St. Paul, Minnesota – Nasra and six of her eight children have been on the move, from Somalia through various parts of the Middle East, since 2007 and finally they moved to St. Paul, Minnesota in May of this year as refugees. The United States is the world's leading resettlement country for refugees; historically, the program has had bipartisan support and has been a mainstay of U.S. foreign policy. But, after the election of Donald Trump, who was saying during the campaign that he plans to suspend the Syrian refugee program and was threatening to deport those already here, numerous refugees are concerned about their future in the U.S.
One 65-year-old woman said she worries that if Trump enacts a ban on Muslim immigrants or makes changes to the refugee resettlement program, her family members awaiting resettlement approval won’t be able to join her here. She’s particularly concerned about one of her sons, stuck in Egypt, whose child is disabled, she added. His family’s application for resettlement is pending as the vetting process, which usually takes between 18 and 24 months, is still underway.
Not everyone, however, buys into the Trump hysteria. A third refugee, who used to teach Arabic in Syria, said he doesn’t believe that Trump will follow through with what he pledged during the campaign. Even if he wants to carry through on what he announced, there would be many legal obstacles. “There is Congress, there is the Supreme Court and the American people,” he said. “They will not let him do all of this.”
“There are just so much uncertainty, confusion and certainly anxiety around the future of immigrants and refugees in this country,” said Elizabeth Ross, the refugee community’s coordinator at the International Institute of Minnesota, a local resettlement group.
“Right now we’re operating under the assumption that all of our programs will continue, that the administration will not reverse such a significant commitment to refugee protection and resettlement,” said Mark Hetfield, CEO of HIAS, one of the nine national resettlement agencies.
Some refugees pointed out that Trump’s policy encouraged the rise in acts of hate and after the election a lot of Americans feel more comfortable saying hateful things.
Hasen and her six children are struggling to make the U.S. feel like their permanent home despite all of the uncertainty and Hesen said, “This is America; we have to stand up together. It’s difficult but we have to believe.”
The U.S. resettled a total of 84,995 refugees in the 2016 fiscal year, which ended in September, according to Refugee Processing Center statistics. Almost 10,000 have already been resettled since then. The Obama administration pledged to increase the number of refugees brought into the U.S. earlier this year. Up to 110,000 refugees can be offered new lives in the 2017 fiscal year, up from 70,000 in 2015 and 85,000 in 2016. What will Trump’s administration do to these numbers and quotas remains to be seen in the next year.
Photo Credits: New American Media
