Hope for pilgrims

America, especially Houston, still remains a guiding light for all seeking freedom.

To hear America’s unofficial nativist-in-chief tell it, with stentorian echoes from his Indiana running mate, we’re about to experience such an onslaught of Syrian refugees that muhammara, fettoush and shanklish will soon replace burgers and fries as America’s favorite foods. And you can say goodbye to “hello.” The Arabic “marhaban” will be our common greeting.

Those have to be likely outcomes if Hillary Clinton has her way. Or so Donald Trump and Mike Pence would have us believe. Asked during last week’s vice-presidential debate how he would deal with home-grown terrorists who have struck in San Bernardino, Orlando and elsewhere, Pence sidestepped toward a favorite Trump claim: that the Democratic presidential aspirant supports a 550 percent increase in the number of Syrian refugees allowed into this country.

To be honest, Trump is right. In a September 2015 interview with CBS News, Clinton said she believes the United States should be taking in at least 65,000 refugees from the warravaged nation. That figure would be a 550 percent increase from the Obama administration’s original goal of resettling 10,000 this fiscal year. (The Obama administration has said more recently it intends to raise its goal to 110,000.) Those numbers are shamefully small compared to the scope of the catastrophe. In addition to some 470,000 Syrians who have lost their lives, at least 11 million people have been driven from their homes by the grinding, unspeakably cruel civil war.

Think about that number, 11 million: That’s Houston emptied out nearly five times over. And of that number, we accept a hundred thousand or so. Or none, if you’re Trump and Pence.

Or if you’re Gov. Greg Abbott. He and our feckless attorney general, Ken Paxton, have fought to bolt the Texas door to every desperate Syrian supplicant. How do we know they’re not terrorists, they bleat.

Here’s how we know: Refugees go through the most stringent clearance of any immigrant entering the U.S. They’re subjected to extensive Department of Homeland Security background checks, biometric screenings, multiple in-person interviews and an investigation by the National Counterterrorism Center and the FBI’s Terrorist Screening Center. For some refugees, the process can take more than two years.

This time, the courts have pushed back. A federal appeals court ruled last week that Pence has no authority to block Syrian refugee resettlement, noting that it amounted to illegal discrimination. That decision may be why Paxton’s office moved on Friday to dismiss its appeal with the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals that also sought to block Syrian refugee resettlement.

Abbott has announced that Texas will pull out of the federal refugee resettlement program. Fortunately, the state’s withdrawal does not affect the number of refugees settled in Texas or the services provided to them. The only change is that federal agencies will lead the efforts directly.

We choose to believe that the governor’s lack of empathy and his cynical willingness to spread fear and misinformation are is not a true reflection of this great state. It certainly doesn’t reflect Houston, home to the largest number of Syrian refugees in Texas. This city, to borrow the words of a former American president, remains a magnet, a beacon, “for all who must have freedom, for all the pilgrims from all the lost places who are hurtling through the darkness, toward home.”

The stirring words are Ronald Reagan’s. Whether we claim ties to the Mayflower or arrived yesterday from a Jordanian refugee camp, the grand vision binds us all.