially right now as schools open, where some local official might have the inside scoop.
Another tip-off might be the soon-to-be open new industry, such as a meat packing plant, which wants to employ cheap immigrant laborers.  Federal contractors like USCRI work closely with not just manufacturing type industries or the food industry, but with the hotel industry as well.  They like to give the impression that this is all about ‘humanitarianism,’ but it isn’t.  That is just the cover! Frankly it is ALL ABOUT THE MONEY and about changing America demographically.
For background on Twin Falls, go here.  And, to contact Mr. Martin, see the website, Magic Valley Refugee Watch, here.
For more on USCRI….
See USCRI’s website here.  The organization is headed by Lavinia Limon who was Bill Clinton’s Director of the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement.  Limon is one of several contractors who have moved in and out of government over their careers resettling refugees.  If you want to know more about her, click here, for our Limon archive.  One of my favorite Limon posts is this one from 2008 when the US State Department did shutter the USCRI subcontractor office in Waterbury, CT for not taking good care of the refugees they had been paid to take care of!

Merkel has gone mad!

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Invasion of Europe news….

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has announced that any Syrian who gets to Germany can apply for asylum there.  Of course this is going to be great news for Italy and Greece in particular which are now bearing the greatest burden in the invasion by mostly Middle Easterners and Africans.
Gee, Germany might someday be called the New Syria!

Angela Merkel Austerity Europe Germany
Angela Merkel invites all Syrians to come on in!

This brief article at Time magazine reminds us that the present EU rule on asylum is that those who claim to be persecuted must apply for asylum in the first country they reach on the continent.  They are not permitted to “asylum shop” for a better country, but of course they already are and that is what the pile-up is at Calais.   Those migrants don’t want to apply to stay in France they want to get to the UK where they see they have better prospects for social services.
Merkel is reportedly getting love letters from Syrians.  I fear that Obama will get jealous and want some for himself, love that is.  So watch for it—-65,000 Syrians by the end of his term in office?  See Obama praising Merkel, here.
Here is Time:

The new rule comes as Germany is witnessing a surge in attacks on refugee shelters.

In a move that will affect tens of thousands, Germany will now allow Syrian refugees to stay and apply for asylum instead of deporting them back to their country of arrival.

The Washington Post reports the country has decided to suspend a European Union rule, called the the Dublin Regulation, which says refugees are supposed to stay in the first European country of arrival until their asylum claims are processed. This rule places an unequal burden on Southern European countries like Greece and Italy, which are amongst the easiest to reach by boat from across the Mediterranean. Both Italy and Greece have faced unprecedented levels of migrant inflow this past year.

Under the new policy, even if the refugees first arrive in Greece or Italy but travel northwards to Germany, they will not be deported back to their first country of contact.

Can you hear the sound of marching feet toward the German border?  Italy and Greece will likely soon be sending busloads northward!
Our complete ‘Invasion of Europe’ archive is here.
Related update:  The Irish government apparently has some good sense and Merkel doesn’t like it!

Obama praises Merkel on Germany's 'welcome' to Syrians….

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

…..and in so doing casts the US (not Obama, but the Republicans!) as mean-spirited, unwelcoming obstructionists.

obama_merkel-kiss
Yuk!

It is fascinating to me that once again Obama is not the target of the criticism.  When the George W. Bush Administration was wisely not moving quickly enough (security concerns!) for the humanitarian industrial complex agitators pushing to resettle Iraqi refugees, it was all about that bad George Bush.
Now that it is Obama’s own Dept. of Homeland Security which says it can’t properly screen Syrians, it isn’t Obama’s fault, it’s the Republicans in Congress that are the meanies.
I hate to say it, but Obama has the legal authority to immediately open the flood gates and Congress can’t do much about it (nor do I think the Republican leadership has the will to do anything).

Invasion of Europe news…….

Here is Deutsche Welle on Obama’s praise for German Chancellor Angela Merkel:

Barack Obama publicly lauded German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s European leadership role in the Syrian refugee crisis. But the US president’s praise also draws attention to his own country’s meager record on the issue.

It does not happen every day that the White House puts out a statement explicitly praising a foreign leader for his or her actions on a certain issue. By doing so and by singling out Berlin’s decision to suspend the so called Dublin rules to allow more Syrian refugees to come to Germany, President Obama was providing crucial support for the chancellor, who has faced criticism at home for being too slow to act.

“I think the US is trying to put their political weight behind that leadership that she is showing,” said Elizabeth Collett, director of the Migration Policy Institute Europe.

Obama’s presidential praise came on Wednesday. Hours earlier, Chancellor Merkel was booed by far-right protesters during a visit to a refugee center in a German town at the center of a recent wave of anti-foreigner violence.

Is Obama starting a conversation back home?

Despite all those efforts and notwithstanding the political and security obstacles Obama is facing, said Betts, the administration’s reaction to the Syrian refugee crisis could have been much stronger than it has been. And in that way, he added, Obama’s remarks regarding Merkel were perhaps also intended as a conversation starter back home.

“Conferring praise on Germany is making a domestic political statement on the need for the US to do more.”

Much more here.

Get ready!

I think Obama will do something dramatic in his last year in the White House.  Will it be to open the flood gates to 65,000 Syrians?  In order to head this off, the subject of Syrian resettlement to the US must become a topic of conversation in the 2016 Presidential election contest—before Obama moves on it!  For those of you in early primary states being treated to many visits from candidates, please bring up the issue of refugee resettlement!
See our complete ‘Invasion of Europe’ news archive here.  Go here for many posts on Germany’s migrant crisis.