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America’s refugee door is swinging wide open Tuesday as the Trump administration said it will now accept refugees from all countries into the U.S., with more stringent vetting for newcomers from “high-risk nations.”
In June, President Trump ordered that the Department of Homeland Security establish an “extreme vetting” process to ensure “radical Islamic terrorists” won’t enter the U.S. while claiming refugee status. The president instituted a 120-day freeze on the refugee program, but that freeze expired Tuesday.
Now refugees from any country may apply for refugees status, according to new rules reported by the Wall Street Journal. However, applicants from 11 countries will be subject to enhanced scrutiny.
An administration official refused to name the 11 countries deemed high risk, though nations previously on that list included Chad, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Somalia, Syria and Yemen.
“It’s classified, and I expect it will stay classified,” he told the Wall Street Journal when asked about the nations on the list.
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U.S. authorities plan to gather more biographical data from applicants from the 11 countries, including names of family members and employment history. The prospective newcomers will also have their names run through law-enforcement and intelligence databases to detect any potential “criminal activity.” And their social media accounts will be searched for any inconsistencies between their public postings and statements made during interviews.
The State Department played a lead role in establishing the new vetting process, along with the Department of Homeland Security and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the administration official told the paper.
When he campaigned for the White House, Trump promised the American people he would stem the “massive flow of refugees” brought to the U.S. every year. He said America’s screening process did little to protect national security and could enable extremists to take advantage of the program, gaining entry into the country. Last month, President Trump established a policy of admitting 45,000 refugees to the U.S. each year.
“We don’t want them here,” he said at the time, warning that America needed to update its process “to ensure that we are not admitting into our country the very threats our soldiers are fighting overseas.”
Trump added, “We only want to admit those into our country who will support our country and love deeply our people.”
In November 2015, Trump told Fox News’ Sean Hannity: “So many people in the migration were strong young men. You look at ’em. I’m saying, where are the women? Where are the children? We’re taking in people [and] we have no idea who they are. They have no identification. They have no papers. They’re creating papers. They’re making up papers. …
“It could very well be the ultimate Trojan horse.”
Learn about the Islamization of American cities through refugee resettlement in the book former U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann is calling the most important read of 2017, “Stealth Invasion: Muslim Conquest through Immigration and Resettlement Jihad.”
Source:: World Net Daily – World
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