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Migrants from Honduras at the Mexico-United States border crossing
Topline: The number of refugees accepted into the U.S. over the next year will be slashed to a record low of just 18,000 in a move that has been slammed by human rights groups.
- Some 4,000 places in the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program will be prioritised for Iraqis, 5,000 places for religious groups facing persecution, and 1,500 for those being resettled from Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador. The move is part of a yearly government review of the number of people welcomed as refugees in the U.S.
- The 18,000 target, which comes into effect in the next fiscal year, is drastically lower than the previous all-time low of 27,000 refugees admitted after the 9/11 attack.
- The measure was intended to alleviate “burdens” on authorities at the southern border, according to the State Department, which also said it aims to clear a “backlog” of claims by people from Central America.
- An accompanying executive order was signed by President Donald Trump, meaning only states consenting to accepting refugees will be expected to do so.
- The ACLU’s Omar Jadwat called the move “sickening,” while former U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Samantha Power called the measure an “abomination.” Mark Hetfield, head of HIAS, a Jewish nonprofit assisting refugees, said the move was a bid by Trump to “allow governors and mayors to imitate his own refugee ban, state by state and town by town,” Reuters reported.
Key background: Trump has steadily cut the number of refugees permitted to enter the U.S. each year. In 2017, the cutoff was set at 50,000, but has since been reduced to 30,000 this year, before being cut to just 18,000 over the next 12 months. This will leave out thousands of refugees already waiting to be resettled, Reuters reported. President Trump has in recent months intensified efforts to reduce immigration into the U.S., a strategy viewed by analysts as an attempt to boost his re-election bid.
