U.S. bishops praise Biden administration’s expansion of refugee resettlement program

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Oct 8, 2024 / 08:00 am

The U.S. bishops issued a statement praising the Biden administration’s decision last week to expand the U.S. refugee resettlement program and commended the role of Catholic organizations in partnering with the government to resettle refugees.

President Joe Biden signed the Presidential Determination on Refugee Admissions for Fiscal Year 2025 on Sept. 30, setting the refugee admissions target at 125,000. This comes after the administration has made several changes and expansions to the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP) and resettled over 100,000 refugees into the U.S. in 2023, the highest number since 1994.

A “refugee” is defined under U.S. law as a person who is “unable or unwilling” to return to his or her country because of “persecution or a well-founded fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion.”

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) is one of 10 “national resettlement agencies” that partner with USRAP to take in and assist these refugees.

The bishops said that dioceses and local Catholic Charities agencies “play an essential role in helping refugees to integrate successfully into their new communities.”

Bishop Mark Seitz, chairman of the U.S. bishops’ Migration Committee, applauded Catholic organizations’ contributions to the refugee resettlement program, saying that “from lifesaving protection for refugee families to the economic renewal they offer receiving communities, this is part of what it means to ‘love thy neighbor.’”

“My brother bishops and I could not be more grateful for the witness of faithful Catholics across our country who have, for many decades now, committed themselves to accompanying refugees as a visible sign of Christ’s love in the world.”

Seitz thanked the Biden administration for its efforts to “reassert and grow our nation’s proud tradition of welcoming refugees” as well as the “bipartisan support of Congress,” which he said “has played a vital role in the success of the resettlement program since its inception.”

“Resettling 100,000 refugees is a significant achievement, given the all-time low number seen in 2021 and some of the challenges facing American communities at this time, including a nationwide shortage of affordable housing,” Seitz said. “Guided by the Gospel and faithful to our national values, the U.S. Catholic community will continue doing its part to carry this endeavor forward.”

After being established through the bipartisan Refugee Act of 1980, USRAP has generally enjoyed wide support across the political spectrum.

While he has been sharply critical of many of the Biden administration’s immigration policies, Andrew Arthur, a former immigration judge and policy expert at the Center for Immigration Studies, told CNA that “of all the things that the Biden-Harris administration is doing to facilitate the entry of people who don’t have visas to come to the United States, this is far and away the least objectionable.”

He said that though 125,000 is “high compared to prior years” it is still “well within” the limits set by the law.

Arthur emphasized that the refugee resettlement program differs greatly from the U.S. asylum system.

“We know from past experience that individuals who make asylum claims generally never follow through on them,” he said. “But when you’re talking about refugees, those are individuals who have already been adjudicated. They’ve already been determined to be refugees before they’re brought here. They’ve already been vetted abroad before they come here. So, the danger that they pose to national security is lower; it’s not zero, but it is lower.”