Joe Biden has denied plans to keep the annual US refugee admission quota at a historically low level

The United States government on Friday denied that the president Joe Biden intends to keep the annual refugee quota the United States receives for this fiscal year at 15,000, the lowest all-time for the country set by his predecessor, Donald Trump.

The measure had been reported on the basis of an official source and involved rescind the Biden administration’s pledge to raise up to 62,500 refugees admitted in this fiscal year, ending in September.

In public statements, the press secretary, Jen Psaki, assured that the president “will increase the figure before May 15”, even if “his initial target (of 62,500 people) seems improbable”.

Press reports scandalized many human rights organizations and members of the Democratic Party, to which Biden belongs. “The Biden administration’s goal of hosting refugees is unacceptable,” Senator Dick Durbin said after the reports were released. “Say it isn’t, President Joe,” he added.

In February, the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, assured Congress that the White House plans to raise the refugee ceiling for this fiscal year from 15,000 to 62,500, But Biden’s delay in implementing that promise has left many activists concerned.

The official source had justified the government’s reluctance the work underway for the White House to “rebuild the resettlement program” for refugees, in addition to the challenges posed by “the covid-19 pandemic”.

He claimed that, coming to power and reviewing the status of the U.S. refugee admissions program, the Biden government realized that it was “even more decimated than it thought” and that it needed “a huge reform to be able to go back to the numbers” of previous years.

“This reconstruction is already underway and will allow us to support a much higher number of admissions (of refugees) in the years to come», Assured the official.

In February, Biden also announced that in fiscal 2022, which begins in October, his executive’s annual refugee quota will increase to 125,000., and the source did not say whether it is keeping that commitment.

What the official argued is that Biden’s order will “expand access” to the United States refugee program even if it does not increase the quota, because it “changes the allocation. by regions “of the beneficiaries.

According to the source, the measure of Trump “has excluded many refugees from regions experiencing conflict, such as Africa and the Middle East.”

With information from EFE

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