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NOORANI'S NOTES

 

 

Reps. Jason Crow (D-Colorado) and Peter Meijer (R-Michigan)
introduced a bipartisan bill
 on
Tuesday to increase the cap of Special Immigrant Visas (SIVs) for
Afghan interpreters and other vulnerable partners by 10,000, reports
Joseph Choi of The Hill
.  

Great. But how do people actually get out of Afghanistan? What
about the interpreter who helped rescue
 then-Senator
Biden from a remote Afghan valley?  

While we cannot forget about those who are stranded, the
debate is intensifying over how the Biden administration will vet
and resettle our Afghan allies, a team at McClatchy
 reports.  

"We can have a rational conversation and debate policy, but let's not
make it about race, ethnicity, or religion," founding CNSI
 leader and
former DHS counterterrorism official Elizabeth
Neumann told Bloomberg
.
"[I]f they're allowed to come to this country, then they have passed
a thorough background check that is in line with our highest national
security measures." 

Meanwhile, remarkable stories of local leadership continue:  

* Catholic Charities in San Antonio is ramping up its humanitarian
mission to accommodate 350 Afghan refugees soon. (Zack Briggs, KENS 5
) 

* A Las Cruces church is helping Afghan refugees resettle in New
Mexico. (Salina Madrid, KFOX 14
) 

* In Missoula, Montana, the International Rescue Committee is working
to resettle Afghan allies and families and aid them in finding housing
and employment. (Martin Kidston, Missoula Current
) 

* Gov. Charlie Baker (R-Massachusetts) says the state will be "as
helpful as we can be" for Afghan refugees. (Matt Murphy, State House
News Service
) 

* Up to 300 Afghan refugees are likely to arrive in Spokane,
Washington, in the coming months, per Mark Finney, director of World
Relief Spokane. (Orion Donovan-Smith, The Spokesman Review
) 

* Gov. Spencer Cox (R-Utah) visited Cache County's refugee and
immigrant center this week to voice his support for resettlement in
the Beehive State. (Manuel Giron, Utah Public Radio
) 

* Kentucky's resettlement agencies are preparing to welcome up to
775 Afghans. (Chris Kenning, Louisville Courier Journal
) 

* Vietnamese Americans across the country, many reminded of their own
journey to the U.S., are organizing to help Afghans resettle.
(Alicia A. Caldwell, Wall Street Journal
) 

* Indiana will welcome 5,000 Afghans and temporarily house them at Camp
Atterbury, an old military base. (Margaret Menge, The Center Square
) 

Welcome to Wednesday's edition of Noorani's Notes. If you have
a story to share from your own community, please send it to me
at [email protected]
.

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**RESETTLEMENT REALITIES** - Afghan allies who have been able to
resettle in the U.S. still face economic and emotional challenges. In
Northern Virginia, Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Arlington is
"working overtime" to help Afghan families resettle and say the
biggest challenge is finding permanent housing, reports Gigi Barnett
of WTOP
. A
team at CNN
 tells the story
of Mohammed Iqbal Selanee - who first started interpreting for
U.S. forces as a teenager - and his emotional journey to the U.S.
"I am happy because I am safe here with my family," Selanee said. "But
I'm still unhappy because I left some of my family back
there." For the Los Angeles Times
, Brittny
Mejia sheds light on the realities of Afghan evacuees in California,
with photos by Irfan Khan.  

**HAITI **- A broad coalition of 344 groups on Monday called
on the Biden administration to halt deportations to Haiti and
expand relief for Haitian migrants, reports Rafael Bernal of The Hill
. "Since
February 1, 2021, the Administration sent at least 37 deportation
flights to Haiti, even as your officials acknowledged internally that
those being deported 'may face harm' on return and the COVID-19
pandemic raged," the coalition wrote in a letter to Biden and others.
"By March, the Biden-Harris Administration had removed more Haitians
since taking office than during all of fiscal year 2020."  

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**MPP LIMBO **- Per Syracuse University's Transactional Records
Access Clearinghouse, the Trump administration sent more than 71,000
asylum seekers to Mexico in 2019 under the Migrant Protection
Protocols (MPP), a.k.a. "Remain in Mexico," reports Rafael Carranza
of the Arizona Republic
. Though
Biden paused MPP in February, a Supreme Court decision last week
"effectively requires the Biden administration to restart the
program while its appeal continues to play out in
court." The decision has led international organizations processing
asylum seekers enrolled in MPP to pause their work, leaving thousands
of migrants in limbo.  

**MEXICO **- Yesterday, we noted the spike in violence in southern
Mexico as the government tried to block the movement of asylum
seekers to other parts of the country. In this
morning's The Washington Post
, León
Krauze digs deeper into the issue. Arturo Viscarra, an immigration
lawyer with CHIRLA, told Krauze: "As more Haitian asylum seekers are
purposely bogged down in Tapachula due to the governments' containment
strategy, they become more visible and exposed to the already existing
xenophobia of the local population." 

**DEPLETED **- New projections indicate that Social Security costs
are expected to exceed the total income in 2021
amid COVID-19's ongoing financial toll, reports Kate Davidson of The
Wall Street Journal
. Trustees
"expect Social Security's reserves to be depleted by 2034, only one
year sooner than they estimated in their April 2020 report
," writes
Davidson. "The trustees now project elevated mortality rates related to
the pandemic through 2023, and expect lower immigration and
child-bearing this year and next, compared with their 2020 estimates,"
adds Davidson. We've touched on this issue in our Room to Grow
 paper: The
country will need more immigrants in order to combat the worst effects
of demographic decline - especially during and after the
pandemic - to protect the nation's social and economic health.

Thanks for reading,

Ali

 

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