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AFGHAN INITIATIVE — In a "massive change" to the Afghan resettlement program, the Biden administration is launching an initiative to give veterans and others with ties to Afghans the opportunity to bring evacuees to their cities, Priscilla Alvarez reports for CNN. Operating as a private sponsorship, the program would allow greater flexibility for resettlement locations — but would be "dependent on people signing up and having the resources to support Afghans and their families." Meanwhile, more than 30 organizations, including the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, signed on to an Oct. 12 letter urging administration officials to help Afghan religious minorities, reports Tom Strode of the Baptist Press. And Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service President and CEO Krish O’Mara Vignarajah (who’s speaking at LTW today) penned a great piece for The Baltimore Sun on supporting Afghan women and girls. Here’s today’s collection of local stories:
ZERO — The U.S. government has recognized the Chinese government’s campaign against Uyghurs as genocide — but it admitted zero Uyghur refugees in fiscal year 2021, report Harvest Prude and Haley Byrd Wilt for The Dispatch. "Refugees from China have consistently represented a slim portion of total admissions in recent years, but a downward trend has been especially noticeable since 2016," they write. China "makes it exceptionally difficult for refugees to escape," they add, "[b]ut those who do make it out of the country must also overcome bureaucratic hurdles and slow processing of their asylum claims." And while the Biden administration has raised the refugee cap for this fiscal year, "I’ve still not seen a dedicated influx of resources to the refugee resettlement programs that would indicate they’re ever going to be able to process 125,000," said Elizabeth Neumann, former assistant secretary of counterterrorism and threat prevention at the Department of Homeland Security. BUILDING TRUST — New immigration enforcement priorities from Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas will help keep communities safe regardless of immigration status, writes Orlando Rolón, chief of the Orlando police department and co-chair of the Law Enforcement Immigration Task Force, for Morning Consult. The updated guidelines "shift how federal immigration authorities will employ prosecutorial discretion, moving away from rigid enforcement categories in favor of individualized assessments that focus on the public interest," he writes. "And for those of us on the local level who work to build trust with our immigrant communities, this will help alleviate fear of law enforcement." Thanks for reading, Ali |
