Asst. Sec. of State for PRM Richard doing the rounds of refugee overloaded cities, visits Portland, OR
Posted by Ann Corcoran on July 21, 2012
Update July 30th: Here is another account of Richard’s trip to Portland.
….but, haven’t seen any mention yet of her visiting Manchester, NH, have any of you?
Here she is in Portland, OR yesterday:
Refugee contractor Catholic Charities: Wahhhhhh! We want more taxpayer money!
The Assistant Secretary of State for Population, Refugees, and Migration [PRM] is in Portland today — to see how well refugees settle into their new lives in the city.
Anne Richard visited two families and met with local charities and government organizations.
Anne Holloway of Catholic Charities says Secretary Richard asked a lot of questions.
“She has already visited two other cities, trying to get a handle on the success of the U.S. Refugee program,” Holloway says. “What the local agencies are being able to do to help resettle them. How they’re faring in our school systems, with employers,all of those kinds of things.”
Holloway says the federal government could help local resettlement efforts by providing more money. She says families get eight months of financial help, but it often takes longer to assimilate into the community.
When she says they need more time to “assimilate” what that really means is that they aren’t finding jobs and need more welfare.
Here is more information for new readers on Anne Richard who came in through the revolving door from the International Rescue Committee (a major federal refugee contractor).
Awhile back I directed readers to ‘fun with numbers’, here, where you could find your state/city and see which nationalities were resettled in your town.
Below are the numbers for Oregon for FY2007-2012. You can check it out yourself by following links in that fun with numbers post, but MOST of those resettled in Oregon went to Portland. Most came after the recession began. No wonder they can’t find work! And, get out your world map! Isn’t diversity grand!
Afghanistan…..93
Albania………….1
Belarus…………27
Bhutan………..591
Burma………..979
Burundi………101
Cent. African Rep….16
China………….1
Congo………….7
Cuba…………..52
Dem. Rep. Congo…..159
Eritrea…………51
Ethiopia……….50
Georgia…………4
Iran…………….90
Iraq…………….554
Kazakhstan…….16
Kyrgyzstan…….21
Liberia…………..9
Moldova……….122
Palestine…………4
Russia……………134
Rwanda…………9
Somalia……….709
Sudan……………11
Syria…………….1
Thailand………..1
Turkmenistan….4
Uganda………….2
Ukraine…………428
Uzbekistan………62
Vietnam………….31
total……………4340 (compared to some other states and cities that is a small number, Texas had over 5000 last year alone, here)
That was fun….will do it again real soon!
6 Responses to “Asst. Sec. of State for PRM Richard doing the rounds of refugee overloaded cities, visits Portland, OR”
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El Cajon, CA officials in DC this week begging for help with refugee overload « Refugee Resettlement Watch said
[...] have 10 previous posts involving El Cajon, here. And, it sure looks like it’s time for an Anne Richard intervention! Like this:LikeBe the first to like [...]
mjazzguitar said
I definitely intend to post a comment at the OPB link you provided, but I want to be sure I have my facts straight first: Is it true that the UN decides on who is a refugee, and that their policy is to pass over Christians?
acorcoran said
The UN definitely leads the State Department to the refugees. However, they will surely deny that they pass over Christians. The State Department does keep statistics on the religions of all the refugees resettled, but they will deny it. I saw the numbers one year so I know they do keep them and it would be better all around if they actually released those stats to the public so that we would have the facts.
mjazzguitar said
Yes, of course they would never admit to that. I should have phrased the 2nd half of that question as do they appear to have a policy of excluding Christians. The reason I brought that up is because I had briefly read an article in Atlas Shrugs that makes that assertion: http://tinyurl.com/88afl2x . Since I posted that comment, I followed the link there, which led me to another link on Atlas Shrugs, which led me to- Refugee Resettlement Watch. It’s the article “The UN is ignoring Christian Iraqi refugees”, posted by judyw on October 25, 2007.
I’d really like to see those figures, because there is no denying the magnitude of the Islamic persecution of Christians.
A UN body dominated by Muslims, denying refugee status to Christians persecuted by Muslims, only perpetuates that persecution.
acorcoran said
jazz, If you have any inside track to a member of Congress you might be able to get the religion numbers. The State Department has a branch called WRAPS. I’ve written about the website before. It is where they keep all numbers I’ve been directing you to about what refugees are going to what cities. I once directed a group that was looking for those numbers on the religions of the refugees to go to their Congressman and I think they were successful.
That said, they are of course bringing in lots of Christians from places like Burma so I don’t think you will find the raw numbers so terrible. The bigger question is in places like Iraq where we know the Christians are persecuted, what do those numbers look like?
I also find it telling that contractors like the US Conf. of Catholic Bishops or the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society are ready and eager to resettle Muslims when they know their own faiths are being persecuted. But, of course, if they stood on principle and refused to bring those who might just continue the persecution here, they wouldn’t get any $$$$ from the feds, and in my cynical view that is all that its about—perpetuating jobs, offices, travel, prestige….and at the higher levels bringing in more needy people who will end up voting for more Democrats.
mjazzguitar said
Thank you, I’ll give that a try.