U.S. Leadership Forsaken: Six Months of the Trump Refugee Bans

In order to advance America’s foreign policy and national security interests, in addition to protecting of some of the world’s most vulnerable populations, the United States must be a global leader in the world’s refugee crises – not deliberately back down from it. U.S. Leadership Forsaken: Six Months of the Trump Refugee Bans published by Human Rights First examines the effects of the “travel ban” executive order of U.S. President Donald Trump in early 2017 and finds that it has worked to make America less safe by destabilizing refugee resettlement programs worldwide. Utilizing Worldwide Refugee Admissions Processing Systems data, the report finds that the travel ban has led to less than half of typical refugee resettlement in the U.S. in the six months following the January 2017 order including an 80 percent cut in resettlement of Syrians; an effective halt of new refugee processing worldwide; a three-fourths drop in resettlement of Muslim refugees; and the layoff of hundreds of refugee processing staff. As a result, the report finds that this dramatic destabilization has burdened U.S. allies and front-line refugee hosting countries, threatened intelligence sharing in the War on Terror, and fueled smuggling and trafficking, which ultimately threaten the safety of American citizens. The report recommends that the U.S. should launch a strong resettlement initiative to reassert its global leadership and maintain its security interests. (Joanathan Eizyk for The Immigrant Learning Center’s Public Education Institute)

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