Legal Briefs on Immigration Reform from 25 of the Top Legal Minds in the Country

by Jason Dzubow

I am pleased to let you know about a new book, Legal Briefs on Immigration Reform from 25 of the Top Legal Minds in the Country.  For the book, editors Deborah Robinson and Mona Parsa asked 25 of The Top Legal Minds in the Country this question:  If you were called upon by the President of the United States to recommend a piece of immigration legislation that could pass the legal test of the U.S. Constitution and both houses of Congress, what would it include?   This book is their answer.

I am also pleased to let you know that your humble blogger is one of the “Legal Minds.”  In fact, I am the number one legal mind!  The contributors are:

Jason A. Dzubow, Esq.
Gary E. Endelman, Esq., Ph.D.
Michael Fix, Esq.,
Austin T. Fragomen, Esq.
Chris E. Gafner, Esq.
Regina Germain, Esq.
Bill Ong Hing, Esq.
Mark Krikorian
Ira J. Kurzban, Esq.
Heather Mac Donald, Esq.
Daniel J. McNeil, Esq.
Cyrus D. Mehta, Esq.
Victoria F. Neilson, Esq.
Nancy A. Noonan, Esq.
Julie A. Pace, Esq.
Renée M. Saucedo, Esq.
David A. Selden, Esq.
Patrick Shen, Esq.
Gregory Siskind, Esq.
Rita Sostrin, Esq.
Nicomedes E. Suriel, Esq.
Carol M. Swain, Ph.D., M.L.S.
Jennifer Van Hook, Ph.D.
Michael Wildes, Esq.
Stephen Yale-Loehr, Esq.

Now, some nattering nabobs might point out that the list of legal minds is alphabetical, and my name happens to be first because it comes earliest in the alphabet.  Don’t believe it!  As far as I can tell, I am numero uno (take that Kurzban, with your obnoxious “K” and Germain with your sad little “G”!).   

The book actually looks to be a great resource for people interested in immigration reform.  I have not yet read the contributions by other authors, but they seem intriguing.  Here are some that caught my eye:  Regina Germain writes about Restoring Dignity to the Asylum Process; Victoria Neilson writes about immigration and LGBT issues, which happens to be a very timely topic; and Michael Wildes, a former mayor, writes about the effects of immigration on our economy.  Other authors write about the current effort to repeal birthright citizenship, and the book includes at least a few authors who are generally considered anti-immigration, such as Mark Krikorian from the Center for Immigration Studies.

All in all, it looks to be a valuable source of information for policy makers and others interested in immigration issues.  To learn more, and to buy the book, visit the website.

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Fifty Million Environmental Refugees by 2020

by Jason Dzubow

A recent article in the Huffington Post reports on last week’s annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the world’s largest general scientific society.  Experts at the meeting warned that, “In 2020, the UN has projected that we will have 50 million environmental refugees.”

At least some people are benefitting from global warming.

“When people are not living in sustainable conditions, they migrate,” stated University of California, Los Angeles professor Cristina Tirado at the AAAS meeting.  She and other speakers outlined how climate change is impacting both food security and food safety.  Southern Europe is already seeing a sharp increase in what has long been a slow but steady flow of migrants from Africa.

Of course, asylum is not available to people who fear return to their country on account of environmental disaster.  In the U.S., we have provided Temporary Protected Status (“TPS”) to people from certain countries that have faced natural disasters.  Most recently, after the January 2010 earthquake in Haiti, Haitians in the United States were granted TPS so that they could remain in the United States until conditions improve.

If predictions are accurate, and more people migrate to escape the impact of global warming, the current system of asylum, refugee resettlement, and TPS may prove inadequate.  Long term environmental change may make it necessary for millions of people to migrate, and impossible for them ever to return home.  If the migrations predicted at the AAAS meeting actually materialize, the U.S. and other developed countries–which are presumably more able to deal with the effects of climate change–will need to re-think how they deal with such large numbers of refugees. 

In this case, it seems to me that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.  The question is: Do our governments have the political will to do something about the problem?  Let’s hope so.     

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Federal Government Provides Grants to Help Refugee Children

by Jason Dzubow

The Office of Refugee Resettlement (“ORR”) at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services provides grant money to support local school systems that are impacted by significant numbers of newly arrived refugee children.  Last year, ORR provided about $15 million in grants. 

Children everywhere are celebrating the ORR grants.

The ORR Program “target[s] school-age refugees between the ages of five (5) and 18 years of age with program activities that include English as a Second Language instruction, after-school tutorials, programs that encourage high school completion and full participation in school activities, after-school and/or summer clubs and activities, parental involvement programs, bilingual/bicultural counselors, interpreter services and other services.”

The San Jose Mercury News reports that about $890,000 in grants were awarded to school districts in California.  The money went to districts that received more than 300 refugee school-age children during the past three fiscal years.  “We are excited to announce these awards,” said state Department of Social Services Director John Wagner.  “These funds will allow our local partners to provide needed supplemental educational services to refugee students.”

From the information I could gather (in a very difficult to understand chart from ORR), it appears that the program has assisted over 69,000 refugee children from FY 2007 to FY 2009. 

It’s unclear whether the cuts in the upcoming budget will affect the ORR grant program.  Hopefully not, as refugee children are some of the most vulnerable people in our community, and the federal money for helping them integrate will likely yield long term benefits for them and for our country.

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Think You Can Do Better Than USCIS – Let Them Know!

by Jason Dzubow

The Refugee, Asylum, and International Operations (RAIO) Directorate will hold a stakeholders meeting on March 2, 2011 at 2:00 PM (EST) in Washington, DC.  The purpose of the meeting is

to discuss changes to the organizational structure of the Directorate. RAIO aims to strengthen cohesion between its three divisions by developing directorate-level functions that will allow for more integrated planning, guidance, and management of knowledge assets. During the session, USCIS will provide an overview of the organizational changes and plans for the transition as well as address questions and concerns from stakeholders.

RAIO is the office responsible for overseeing, planning, and implementing policies and activities related to asylum and refugee issues as well as immigration services overseas.  It is made up of three divisions: (1) The Refugee Affairs Division, which is a principal partner in the United States Refugee Admissions Program, and is responsible for providing the humanitarian benefit of refugee resettlement to applicants in need of protection throughout the world while diligently protecting the U.S. homeland; (2) The Asylum Division, which manages the U.S. affirmative asylum process; and (3) The International Operations Division, which has 29 international field offices around the world and serves as the face of USCIS overseas.  The international offices play a critical role in extending immigration benefits to eligible individuals and exercising vigilance in matters of fraud detection and national security.

For more information or to sign up to attend the meeting (in person or by phone), click here.

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Must Attorneys Always Ask Their Clients About FGM?

by Jason Dzubow

In a strongly-worded dissenting opinion, Judge Harry Pregerson of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit Court wrote that an immigration attorney provided ineffective assistance of counsel for failing to ask her client about whether the client had been subject to female genital mutilation (“FGM”).

In Teclezghi v. Holder, Nos. 07-70661 & 07-71463 (9th Cir. Jan. 4, 2011), Judge Pregerson writes:

An attorney representing an asylum seeker has a duty to investigate all grounds upon which an applicant may be entitled to relief… [and must] inquire as to whether her female client has suffered female genital mutilation when (1) nearly 90 percent of women in the client’s home country endure such a brutal procedure, and (2) it is well-settled that female genital mutilation constitutes persecution sufficient to warrant a grant of asylum.

The Judge concludes by rejecting the majority’s reasoning that an attorney should not be required to inquire about something as personal as FGM:

The panel majority fails to recognize that most political asylum applications are intensely personal, often painful, and may involve questions of sexual torture, rape, and humiliation. It is entirely expected that clients may not want to readily reveal such circumstances to their attorneys. It is precisely because the subject matter of an asylum claim based on female genital mutilation is so intensely personal and our immigration system so complex that an attorney has a special responsibility to adequately explain to her female clients their rights to asylum and diligently investigate all grounds for relief. The panel majority’s decision allowing attorneys to forego investigating intensely personal facts in an asylum claim diminishes the attorney’s role in the asylum process. Our precedent tells us that competent attorney performance requires more. I believe that our court should instill a greater sense of professional responsibility in attorneys who represent asylum seekers.

It’s a powerful argument–and a cautionary tale for those of us who represent women from countries where FGM is widespread.  If Judge Pregerson’s position were adopted, attorneys would be required to ask about FGM not just in asylum cases, but also for clients seeking other forms of relief.  And we would–I suppose–be required to file FGM-based asylum applications for all clients who have been victims of the practice.  I have mixed feelings about this.

An anti-FGM poster in Kenya.

One problem is that it takes considerable time to develop an asylum case; particularly a case based on FGM.  For private attorneys, we would need to charge money for this time.  For non-profit attorneys, more time on one case means taking fewer cases overall.  Thus, fewer asylum seekers would be represented. 

Another problem is that adding an additional claim for relief may weaken the overall case.  It’s a question of strategy, but generally, if I have a strong basis for relief, I would rather not include a second, weaker claim for relief.  The weaker application tends to distract from the stronger, and increase the odds that both applications will fail.  Under the regime outlined by Judge Pregerson, I might feel obliged to include the FGM claim, even if I felt it would distract from the main focus of the case (if only for CYA–cover your ass–purposes).

On the other hand, if asylum might be available to a client based on FGM, the lawyer has a duty to at least explore that option.  I think it goes too far to label an attorney “ineffective” for failing to file an FGM asylum claim, especially where the attorney determines that such a claim is not the best strategy for the case.  However, where the attorney fails to ask about FGM when the client hales from a country where that practice is prevalent, there is a good argument that the attorney has provided ineffective assistance of counsel.

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FAIR Gets It Wrong

by Jason Dzubow

The Federation for American Immigration Reform recently issued a report called Refugee and Asylum Policy Reform.  I already blogged about flaws in the report’s methodology and some points in the report I agree with.  For today, I want to discuss some points that I disagree with (i.e., where FAIR got it wrong).

The Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS)

The FAIR report basically attacks HIAS:

I wonder if this refugee family - reunited with help from HIAS - thinks the organization has outlived its purpose.

A prime example of a refugee resettlement organization whose raison d’etre has become self-perpetuation is the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS). The venerable organization that has helped Jews fleeing pogroms, the Holocaust and, more recently, oppression in the Soviet Union, has been confronted with a situation that might otherwise be considered a positive development: There [are] remarkably few Jewish refugees in need of resettlement. Without a real mission, HIAS has resorted to inventing one rather than declaring its mission accomplished and closing its doors. By its own admission, only a small percentage of the people resettled by HIAS are the people whom the organization ostensibly exists to serve.

This statement is pretty ridiculous.  Today, there are over 14 million refugees in the world.  HIAS was created to help Jewish refugees.  Now that (thankfully) there are few Jewish refugees, HIAS uses its expertise to assist other people in need.  To anyone concerned about helping others, this seems like a no-brainer.  Apparently, though, FAIR doesn’t get it. 

Particular Social Group

FAIR complains that the definition of “particular social group” has been expanded too far.  Specifically, the report mentions homosexuals, and argues that most cases of persecution based on sexual orientation involve persecution by private individuals where the government cannot or will not protect the individual from harm.  FAIR objects to this in principle:

In essence, decisions of this type put the United States in the position of a safety valve whenever foreign governments fail to exercise their responsibilities to protect their own citizens. That may be a noble objective, but it is an unreasonable burden.

First, while some cases of persecution of gays involve non-state actors, a number of countries persecute homosexuals, including Iran and Saudi Arabia, where the “offense” of homosexuality is punishable by death.  Second, protecting individuals who face harm or death is not an “unreasonable burden” (when is saving someone’s life ever really an unreasonable burden?).  There are no statistics about the number of people granted asylum based on “particular social group,” but my guess is that only a small percentage of asylum seekers fear persecution on account of their particular social group.  So even if we are concerned with the number of people winning asylum based on this protected ground, that number is fairly small.  Finally, the asylum law does not require state action–people who face persecution from non-state actors are eligible for asylum if their government cannot or will not protect them.  To the person who is persecuted or killed, it may not matter much whether he is killed due to government action or government inaction.  Dead, as they say, is dead.

Asylum Should Be Temporary

FAIR also believes that a grant of asylum should generally be temporary:

Asylum protection should be temporary, maintaining the focus of the individual on the need to return to the home country to work for positive change.

By this logic, we should have sent Einstein back to Nazi Germany to work for “positive change.”  

The hope, of course, is that asylum seekers will return to their country if conditions improve, but the reality is that most will not–even if it becomes safe to go back.  For one thing, it usually takes a long time for country conditions to change.  I represent many asylum seekers from Ethiopia.  That country has had the same repressive government for almost 20 years, and it does not look to improve anytime soon.  Also, people need to feel that they are safe.  To grant someone asylum, only to deport her later, leaves her in a frightful limbo, unable to move forward with her life or to feel secure.  Finally, when helping another person, it is important to respect that person.  We should respect asylees enough to allow them to make their own decision about whether it is safe to return.

So I suppose that concludes my comments on FAIR’s report.  While I disagree with many of the recommendations, the report raises points that are worth discussing, and I hope the conversation will continue.

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Mental Health for Refugees and Asylum Seekers

by Jason Dzubow

The below post was prepared by a friend who is a keen observer of the immigration system, and who has seen many cases in immigration court, at the asylum office, and with USCIS.  My friend wishes to remain anonymous: 

Refugees and asylum seekers more often than not arrive in the United States after having endured difficult conditions and traumatic experiences.  As a consequence, many are affected by stress and trauma-related mental health issues, such as PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder).  

Newly arrived asylum seekers often have difficulty finding mental health assistance, especially when many are unlikely to venture beyond their close family and friends, and there are stigmas attached to seeking such assistance.  Fortunately across the country, there are many organizations that provide low-cost or free mental healthcare.

According to the Transactional Record Access Clearing House (“TRAC”), the bulk of asylum cases (six out of ten) are decided in four of the fifty-two immigration courts across the country: New York City, Miami, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.  Finding assistance in one of those four cities is probably easier than in other places, since immigrant communities are more established.

Regardless of location, the links below should provide a good starting place to find the help needed.  The below list is far from comprehensive, so please feel free to share any other sources in the comments section.

 And of course, inclusion on this list does not constitute an endorsement.  Rather, the organization listed below should provide a starting point for people in need of assistance:

Mental Health Association of California: www.mhac.org (California Only)

Florida Mental Health Counselors Association: www.floridamhca.org (Florida Only)

The Pro Bono Counseling Project: www.probonocounseling.org (Maryland only)

CAIR (Capital Area Immigrant’s Right’s) Coalition: www.caircoalition.org  (Maryland, Virginia, and DC)

Mental Health America: www.mentalhealthamerica.net (Nationwide)

Another good place to seek out assistance is any local teaching hospital.  Hopefully this list will provide a starting point for those seeking assistance. 

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The Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) Gets It Right

by Jason Dzubow

Recently, the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) released a report called Refugee and Asylum Policy Reform.  Last week, I wrote about some problems with the report’s methodology.  Since it’s a new year, I wanted to do something more positive, so for today’s post, I will discuss some recommendations in the report that I agree with. 

The Cuban Adjustment Act

The report recommends that the Cuban Adjustment Act be scrapped as a Cold War anachronism:

The exemption of Cubans in the United States from being required to justify a well-founded fear of persecution if sent back to Cuba is a political rather than humanitarian provision that encourages illegal immigration from Cuba.  The Cuban Adjustment Act should be repealed and the “wet-foot-dry-foot” policy that paroles Cubans into the country should be rescinded by the president.

While I oppose the Cuban Adjustment Act, Cuba's loss has been our gain: Rapper Cuban Link

This policy has never made much sense to me, especially since the end of the Cold War.  I’ve represented Cubans who gained their residency in the U.S. through the Cuban Adjustment Act, and they have all been very nice people.  But they were not political dissidents or people who faced persecution in Cuba.  Maybe the original idea behind the Act was to score a propaganda victory against Cuba, but after 50 years of the “Revolution,” I don’t know that it’s done much good (on the other hand, all those Cubans coming to the U.S. have greatly enhanced our country).  Rather than allow any Cuban who reaches the U.S. to remain here, we would do better to require each person to prove that he has a well-founded fear of persecution in Cuba, just like asylum seekers from other countries.    

Coercive Family Planning

Congress has defined the term “refugee” to include victims of China’s coercive family planning policies.  The FAIR report recommends that the “expansion of the definition of a refugee to include coercive family planning policies should be reversed.”  “It deviates from international practice and encourages illegal immigration from China.”  

I have always felt that it is unfair to condemn China for its one-child policy.  That country faces a very real and very dangerous population crisis, and the government instituted a policy (however unpalatable) to avoid disaster.  The law that FAIR opposes is more narrowly written than the report indicates, but it is still over-broad.   INA § 101(a)(42)(B) defines “refugee” as follows:

For purposes of determinations under this chapter, a person who has been forced to abort a pregnancy or to undergo involuntary sterilization, or who has been persecuted for failure or refusal to undergo such a procedure or for other resistance to a coercive population control program, shall be deemed to have been persecuted on account of political opinion, and a person who has a well founded fear that he or she will be forced to undergo such a procedure or subject to persecution for such failure, refusal, or resistance shall be deemed to have a well founded fear of persecution on account of political opinion.

The law appropriately defines “refugees” to include past victims and possible future victims of forced abortion and forced sterilization.  However, those who “resist” the family planning policy are also covered.  I would limit the definition of “refugee” to include only those who suffer from the coercive policies, not those who merely oppose such policies (though in my understanding, asylum is not given willy-nilly to anyone who expresses opposition to the one-child policy, and in this respect, I think FAIR’s concern is a bit over-blown). 

Asylum Fraud

The FAIR report is concerned with “combating the documented fraud in the asylum system.”  Fraud is a problem in the asylum system, and it is one I have written about before in a post creatively titled Fraud and Asylum.  I believe the most effective method to combat fraud–and I did not see this mentioned in the FAIR report–is to aggressively go after attorneys and notarios who engage in fraudulent practices.  To quote my own blog on this point:

Another option is to identify attorneys and notarios who prepare claims deemed suspicious.  Such people should be investigated and, if evidence of fraud is uncovered, prosecuted.  This, to me, is the easiest and most effective solution.  The DHS attorneys generally know who is producing and/or facilitating fraudulent claims.  Why not send an undercover investigator posing as a client to the suspected attorney?  If the attorney suggests that the “client” engage in fraud, the attorney could be charged with a crime….  Such tactics would reduce fraud by eliminating the purveyors of fraud and by deterring others who might engage in such practices.

So, I am pleased to have found a few points of agreement with the FAIR report.  In a future post, I will discuss some areas of disagreement.  Happy New Year.  

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FAIR’s Report on Asylees and Refugees Offers a Distorted Picture

by Jason Dzubow

The Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) recently released a report calling for reform of our country’s refugee and asylum policies.  The report, titled Refugee and Asylum Policy Reform, was authored by FAIR’s Director of Special Projects, Jack Martin.  The report covers a wide range of topics, from refugee admissions, to Temporary Protected States (TPS), to Chinese family planning asylum.  In general–and as expected–it calls for restricting humanitarian benefits for people seeking protection in the United States.  Concerning asylum, the report states:

Our country’s asylum law has been expanded by legislation and by court decisions to the extent that it has grown from a small program intended for unusual situations, where the return to a home country would constitute exposure to persecution, to become a major component of immigrant admissions. It too, by the absence of evidentiary standards, is open to fraud by persons who have no other basis for entry as immigrants.   

Having reviewed the report, there are some points I agree with, more points that I disagree with, and a few questions I have about the report’s methodology.  The report is fairly long (36 pages), and there are a number of points worth discussing, so I will devote a couple blog posts to my response.  For today’s post, I want to raise a few questions about the report’s methodology. 

The report, p. 5, states that “combined refugee and asylee admissions have hit new levels in recent years, exceeding 200,000 in 2006,” but it is not clear where FAIR gets its numbers.  According to the Department of Homeland Security, in 2006, 41,150 people were admitted into the United States as refugees, 12,873 were granted asylum affirmatively, and 13,240 were granted asylum defensively.  By my calculation, the total number of refugee and asylee admissions for 2006 was 67,263 people.  The figure of 200,000 likely refers to the number of asylees and refugees who adjusted status to lawful permanent residents in 2006.  These are not new admissions.  Rather, these are people who have been in the United States–in some cases for many years–who were able to adjust status after the cap on refugee adjustments was lifted in 2005. 

Does anyone really trust statistics?

Also on page 5 of the report, there is a chart showing how many refugees and asylees were admitted into the U.S. from 1990 to 2009.  The data on the chart purportedly comes from the Yearbook of Immigration Statistics.  But even a casual comparison of the Yearbook to FAIR’s chart reveals major discrepancies.  For example, FAIR’s chart shows that over 100,000 refugees were admitted into the United States in 2009.  However, the Yearbook of Immigration Statistics (Table 13) states that 74,602 refugees were admitted in 2009.  The chart also shows over 100,000 refugee admissions in 2002, but the Yearbook (Table 13) indicates that only 26,765 refugees were admitted in 2002.  Again, FAIR’s numbers appear to be the number of refugees who adjusted status (i.e., obtained their green card) in a given year, not the number of refugees who actually entered the United States in the specified year.

Page 6 of the report refers to refugees from the Soviet Block.  The report notes that the number of refugees has “nosedived” since the collapse of the Soviet Union, but states: “It is significant, however, that the admission of refugees from Russia and the Ukraine has not ended.”  Next to this statement is a chart, purportedly showing the number of refugees from the “Soviet Union/Ukraine.”  The chart shows that about 4,000 refugees came from the “Soviet Union/Ukraine” in 2009.  A review of the Yearbook of Immigration Statistics (Table 14) shows that in 2009, 495 refugees came from Russia and 601 came from the Ukraine, for a total of 1,096, far short of the 4,000 refugees listed on FAIR’s chart.  Again, FAIR seems to be listing the number of refugees from the former Soviet Union who are adjusting status, not the number of new admissions.  Some of these refugees may have lived in the U.S. for decades before adjusting status.

Page 14 of the report unfairly represents the proportion of refugees accepted by the United States.  The report states:

[The] United Nations High Commission on Refugees (UNHCR)… states that the United States accepted of 62,000 refugees out of 84,000 who were identified as needing permanent resettlement by that agency in 2009 — nearly three-fourths of the total.

In fact, footnote 23 of the FAIR report states that: “In 2009, UNHCR submitted 129,000 refugees for resettlement…. 84,000 refugees were actually resettled last year.”  So it seems to me a bit misleading to say that the U.S. accepted “62,000 refugees out of 84,000 who were identified as needing permanent resettlement,” when, in reality, the UN identified 129,000 refugees in need of permanent resettlement (and when there are about 15 million refugees worldwide).  This means that the U.S. accepted less than half of the refugees identified for resettlement, not three-fourths as stated in FAIR’s report. 

In sum, FAIR’s report gives a distorted impression of the number of refugees and asylees coming to the U.S.  The report should have relied on the number of new arrivals–not the number of refugees and asylees who are already here and who are applying for residency–to make its points.  Perhaps this would have made FAIR’s points somewhat less compelling, since the number of refugees and asylees arriving in the U.S. is less than what the report represents, but it would have had the virtue of being less misleading.

In future posts, I will discuss some points of agreement and disagreement with FAIR’s policy recommendations.    

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Funding Shortfall for Refugee Resettlement

by Jason Dzubow

The Senate’s recent decision to fund the government through a continuing resolution instead of an omnibus appropriations bill will have major implications for refugee resettlement agencies in the United States, reports the Huffington Post. 

Maybe the Spirits of Christmas will convince the Senate to save the "surplus population."

The President’s proposed budget for FY 2011 had included an 18.5% increase in funding for refugee programs, an increase that is desperately needed.  However, the continuing resolution keeps funding at FY 2010 levels.  This means that refugee resettlement agencies do not have the resources to do their jobs, and that refugees are unable to meet short term needs–such as grocery bills and rent, and long term needs–such as moving towards self sufficiency. 

There is some bipartisan support for increasing funding for resettlement.  The Huffington Post reports:

Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), ranking member on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, issued a report in July stating that funding for refugee programs is too low, and that that, in turn, puts strain on local communities stepping in to fill the void. Lugar argued the government should either accept fewer refugees, or give more funding to programs designed to help those that are allowed into the country.

In tough economic times, there is a temptation to reduce the number of refugees we admit into the United States (the admissions ceiling for FY 2011 is 80,000 refugees, which is similar to previous years).  However, if the U.S. reduces its refugee numbers, other countries will likely follow suit.  This means that thousands of refugees will be left to linger, and sometimes die, in refugee camps.  The U.S. has been–and should continue to be–the leader in assisting refugees.  Further, we bear a particular responsibility since many of the refugees come from Iraq and Afghanistan, collateral damage from our efforts to fight terrorism and extremism.

Protecting and resettling refugees helps the United States maintain its moral leadership in the world.  As they say, the U.S. is great when it is good.  We should fully fund our refugee resettlement programs to ensure that some of the most vulnerable people in our community get the assistance they need. 

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Obama’s Muslim Refugee Army Set to Invade America… Or Is It?

by Jason Dzubow

If that series of tubes called the Internet is to be believed, President Obama is bringing 80,000 Muslim refugees into the United States to take our welfare and convert our children to Islam.  Never mind that most of the 80,000 refugees authorized to come here in FY 2011 are not from Muslim countries or that the refugee admissions numbers are consistent with those of President Bush’s administration (and lower than during President Clinton and the first President Bush’s terms).

But unfortunately, the internet is not about facts.  From his website, The Last Crusade, Paul L. Williams, Ph.D.–and he never forgets to include those three little letters after his name–screams: “Get ready for the new Muslim invasion!”  Mr.–excuse me, Dr.–Williams informs us:

President Barack Hussein Obama, in a determination letter to Congress, has announced that he will allow an additional 80,000 immigrants – – mostly from Islamic countries – – to resettle in the United States during fiscal year 2011.

OK, part of this statement is true.  Just like the presidents before him, President Obama has sent a proposal to Congress about refugee admissions for the current fiscal year.  In that proposal, the President suggests a ceiling of 80,000 refugees who can be admitted into the United States.  The number of potential refugee admissions are divided by region as follows:

Africa

15,000

East Asia

19,000

Europe and Central Asia

2,000

Latin America / Caribbean

5,500

Near East / South Asia

35,500

Undesignated

3,000

What’s false–and offensive–is Dr. Williams’s claim that the 80,000 refugees are “mostly from Islamic countries.”  This claim is false because the President’s designation does not refer to specific countries.  Rather, the designation refers to regions.  Only after needs are assessed will we know how many refugees each country will produce.  During FY 2009 (the last year I see data available), the largest groups of refugees have come from the following countries (I have listed only countries with over 1,000 refugees; for the entire list, see page 57 of the Proposed Refugee Admissions):

Country Number of Refugees Percentage of Total Refugees
Bhutan 13,452 18.02%
Burma 18,202 24.38%
Cuba 4,800 6.43%
Democratic Rep. of Congo 1,135 1.52%
Eritrea 1,571 2.10%
Former Soviet Union 1,995 2.67%
Iran 5,381 7.21%
Iraq 18,838 25.23%
Somalia 4,189 5.61%
Vietnam 1,538 2.06%

These countries account for over 90% of refugee admissions for FY 2009 and most–about 60%–of these refugees are not from “Islamic” countries.  Further, even the refugees from majority Muslim countries are not necessarily Muslim.  Many refugees from Iraq and Eritrea, for example, are Christians.  So Dr. Williams’s claim about a Muslim “invasion” is patently false. 

What is so offensive about Dr. Williams’s canard is his implication that something is wrong with Muslim refugees (and Muslims in general).  To Dr. Williams, we are at war with Muslims, and anything we do to help a Muslim only hurts “us.”  He conveniently disregards our Muslim allies in the war on terror, or our own Muslim soldiers who risk their lives defending our country.  But hatred and bigotry rarely concerns itself with truth, and to Dr. Williams, the vulnerable Muslim refugees coming to our country are an invading army.  Better we should let them die in refugee camps.  And why not leave the non-Muslim refugees to die as well, for there might be Muslims among them.  To Dr. Williams, we live in an “us” vs. “them” world, where helping refugees–an act of compassion and humanity–is viewed as an act of treason.

Unfortunately, Dr. William’s lie has made its way around the internet as truth, and has been re-posted on many blogs.  People who hate Muslims and who hate President Obama seem ready to believe anything that fits their paradigm, regardless of the facts.  It’s a shame that refugees–some of the most vulnerable people on earth–are exploited by hate mongers like Dr. Williams, Ph.D.  You’d think an educated person would know better.

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Can the Mandaeans Be Saved?

by Jason Dzubow

Followers of the Mandaean religion have lived in Iraq for well over 1,000 years.  However, since the U.S. invasion in 2003, Mandaeans have faced all sorts of persecution from their fellow Iraqis, including murder, kidnapping, rape, confiscation of property and forced conversion.  Their numbers have dropped from about 60,000 in the 1990’s to less than 5,000 today.  The Mandaeans have fled to Kurdistan, Jordan, Syria, the United States, and other countries. 

A Mandaean Baptism Ceremony.

While the Iraqi Mandaeans are able to resettle in other countries, the concern is that they will be disbursed throughout the world and their religion will die out. 

The end of the Mandaean religion would be a great loss.  From a New York Times article on the Mandaeans (re-posted on Red Ice Creations):

The Mandeans are the only surviving Gnostics from antiquity, cousins of the people who produced the Nag Hammadi writings like the Gospel of Thomas, a work that sheds invaluable light on the many ways in which Jesus was perceived in the early Christian period. The Mandeans have their own language (Mandaic, a form of Aramaic close to the dialect of the Babylonian Talmud), an impressive body of literature, and a treasury of cultural and religious traditions amassed over two millennia of living in the southern marshes of present-day Iraq and Iran.

Practitioners of a religion at least as old as Christianity, the Mandeans have witnessed the rise of Islam; the Mongol invasion; the arrival of Europeans, who mistakenly identified them as “Christians of St. John,” because of their veneration of John the Baptist; and, most recently, the oppressive regime of Saddam Hussein, who drained the marshes after the first gulf war, an ecological catastrophe equivalent to destroying the Everglades. They have withstood everything — until now.

The Mandaean religion is pacifistic, and followers are not allowed to carry weapons, even for self defense.  Until the 2003 war, most of the world’s Mandaeans lived in Iraq.  Now the insular community has been divided into small groups and resettled as refugees.  Such groups are too small to create sustainable communities, and the fear is that the dispersion is the beginning of the end for the Mandaeans.

In the U.S., one of the largest refugee populations of Mandaeans is in Boston, which is home to about 450 individuals.  Mandaean activists hope to resettle enough refugees there to create a sustainable community.  According to the Boston Globe, nations don’t take in refugees from just a single ethnic or religious group, and the receiving countries face capacity issues.

In this instance, the UN and the receiving countries should make a greater effort to resettle the Mandaeans in larger number in order to create sustainable communities.  If not, this ancient religion could vanish forever.

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Remembering Louis Henkin – Architect of the 1951 Refugee Convention

by Jason Dzubow

Louis Henkin, a leading scholar in international law and foreign policy, professor emeritus at Columbia Law School, and one of the principal architects of the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, died last week at age 92.

Louis Henkin (November 11, 1917 - October 14, 2010)

Prof. Henkin led a long and eventful life.  He was born Eliezer Henkin in 1917 in Belarus, the son of a prominent rabbi.  He and his family immigrated to the United States in 1923, and he eventually attended Harvard Law School. 

After law school, Prof. Henkin clerked for Judge Learned Hand before enlisting in the United States Army during World War II.  He served in the European Theater and was awarded a Silver Star for his efforts. 

After completing his military service, he clerked for Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter.

Beginning in 1948, Prof. Henkin worked for the U.S. State Department in the United Nations Bureau.  There, he helped author the 1951 Refugee Convention, the key legal document defining who is a refugee, their rights, and the legal obligations of states.

Prof. Henkin left the State Department in 1956 and began a long academic career, mostly at Columbia University where he founded the university’s Center for the Study of Human Rights in 1978 and created the Human Rights Institute in 1998.  Prof. Henkin was considered by many one of the “founding fathers” of human rights law. 

Volker Türk, director of UNHCR‘s Division of International Protection, saluted Professor Henkin for his “fundamental contribution to the early development of international refugee law and his unwavering commitment to the protection of human and refugees’ rights.”  “It is no exaggeration to say that no American was more instrumental in the development of human rights law than Lou,” said Elisa Massimino, the president and chief executive officer of Human Rights First, an organization Professor Henkin helped found in 1978 under the name Lawyers’ Committee for Human Rights.  “He literally and figuratively wrote the book on human rights,” she said.

According to the New York Times, Prof. Henkin took a lofty view of his own government’s international responsibilities, but he often felt let down: “In the cathedral of human rights,” he wrote, “the United States is more like a flying buttress than a pillar — choosing to stand outside the international structure supporting the international human rights system, but without being willing to subject its own conduct to the scrutiny of that system.”

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Wonderful State Department Publication on Refugees

by Jason Dzubow
Eric P. Schwartz, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Population, Refugees and Migration

Since 1975, the United States has resettled almost 3 million refugees and asylum seekers, more than all other resettlement countries combined.  The most recent edition of the U.S. State Department’s eJournalUSA is entitled, Refugees: Building New Lives in the USA.  It presents a number of moving stories about refugees and the Americans who assist them.  From the introduction:

This eJournal USA chronicles lives of desperation and struggle but also offers examples of friendship and hope. In this issue:

• a boy is separated from his family and spends his childhood trying to elude the carnage of the Second Sudanese Civil War;

• a Cuban family of 10 faces persecution for their political beliefs in their home country;

• a young girl flees war and takes an uncertain journey across the Pacific;

• a man escapes ethnic violence in Rwanda and subsists on the street and in a refugee camp for 10 years.

All these people left their homelands and came to the United States as refugees, and all were met by American sponsors who helped them build new lives in the U.S. Through interviews and first-person accounts, our journal tells the stories of refugees who are building new homes and lives in the United States — and of those Americans who guide and help them.

Diversity and plurality are among the United States’ defining national characteristics. These national values inspire individual Americans to strengthen the country’s social fabric by welcoming and helping integrate refugees into U.S. communities. The resettled refugees in turn enrich American culture as well as the nation’s social, economic and legal framework.

The stories and articles in these pages explain the U.S. government’s commitment to help refugees and illustrate how that commitment is embodied by thousands of Americans who extend a hand to aid and befriend some of the nation’s newest — and bravest — residents.

The articles in the State Department journal highlight America at its best and remind us that our country has been greatly enriched by the refugees we have helped.  I also learned that Gloria Estefan came to the U.S. as a refugee (p. 18) and that a church in my old neighborhood helped welcome Turkish refugees from Georgia and Uzbekistan (p. 21).

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Presidential Memo on Refugees, but What About IDPs?

by Jason Dzubow

In a Presidential Memorandum issued last Friday, President Obama has authorized the admission of up to 80,000 refugees in Fiscal Year 2011, which is pretty similar to the admissions numbers for recent years.  “Refugees” are defined as people who are outside their country of origin and have a well-founded fear of return to their homeland.  Internally displaced persons (IDPs), who have been forced from their homes but are still within the borders of their own country, do not qualify as refugees, and–with some exceptions–cannot come to the U.S. as refugees.

The distinction between refugees and IDPs has always struck me as somewhat arbitrary.  For example, it doesn’t get much attention, but according to UNHCR, there are over 3 million IDPs in Colombia.  This is significantly more than the number of IDPs displaced from more well-known conflict areas like Darfur (2 million) and Iraq (2.6 million).  The refugee admissions numbers do almost nothing to assist IDPs. 

My left foot is an IDP; my right foot is a refugee.

The only exceptions actually written into the law are for IDPs from Iraq, the former Soviet Union, and (surprise, surprise) Cuba.  Also, U.S. embassies are authorized to designate certain IDPs as refugees, but only in “exceptional circumstances.”  This means that–for example–Tutsis in Rwanda in 1994 would not qualify for admission to the U.S. as refugees by virtue of the fact that they are still in their home country.  Ditto for Jews in Germany during World War II.

I’m not necessarily advocating increasing the number of refugees admitted into the U.S. every year (though I do think we can probably admit more than 80,000, which is less than 0.02% of the 42 million people displaced by conflict).  That should be a function of world-wide need and our ability to pay for and absorb the refugees.  It is determined by Congress and the President.  However, I do think we should consider including IDPs in the pool of potential refugees that will be admitted into our country.  If a person really can demonstrate a well-founded fear of persecution in his country, he should not be prevented from resettling in the U.S. merely because he has not managed to escape from his home country.  IDPs and refugees should be treated the same for purposes of resettlement.

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