He furthermore ordered the refugee resettlement arm of the state’s Health and Human Services Commission “to not participate in the resettlement of any Syrian refugees in the State of Texas”.
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“This letter should raise serious concerns for refugees now receiving assistance in Texas, and also for legislators – who should be asking what fiscal impact the Texas Health and Human Services Commission could be bringing down on the state through its increasingly contentious communications”, Moorhead said.
The controversy over Syrian refugees and where they will be placed is blowing the lid off the federal government’s refugee resettlement program as governors are learning just how secretive this program really is.
Officials at the International Rescue Committee’s headquarters in NY said they would not stop resettling Syrian refugees in Texas despite the state’s opposition.
One family is expected to join relatives in Richardson within days.
“There is no basis for anyone to claim that refugees will be recruited by ISIS”, Weiss Armush says.
“We have been unable to achieve cooperation with your agency”, Traylor wrote in the letter, adding that, “Failure by your organization to cooperate with the State of Texas as required by federal law may result in the termination of your contract with the state and other legal action”.
In the past four years, only 1,500 Syrian refugees have been accepted into the United States, but the Obama administration announced in September that 10,000 Syrians would be permitted entry next year.
In the statement, the group said it would “welcome the opportunity to meet with Gov. Abbott” to discuss the resettlement.
The conservative leaders also offer alternative choices to help refugees, such as humanitarian support to individuals in refugee camps in the Kurdistan region of Iraq.
The US takes in about 70,000 refugees from around the world through resettlement each year, and has admitted slightly more than 2,000 Syrian refugees since the beginning of the Syrian civil war, in 2011.
Two weeks ago, Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker said he’s opposed to allowing additional Syrian refugees into the state until he knows more about the federal government’s vetting process for refugees.
Plans have been in place for six Syrian refugees to be resettled in Dallas this week. Legal specialists allege in that while the states can’t close their borders to refugees, they will complicate efforts at resettlement in the event in that they decide to withhold some funding.
The House of Representatives passed a bill before their Thanksgiving recess that essentially blocks the resettlement of Syrian and Iraqi refugees in the US unless they pass heightened security background checks.
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The International Rescue Committee, a nonprofit that’s based in NY and runs a program in Dallas, gave no indication that it will change course and relocate Syrian refugees somewhere other than Texas. “Even in those cases where refugees were arrested on terrorism-related charges, years and even decades often transpired between their entry into the United States and their involvement in terrorism”. Federal courts – including the U.S. Supreme Court – have said immigration and admission of noncitizens to the United States is a federal responsibility and one managed wholly by the federal government.
