Iraqis were tortured, that’s why they aren’t doing well in America

So they are not fitting in real well because they have mental problems.  It’s not that we brought too many into a feeble economy with few jobs?  It’s not that they came with high expectations of streets paved with gold? It’s not that they don’t really want jobs they consider beneath them?  It’s not that some of them were thugs in Iraq?  (Unemployment among Iraqis resettled in the US is in the vicinity of 50% and 95% are on food stamps, here.)

But, their problem assimilating stems from torture.   That is what the Journal of Immigrant and Minority Health is reporting, here.

Iraqi refugees face difficulties resettling in the US, which may be partially due to high rates of torture. This study determines the rates of torture experience, primary and secondary, among Iraqi refugees in the US; and the association to physical and mental health symptoms on arrival. A retrospective review was conducted in 2011 on the post-arrival health screens of Iraqi refugees resettled in Utah in 2008 and 2009. Measures included reports of torture experience as defined by the United Nations; reports of physical and mental health symptoms at the time of screening; and association of torture to the presence of symptoms on arrival.

Does this explain the case of those Iraqi refugees who tortured and raped a woman in Colorado a while back, here?

So, it’s a good thing Obamacare is around so we taxpayers can pay for the mental health treatments needed by the poor tortured souls.

Come and get it! Free government money for “culturally appropriate” child care

Your tax dollars!

We have a sequester.  The federal government is shortly going to lay off large swaths of its workforce, including the military, yet the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) is still sending out announcements for applications for micro-enterprise grants to non-profits so they can further distribute your tax dollars to refugee ‘entrepreneurs’ who truth-be-told want to get paid to care for their own kids and a few others (of their own kind) in their own homes.  What! they can’t use existing American child care facilities?

Here is the announcement I received last week from ORR (applications are due in May):

Funding Opportunity

(Lewiston, ME) Candidates for micro-enterprise loans from the federal government—”culturally appropriate” home-based daycare for special groups of people. Photo: AP

Title: Refugee Home-Based Childcare Microenterprise Development Project

Description

The Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) within the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) is pleased to announce the availability of funds for Refugee Home-Based Child Care Microenterprise Development Projects. These projects are aimed at assisting primarily refugee women in becoming economically self sufficient by providing home-based child care services. Thus, recipients of grant awards through this announcement will teach refugee women about local, state, and federal child care laws, regulations and licensing requirements and about cultural norms [wouldn't their kids learn cultural norms more quickly in American-run day care centers?---ed] concerning child care and child care development. Also, they will assist refugee women in English language acquisition, advance educational attainment (GED) and improve economic opportunities through application of acquired job skills in a market where there is a shortage of childcare providers. Through this grant, mentors [non-profit groups--ed] will help primarily refugee women establish agreements or contracts with State or county child care offices so they may qualify for State/county childcare reimbursement as childcare service providers.

Not to be exclusionary, men can get this money too!

Although the focus will be on refugee women, all services provided to refugee women under this project are available to refugee men who are able to benefit from these services.

I told you about this “culturally appropriate” daycare in January, here, when the Office of Refugee Resettlement reported on their ‘success’ with the program, and I said this:

We trained hundreds, paid out millions of dollars and got 79 refugees off public assistance all the while assuring the kids were cared for by appropriate culturally competent caregivers.

It’s not just day care centers we are encouraging.  Micro-enterprise loans flow out of the US treasury and then through a bunch of non-profit groups and fund all sorts of businesses that then compete with existing businesses in an already stressed economy.  Go to the Annual Report to Congress for 2009 (beginning on p. 43) to just get an idea of who is getting these grants from the Office of Refugee Resettlement.  And, could someone direct me to a site where we can learn how many of these “loans” to start a businesses are repaid!

For new readers:  See my previous posts on where we can save millions of dollars by cutting out grants to non-profits involved in setting up refugees as a special class of people, here (refugee unhealthy marriage grants), here (ethnic community based groups that create division), and here (federally funded savings accounts for special people—refugees—but not for you low-income Americans!).

Iraqis still lined up in Jordan in hopes of getting to the US, and getting a job!

This week there have been a bunch of stories in which the news hook is the tenth anniversary of the US invasion of Iraq, and although we supposedly gave them a democracy and supposedly things have calmed down in Iraq—tens of thousands are still waiting in Jordan to come to your town in hopes of getting a job and finding the American dream.

Here is one such story from the Jordan Times.

Jordan took refugees from Iraq and now from Syria, but Saudi Arabia takes NO REFUGEES and nary a word is mentioned because the UN and its cabal of “human rights” agitators is scared of Saudi Arabia.

We applaud this refugee man’s wish to work, but I sure hope the IOM has him adequately informed:

While the US might be seen as the land of opportunity for many, Abu Sufyan is mindful of the various challenges awaiting him.

He is “scared of the future” in a country where he does not know many people or speak the language.

But if there is one thing he can do, it is to find employment.   [Not so much! See below---ed]

While his sponsor will help him get on his feet, Abu Sufyan says, “I will depend on myself. Of course I am going to need help in the beginning, but I will avoid asking people for help. I don’t like to sit still. I would like to get a job and feed my family.”

Perhaps Abu Sufyan’s determination was cemented after his cultural orientation organised by the International Organisation for Migration (IOM).

Daryl Morrissey, an emergency response project manager at the IOM, explained that a lot of effort has been put into designing the resettlement orientation programme, whereby participants could come to their own conclusions on what life in their new country of residence will be like.

“We try to give them a very realistic perspective. We let them know how difficult it is to get jobs; even if they have professional qualifications these may not be accepted in the US and it may take them several years to be recertified, so that means they may have to take entry-level jobs.”

Let’s have a look at his chances of finding a job—based on the 2009 Annual Report to Congress on the refugee program (the most recent summary we have since ORR has not released more recent figures).  So, if things have improved for Iraqis in the US, we don’t know it because ORR hasn’t reported since this 2009 report came out only last month.

The Annual Report (beginning on p. 113) tells us that the US unemployment rate for Iraqis is at 46%.  The average hourly wage is $8.80!    The average number of weeks worked was 25!   37% took 7-12 months to find the first job.

(BTW, isn’t the gang of eight in the US Senate telling us that we need more immigrant labor as they craft an amnesty for 11 million illegal aliens?)

89% of the surveyed Iraqis are on Medicaid or a special Refugee Medical program (also paid for with tax dollars), 86% get some sort of taxpayer-funded cash assistance, and 95% are on food stamps.

We have some sympathy for Jordan.  Surely they want to move the Iraqis out, because as we reported the other day, here, masses of Syrians are now moving in!

For ambitious readers!  We have 563 previous posts on Iraqi refugees in our special category on the subject.

Canada wants more private groups to sponsor refugees

Private charitable groups need to put their money where their mouth is!

Unlike the US where the federal taxpayer is on the hook for refugee resettlement via contractors (like the USCCB in the previous post), Canada has some private refugee resettlement.    Before the Refugee Resettlement Act of 1980 (Kennedy, Biden, Carter), US resettlement was done with PRIVATE CHARITY as well.

This article in The Star is a little confusing.  But, if I can summarize it:  the government wants more private charities to pick up the costs and resettle refugees; they say that refugees assimilate better when cared for by a private charity; the private charities say they don’t want to be told which refugees they must take and believe this is a backhanded way for the government to pawn off its responsibility to private charities.

I say this is solely the responsibility of private charity and not a responsibility of the taxpayer in Canada or the US and we should be going back to that idea—private groups take full responsibility for the financial well-being of refugee families and their assimilation into their new culture (if we are going to bring any at all!).

Here is the article from Ottawa in The Star (emphasis mine):

OTTAWA—The federal government is seeking to offload some of its international promises to refugees onto the private sector.

It’s asking community groups to sponsor 1,000 of the refugees the Canadian government has told the United Nations it will resettle over the next three years.

But at the same time, Ottawa is restricting the groups’ ability to sponsor refugees themselves by placing caps on private applications.

The decisions are raising concerns from not-for-profit groups that they are being forced to carry out the Immigration department’s objectives instead of their own.

[....]

Refugee resettlement in Canada is a shared activity between the government and about 80 groups, which have formal agreements with Ottawa to sponsor refugees.

Canada voluntarily accepts about 10 per cent of the world’s refugees. Last year, there were 7,365 government-assisted refugees and 5,585 privately sponsored ones, according to government statistics.  [The US is resettling roughly 50,000 to 75,000 annually in recent years---ed]

[....]

Between 2006 and 2011, the top five source countries for privately-sponsored refugees were Iraq, Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Somalia.  [Mostly Muslims?---ed]

Immigrants fare better when privately taken care of—hmmmm!  Where have we heard that before!  But, we will throw you some taxpayer money too (as a sweetener).

A spokesman for the Citizenship and Immigration department said the decision to ask private groups to help settle 1,000 government-assisted refugees was made because research shows refugees fare better when they are brought to Canada by private organizations.

“By providing up to six months of income support for (UN-referred) refugees supported by sponsors, we hope to help organizations new to refugee sponsorship and encourage existing civil society groups to sponsor refugees who have few or no pre-existing family or community links in Canada,” said Remi Lariviere in an e-mail.

Supposedly Canada wants  more refugees, but private groups don’t have the money (surprise!).

The department’s Lariviere said Canada is seeking to increase the number of refugees it resettles to a high of up to 14,500 refugees and other vulnerable populations by 2013.

But both Dench and Wiebe said it’s not certain that goal can be met.

Wiebe questions whether the voluntary sector has the capacity or the resources to help resettle more refugees.  [Call in the taxpayers!---ed]

[....]

But community groups pin the changes to budget cuts — they say it’s cheaper for the government to ask private groups to pick up part of the tab for their international obligations.

Bottomline—There is not enough charitable money to bring in large numbers of impoverished people because private citizens and “charitable” groups only want to sacrifice so much or contribute personally only so much as they bring in ever more culturally diverse, job seeking, and socially needy people.  There are not enough private citizens/groups putting their money where their mouth is to be responsible for the immigrants’ long term well-being, so they milk the taxpayer all-the-while claiming we critics have no heart.

VDARE publishes definitive piece on Bishops funding and asks a question?

Could the US Conference of Catholic Bishops be using federal funding for the settlement of sexual abuse cases?

It isn’t such a farfetched question.  Remember in early 2010 we posted charges by a man closely connected to the Episcopal Church who alleged that it is the federal funding for refugee resettlement that is keeping that cash-strapped church afloat.  See those posts here and here.

As I said at the time and still say today—there needs to be a regular annual financial audit (available to the public) of each of the nine major federal refugee contractors.   Their hundreds of subcontractors should also be audited (financially!) on some regular schedule.    They will tell you they are audited, but its largely a “programmatic” audit that looks at how well they are doing getting the refugees jobs or hooked up with social services.

And, here is a question that continues to perplex me especially at the Christmas season when groups like the ACLU come alive and demand that there be a separation of church and state, why are they silent on federal funding of the Catholic Church?

Here are some key points from Thomas Allen’s definitive post on funding for the US Conference of Catholic Bishops entitled, Is The Refugee Racket Helping Pay For The Catholic Church’s Child Abuse Settlements?

~2011 revenue for Migration and Refugee Services, USCCB’s refugee contracting arm: $72.1 million.

~[I]n fact USCCB independently raises only about 2% (two percent) of its $72.1 million total revenues. The rest comes from contracts, grants and earnings from federal programs.

~“Affiliate funding” does not mean voluntary donations. This is not charity. The USCCB and its Catholic Charities affiliate assist refugees only when paid by the U.S. government.

~Even volunteer time and donated items given by local community members turns into money for USCCB. It imputes a dollar value to all volunteer activity and gives the bill to the feds under the misnamed Federal Matching Grant program.

On this last point, I gotta laugh. I knew a young man who volunteered at one of the major refugee contractors here in Maryland. He received no pay (as I said he volunteered) and used his own old car (got no repayment for mileage) to be the one-man “welcoming committee” to pick up newly arriving refugees at the airport.  Often one will read about the lavish welcome refugees get upon landing in the US, not so in large numbers of cases.   Little did this young man know that his hours and his mileage were being turned into the federal government for repayment to the contractor from the US taxpayer.

Read the whole VDARE article and save it!

Oh, and one final outrage—word is that the US State Department pays for the US Conference of Catholic Bishops Washington, DC office!  And, they use your money to lobby for things like Obamacare and Amnesty for illegal aliens, here and here.

Don’t cry now for the Catholic Churches predicament with Obama.  Apparently they haven’t learned the lesson well enough yet—when you take Caesar’s money, Caesar owns you!

Norway wants to deport Palestinians back to Iraq; Iraq is safe

Before I get to this bit of news, I bet you are wondering how Palestinians came from Iraq to Norway (instead of from Gaza) in the first place.  A few years ago we wrote extensively about the subject.

As you are probably aware no one wants the Palestinians—and that means NO Muslim country wants them either.  Well, except Iraq under Saddam Hussein who invited Palestinians to live in Iraq during his regime.   So, to make a long story short, when the Sunni minority was basically overthrown with the help of the US, the Palestinians, in the minds of the Shiites, were associated with the departed Saddam Hussein.

Fearing retribution from the newly energized Shiites, a large group of Iraqi Palestinians fled to Syria but were denied entry and so a Palestinian camp was set up on the border of Iraq and Syria. Much agitation from the US refugee industry lobbyists and the UN culminated in a July 2009 national news story—the US would begin taking these Iraqi Palestinians (1350 to start)!   They were scheduled to be admitted in the numbers allotted for Iraqis so that you wouldn’t know we were bringing Palestinians to your towns.  I assume those shipments are on-going.

So, who are these “Iraqi” Palestinians in Norway that Norway wants to deport?  Who knows!   They could be from anywhere.  If they were among the “refugees” that no Muslim country wanted on the border of Syria and Iraq, they didn’t make the cut to come to the US.

Now they are camping out in Oslo with a banner that proclaims, “we don’t want to fight, we just want our right.”

Here is the story from the Women News Network:

(WNN) Oslo, NORWAY: Twenty-five Palestinian refugees who managed to escape persecution in Iraq and find their way to Norway they continue to live in harsh conditions after their asylum applications were refused. Some have deportation (‘forced relocation’) orders pending. The Norwegian immigration service based its decision with refusal of these Palestinians on a June 2012 report issued by Norway’s land information branch, stating that Iraq is now considered safe for their return.

The report quotes Mohamed Abu Bakr, charged with managing the file of the Palestinian refugees in Jordan, who said that “the living conditions for Palestinians in Iraq is now much better than it used to be back in 2003.” He added, “Palestinians today have the same citizenship rights as the Iraqis.”

Read it all.   Those Socialist countries in Scandinavia sure are having a tough time of it these days as they are overrun with Muslim immigrants.

Through much blood and treasure we gave Iraq a democratically elected government.  The country is safe now, Obama says so.  Then why is the US still taking thousands of Iraqi refugees each year?

On the stats for US resettlement!

By the way, this reminds me, up until yesterday we could readily get the statistics for arriving refugees but the feds are now blocking the average citizen from finding out who is coming, from where, and where they are being resettled into the US.   I used to at least be able to get to the statistics through the ‘Cultural Orientation Resource Center’ here.  Now they re-direct readers to WRAPSnet and that government website is now password protected (when I get a minute I’ll apply and see if they reject me!).

For some rough idea of who we are bringing to the US, you might want to go to the President’s FY2013 Report to Congress here, which backs up Obama’s refugee wishlist for the fiscal year we are now in.  (This report is not to be confused with the much more detailed ORR annual report to Congress that ORR is illegally withholding from Congress).

So, back to my question, if we gave Iraq a democratically elected government, why did we bring 9,388 Iraqis to the US in FY 2011 and 12,000 in 2012 (p. 50 of the President’s wish list for 2013.)?

While you are visiting that report, check out Page 58 where it’s noted that this program to bring on average less than 70,000 refugees to the US each year costs over ONE BILLION TAXPAYER DOLLARS!   And, that does not include all the welfare programs and education they are receiving in your city and state.

If you are wondering why I write so much about Socialist countries like Norway, Sweden and Denmark here at RRW, it’s because we can look to them to see our future.   And, it isn’t pretty!

Will we one day have Palestinians camping on the streets of Washington demanding their “rights?”

ORR: Happy New (fiscal) Year newsletter reminds me…..

Where are the annual reports to Congress?

The Office of Refugee Resettlement (in the Department of Health and Human Services) periodically sends out a newsletter with some glowing reports about the program.

Here is one item in the recent newsletter that caught my eye and reminded me to ask:  WHERE ARE THE ANNUAL REPORTS TO CONGRESS FOR ALL OF OBAMA’S YEARS IN OFFICE-–2009, 2010, 2011 (and soon they will be due 2012) required by law?

There are only two answers why this LEGAL requirement is not being fulfilled—sheer incompetence, or they are hiding something!

The last report filed by Eskinder Negash’s ORR is 2008, here.  If you are not familiar with these reports, have a look at that one.  They have to report among many things the amount of welfare refugees are receiving and their employment status.  I think the numbers are so bad, they are just not doing the report.  And, NO ONE IN CONGRESS ASKS FOR IT!

This (below) is from the newsletter.  This sure doesn’t look like 100% employment to me!

ORR is pleased to see the national voluntary agencies (volags)* reporting strong outcomes for refugee employment in the 3rd trimester of FY2012, with many affiliates achieving 100% employment for their caseloads.

As the final reports come in, here’s a sample of their successes:

World Relief:

874 clients enrolled
64% self-sufficient @ 120 days
74% self-sufficient @ 180 days

USCRI:

1811 clients enrolled
61% self-sufficient @ 120 days
75% self-sufficient @ 180 days

EMM:

1168 clients enrolled
49% self-sufficient @ 120 days
71% self-sufficient @ 180 days

For more information about ORR’s Matching Grant program, and full program statistics, please visit the Matching Grant page on the ORR website.

Now here is what you need to ask about these facts.

~ Those numbers sure don’t look like 100% to me, do they to you?

~ Where are the stats for the other federal contractors?  There are nine right now, here.  For their “sample” did they only select the best.  Of course they did!

~ No one is keeping track of refugees receiving food stamps (or probably other state-administered welfare either), so when they say self-sufficient, how do the contractors know?

***Update from a reader named ‘tomasrose’***

The volags talk about the number of “self-sufficient” refugees they have placed. You can be in public housing, receiving food stamps, medicaid, free lunches, cell phones plus CASH from SSI and be considered officially “self-sufficient”. The only program that makes you not “self-sufficient” is TANF [Temporary Assistance for Needy Families---ed]

~ How do we know that the contractors don’t just get refugees a little job just in time for the contractor to report that their refugees are working?  That is one of their tricks—get the refugee doing anything to collect a pay check even for a very short time.

* New readers, it’s very funny that they call these federal refugee contractors VOLAGS (short for Voluntary Agency).  They are contractors receiving in some cases over 90% of their funding from you—the taxpayer.  They would like you to think that this was all some sort of private charity, but it isn’t!

Refugees used as props again in Thanksgiving puff-piece stories

A few years back some of us heard that the federal refugee contractors were urged to use Thanksgiving as a time to get fluffy media stories out about how the refugees are just like the original Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth Rock.  No they aren’t.

And, before critics say I’m being too cynical, this isn’t about the individual human beings enjoying a feast, I’m cynical because the contractors who want to stay in business use them for media stunts.   Catholic Charities, a contractor, could quietly hold a dinner like this one in Jacksonville, Florida without the press, right?

And, one important thing the Pilgrims (or generations of immigrants that would follow) didn’t have  is the social safety net paid for by you—-food stamps, subsidized housing, job training, language lessons, education, medical care etc.  They had to make it or die.   Later many immigrants returned to their home countries if they couldn’t make it in America.

So, when people say we are a Nation of immigrants—the immigrants were different from today’s, they were largely European and Christian and they had to make it on their own.    We can’t have mass immigration and a socialist welfare nation, eventually we run out of other peoples’ money!
 

Here is the story from Jacksonville, but know it’s like many that have crossed my desk in the last few days from around the country.

Food is the universal tie that binds.

Refugees from Burma, Bhutan, Colombia, Cuba, Iraq and Sudan are not necessarily familiar with the concept of sweet potato pie with marshmallows on top. But they enjoyed it just the same at the Thanksgiving feast held for them Tuesday by Catholic Charities of the Diocese of St. Augustine, which runs a resettlement program to help such new arrivals acclimate, learn the language and find jobs.

[.....]

The guests of honor at the feast, held at Jacksonville’s Immaculate Conception Catholic Church, were 60 or so refugees. Most have been in the United States six months or less. In addition to sampling a variety of food from a long table filled with holiday delicacies, they played get-to-know-you games and learned about the origins of the holiday, with the help of translators.

“In many ways refugees from around the world who come to America today reflect the story of the original pilgrims that landed at Plymouth Rock,” Karolak said. “They are fleeing persecution themselves and seek a life of freedom and safety in our country.”

[.....]

The United States offers protection to thousands of refugees each year through the program, which resettles them in collaboration with rights groups and faith-based organizations such as Catholic Charities. Before coming to America, refugees must demonstrate a well-founded fear of persecution in their homelands, according to Catholic Charities.

Florida Catholic Charities rolling in federal tax dollars!  This isn’t private charity!

I just checked USA Spending.gov and see that Catholic Charities in Florida directly benefits from US taxpayer ‘generosity’ to the tune of $17,405,034 in recent years.  This figure does not include what is surely coming through the refugee funds that are laundered through the US Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Florida readers might want to check out the Refugee Services Department for the State of Florida here.  They say $80 million came in from the feds to support 62 projects in Florida.

And, cool, they have a handy statistics page for you too—here.  You can even see what “services (welfare)” are being provided and to how many in each county!

Earlier this year we posted on the Archbishop of Miami insisting on more refugees for Florida, here.

By the way, I see a lot of readers recently are searching for information on how many refugees are coming to their state (or city).  Use the WRAPS stats here.   There are several data bases, but I find the one titled, ‘Destination city, by nationality by FY’ or the similarly titled one …by CY’ very useful.   If you visit you’ll see that St. Augustine is not listed as a destination city, but Jacksonville is.

From 2007 to 2012 Jacksonville received 4,363 people in need of services and jobs.

Others may have come to Jacksonville as secondary migrants.

‘Secondary migrants’ in refugee industry lingo are refugees who were resettled in one city and have since migrated elsewhere.  They are pretty much free to leave their resettlement city as early as 3 months after arrival (in many cases) and no one tracks where they go.

Germany: Asylum seekers continue to “camp out” at Brandenburg Gate

We first reported the story here last month.

Now, it’s getting cold and they are still there demanding ‘stuff’ from Germans who aren’t giving them a large enough allowance they say.

From Deutsche Welle:

Frustrated at their treatment at the hands of the German authorities, a group of asylum seekers is protesting in Berlin. They have now been camping for nearly a month in front of the Brandenburg Gate.

Asylum-seekers in Germany are entitled to a 134 euros (around $170 USD) allowance per month. [In addition to shelter and food---ed].  They say this isn’t enough. Normally, they are not allowed to leave their refugee accommodation either.

We then learn about Mirsai, an asylum seeker from Afghanistan, who doesn’t bother staying in Afghanistan to help fix his own country.  Heck we have Americans dying there to help fix “his” country so why can’t he stay?

When Mirsai first arrived in Germany, he landed at Munich airport. Carrying a fake passport, and was immediately arrested by police.

“Well, I knew it was a risk, it was a big risk. And I knew what would happen,” he told DW. “But I had to do it because I had to save my life and that’s why I tried.”

He came to Germany expecting to learn the language, go to school, and find a job. Instead, he was packed into a home with other asylum-seekers. His allowance is barely enough to get by on. His German is still rudimentary and authorities don’t pay for lessons.

Mirsai went on a week-long hunger strike before setting off to Berlin. He had to be tube fed at a hospital. When he got to Berlin he went on hunger strike again.

I wonder how much his hospital stay cost the German taxpayer?