Trump Could Be the Final Nail in the Coffin for U.S. Refugee Admissions
Among the dozens of executive orders signed by U.S. President Donald Trump since taking office, one action received relatively little media attention: his decision to suspend the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program, or USRAP. A judge in Seattle temporarily blocked that executive order earlier this week, saying that it overstepped the president’s authority with regard to a congressionally mandated program. But even if resettlement resumes, admissions numbers are likely to be quite low.
The effort to shutter USRAP was not entirely unexpected, as Trump slashed refugee admissions to historical lows during his first term, causing many resettlement agencies to close offices and lay off staff. This time around, however, it has become clear that what was once a program enjoying broad bipartisan support is now subject to the same rancorous divide on display with regard to all aspects of immigration policy. Other than a handful of human rights and humanitarian advocacy groups, few voices in Washington defend refugees. While Trump will shoulder the blame if USRAP ends up being cut, changes to Washington’s resettlement priorities since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, set the stage for him and his allies to halt admissions altogether.
Since the passage of the 1980 Refugee Act, the U.S. has been the world’s leader in refugee resettlement, an effort that not only saves lives but also promotes U.S. interests abroad. It is also one that has historically enjoyed bipartisan backing from both Republicans and Democrats. Presidents from Ronald Reagan to Barack Obama used USRAP to admit nearly 80,000 refugees on average per year. Members of Congress from both parties historically approved State Department resettlement targets with little debate. And for good reason: Research has shown that, once in the U.S., refugees often revitalize communities, contribute meaningfully to the economy and earn U.S. citizenship at higher rates than other immigrants. So, while USRAP was not entirely free from criticism, it was one of the few migration policies that enjoyed strong support in Washington.
Although often thought of as a purely humanitarian program, refugee admissions also reflect U.S. foreign policy priorities. A tacit partnership between human rights proponents and national security hawks bolstered support for USRAP for the first two decades of its existence. During the 1980s, refugees from three countries—Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos—made up the vast majority of admissions. In the following decade, the U.S. resettled many refugees from the former Soviet Union, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Iran, Somalia and Kosovo. Looking at the main countries of refugee origin from 1980 to 2000, the U.S. clearly prioritized people fleeing from countries where there was direct U.S. military involvement—Vietnam and Kosovo, for instance—or countries that were geopolitical rivals, like the Soviet Union and Iran.
USRAP was designed to be a humanitarian program, yet refugee admissions have long been used strategically to aid U.S. military and diplomatic efforts.
Helping refugees from U.S. military operations abroad was seen as a moral obligation and an important component of a holistic foreign policy strategy. Such admissions served to evacuate people who had collaborated with the U.S. and were targeted for reprisal upon the withdrawal of U.S. forces. In addition, mass migration out of war-torn areas can strain the economy and security of neighboring states, whose cooperation was often essential to U.S. political and military goals. For this reason, the U.S. worked to prevent regional destabilization in the Balkans by resettling many refugees from Kosovo, to take just one example.
Accepting refugees from rival states, such as communist dictatorships during the Cold War or Iran after the Islamic Revolution, served to discredit such countries for their human rights abuses. People “voting with their feet” by coming to the West played an important role in public diplomacy, signaling to global audiences that living in a free, democratic society is preferable to authoritarianism.
After the terrorist attacks of 9/11, however, the foreign policy logic underpinning USRAP changed dramatically. Then-President George W. Bush temporarily limited refugee admissions pending a major overhaul of all immigration programs. In the years after 9/11, U.S. foreign policy and national security priorities shifted from a focus on threats from states to a focus on threats from terrorists. For refugees, this meant that the U.S. emphasis shifted accordingly from letting people from enemy states in to keeping potential jihadists out. As such, in the 21st century, USRAP expanded programs for Bhutanese and Congolese refugees, while admitting relatively few Iraqis and Afghans.
These fears became even more pronounced with the outbreak of Syria’s civil war in 2011, given the presence there of both al-Qaida and the Islamic State. In 2015, with millions of Syrian refugees having already fled to neighboring regional states and a marked increase in asylum-seekers in Europe, then-President Barack Obama announced a modest plan to resettle Syrians. Yet, 30 state governors—29 of them Republicans—called for a moratorium on Syrian admissions, underscoring the partisan divide that had emerged on the issue. Refugee admissions then became a centerpiece of Trump’s 2016 presidential election campaign, in which he promised “extreme vetting” of refugees and a ban on Muslim migration altogether, despite little evidence that terrorists were abusing USRAP to enter the United States.
Unlike previous decades, refugees no longer follow U.S. troops leaving a warzone. While the fall of Saigon led to the admission of over 1 million Vietnamese refugees, the fall of Kabul left over 6 million Afghans displaced, with little hope of admission to the United States. Former President Joe Biden did admit over 70,000 Afghans through a separate humanitarian parole program. But unlike USRAP, this does not guarantee permanent residency, and Congress has blocked efforts to allow them to stay.
As a modest gesture, the U.S. created a Special Immigrant Visa, or SIV, program for those Iraqis and Afghans—such as interpreters—who worked directly with the U.S. military, but this was limited in scope and small in number. Efforts to increase the number of SIVs have stalled in Congress. Moreover, Trump’s executive actions left thousands of Afghans in the queue, some of them awaiting imminent departure from where they are presently located but suddenly without a pathway to enter the United States.
In short, USRAP was designed to be a humanitarian program, yet refugee admissions have long been used strategically to aid U.S. military and diplomatic efforts. However, in recent decades there has not been a strong voice on Capitol Hill for letting certain refugees in as a matter of geopolitical interest. Some veterans’ groups have partnered with human rights advocates to lobby for a robust Afghan resettlement program, but most Republicans in Congress have little enthusiasm for expanding admissions.
Thus, when Trump signed his latest executive order suspending refugee admissions, there was hardly an outcry from Republican lawmakers in Congress. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, himself the son of a Cuban refugee to the U.S., was a champion of refugee admissions during his time in the Senate and sought to tie them to U.S. foreign policy goals. It remains to be seen if he can influence the White House, however, particularly without momentum from Congress.
With Venezuelans fleeing the dictatorship of President Nicolas Maduro, Chinese fleeing ethnic and political persecution, and Iranians fleeing a fundamentalist regime, there are opportunities to revive a bipartisan consensus on refugee resettlement. Yet, doing so will require coalition-building in what remains a polarized political climate in Washington.
Idean Salehyan is a professor of political science at the University of North Texas and the executive director of the Peace Science Society (International).