Plus, what's the Space Force budget?

View this email in your browser ([link removed])
[link removed]


** Who are the refugees and asylees coming to the US?
------------------------------------------------------------

Refugees ([link removed]) and asylees ([link removed]) are two distinct groups of people who seek protection in the United States due to fears of persecution in their home countries based on their race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion. The paths these groups take touch on humanitarian concerns, international obligations, and more. USAFacts has explorations on refugees and asylees to understand who is coming to the country and why.
Was this forwarded to you? Subscribe here. ([link removed])
[link removed]
* Refugees ([link removed]) apply for protection while outside the US. The State Department’s United States Refugee Admissions Program has admitted fewer refugees in recent years, partially due to the pandemic. In 2022, 25,465 refugees arrived in the US, a 123% increase from the year prior.
* Presidents set the refugee ceiling — the total number of refugees who can enter the country — each federal fiscal year. Former President Donald Trump set the lowest limit since the Refugee Program’s creation in 1980 — 15,000 in 2021. President Joe Biden raised the ceiling to 62,500 for the remainder of the 2021 fiscal year, and to 125,000 for fiscal years 2022 and 2023.

[link removed]
* The US admitted 1.09 million refugees between 2001 and 2022. Burmese citizens were 16.7% of all refugees during this time —183,292 people —more than any other nationality. Refugees from Iraq and Somalia followed. People from these three countries accounted for more than 40% of refugees over 21 years.
* 1975, 1980, and 1981 were the biggest years for refugee arrivals, primarily due to the influx of Vietnamese and Cambodian refugees at the end of the Vietnam War.

* Texas and California accepted more refugees ([link removed]) between federal fiscal years 2010 and 2021 than other states, each accepting more than 50,000 refugees in total. New York, Michigan, and Arizona rounded out the top five states where refugees resettled.

[link removed]
* Unlike refugees, asylees ([link removed]) make their claims either upon arrival or after they are already in the United States. Between 1990 and 2021, the US admitted 767,950 asylum seekers into the country. It admitted 17,692 asylees in 2021 alone, down 42.9% from the year before, and the fewest since 1994.
* The US offers two types of asylum: affirmative and defensive. An affirmative seeker seeks asylum by applying to the Department of Homeland Security after entering the country. A defensive asylum seeker requests asylum as a defense against deportation during a standard removal proceeding. The US has historically approved more affirmative asylee applicants (481,612 total acceptances since 1990) than defensive asylee applicants (286,338 acceptances
since 1990).

[link removed]
* Chinese nationals were the largest group of asylum seekers over the past decade: approximately 63,000 people. That’s more than a fifth of total asylees entering the US between fiscal years 2012 and 2021. More Chinese asylees received defensive rather than affirmative asylum.
* Over 30% of defensive asylum seekers come from El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, and Venezuela. This is largely due to an increase in migrants arriving at the Southern border in recent years, reaching a record high in December 2022.

The top nationalities for defensive asylum seekers ([link removed]) in this article and get more on refugee applicants here ([link removed]) .


** Data behind the news
------------------------------------------------------------
* Last week, a House Oversight committee held a hearing called “Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: Implications in National Security, Public Safety, and Government Transparency.” See data on unidentified aerial phenomena, formerly called UFOs right here ([link removed]) .
* Just published at USAFacts: Space Force is the first new branch of the US military since 1947 and was established to protect the United States’ interests in space amid a growing spectrum of threats. How much does the government spend on Space Force ([link removed]) ?
* Test your data knowledge with the weekly fact quiz ([link removed]) .


** One last fact
------------------------------------------------------------
[link removed]

American businesses and individuals filed 383,810 bankruptcies ([link removed]) in the 2022 fiscal year. The number of filings had generally risen since 1980, peaking at more than 1.78 million in 2005, but it has fallen since then (other than an uptick after the Great Recession). There were 12% fewer bankruptcy filings in 2022 than in 2021.
[link removed] [link removed] [link removed] [link removed]

Was this email forwarded to you?

Sign up here ([link removed]) for your own weekly issue of the USAFacts newsletter.

Copyright (C) 2023 USAFacts. All rights reserved.
You are receiving this email because you opted in to our newsletter for USAFacts.
Our mailing address is:
USAFacts
PO Box 1558
Bellevue, WA 98009-1558
USA
Want to change how you receive these emails?
You can
update your preferences ([link removed]) or unsubscribe ([link removed])