Biden to raise Trump-era refugee cap after outcry

WASHINGTON – The White House said Friday that President Joe Biden plans to increase the number of refugees allowed to resettle in the USA next month after facing outcry over a decision to keep a Trump-era cap in place.

The administration had said earlier Biden would sign an emergency determination that would maintain the fiscal year’s target of 15,000 refugee admissions – a historically low number set under President Donald Trump. The move, a reversal of his promise to lift the cap to 62,500, prompted blowback from Democratic allies and advocacy groups.

The order lifted refugee admission restrictions on regions blocked by the Trump administration, including Africa and the Middle East, and said the president would consult with Congress “should we need to increase the number of admissions to further address the unforeseen emergency situation.”

Hours later, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said the president consulted with his advisers to determine the number of refugees that could “realistically be admitted to the United States” through Oct. 1, the end of the fiscal year.

“Given the decimated refugee admissions program we inherited, and burdens on the Office of Refugee Resettlement, his initial goal of 62,500 seems unlikely,” she said in a statement.

Psaki said Biden was urged to reverse his predecessor’s ban on refugees from certain regions.

“With that done, we expect the president to set a final, increased refugee cap for the remainder of this fiscal year by May 15,” she said.

In February, Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced the United States would allow 62,500 refugees to resettle, saying the move was “justified by grave humanitarian concerns.”

Rep. Ilham Omar, D-Minn., called Biden’s decision to keep the Trump-era cap “shameful.”

“As a refugee, I know finding a home is a matter of life or death for children around the world,” tweeted Omar, a refugee whose family fled Somalia’s civil war in the 1990s.

Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., called the decision “unacceptable and unconscionable” and said Biden “has broken his promise to restore our humanity.”

“We cannot turn our backs on refugees around the world, including hundreds of refugees who have already been cleared for resettlement, have sold their belongings, and are ready to board flights,” she said in a statement.

There were more than 25 million refugees across the globe as of mid-2020, according to the United Nations Refugee Agency.

The administration is struggling to manage an influx of migrants showing up at the U.S. southern border.

Although the refugee resettlement program is separate from border issues, Psaki said “it is a factor.”

The Office of Refugee Resettlement “has personnel working on both issues, and so we have to ensure that there is capacity and ability to manage both,” she said.

“It took us some time to see and evaluate how ineffective, or how trashed in some ways, the refugee processing system had become, and so we had to rebuild some of those muscles and put it back in place,” Psaki said.

As of March 31, the United States had admitted 2,050 refugees under the Trump administration’s 15,000 cap, according to the most recent data from the Refugee Processing Center.

Democrats in Congress pressed Biden to formalize the 62,500 refugee cap.

“We must keep our promises to people who have fled unthinkably brutal conditions in their home countries and live up to our ambition to provide them a safe haven to re-start their lives,” more than 40 House Democrats wrote to Biden.

Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, noted that Trump’s 15,000 limit is the lowest refugee admissions cap since the inception of the refugee resettlement program 40 years ago.

He said the Biden administration’s delay in issuing its revised refugee cap “has not only stymied the number of refugees permitted entrance into the United States but also it has prevented the Department of State from admitting vetted refugees currently waiting in the system who do not fit into the unprecedentedly narrow refugee categories designated by the Trump administration.”

Melanie Nezer, a spokeswoman for refugee resettlement organization HIAS, said the clarification doesn’t explain waiting two months to lift restrictive regional allocations, which resulted in flight cancellations and stranding refugees waiting to be resettled.

“To now wait two months, lose those two months, and then have the result be we’re not increasing admissions, it’s almost worse than had he just come out of the gate and said it. Because we lost two months of refugee admissions,” she said. “These are individual human beings, they’re not numbers.”

She said Psaki’s statement didn’t address why the administration linked the decision to the border.

“We’ve resettled refugees in times where there’s been a lot of asylum seekers at the border and when there’s been fewer asylum seekers,” she said.

Refugees and asylum seekers must show they have been persecuted in their home country or have a fear of persecution on account of their race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group or political opinion.

“We expect the president to set a final, increased refugee cap for the remainder of this fiscal year by May 15.” Jen Psaki White House press secretary