How Many Refugees Does the United States Accept?
With Trump’s immigration ban, you may be wondering, how many refugees does the United States accept? To answer this question, you must do some math.
The United States will not accept any more refugees until May 27, and in the meantime, the Secretary of Homeland Security, the Secretary of State and the Director of National Intelligence will review the screening procedures for refugees. President Trump’s immigration policy includes a 90-day complete ban on individuals from Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen from entering the United States. Syrian refugees will be banned from entering the United States for an undetermined amount of time.
Over 100,000 refugees were allowed in the United States in 2016 under Obama’s plan, but Trump is capping the number of refugees allowed into the United States at 50,000. The 2017 fiscal year began last October, and as of Jan. 20, 29,895 refugees were already accepted. This leaves room for only about 20,000 more refugees to enter the United States in 2017 under Trump’s plan.
The United States accepted almost 85,000 refugees in 2016, according to the United States Department of State. In 2016, over 45% of those refugees were Muslim, the highest recorded number of Muslim refugees in history. President Trump said that he will give Christian refugees priority over Muslim refugees in the future.
David Mednicoff, Assistant Director for Public Policy at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, states that there are many benefits to allowing Syrian refugees in the United States. Syrian refugees bring a knowledge of the conflict in the Middle East and how to diffuse it. Mednicoff believes that if refugees are allowed into the country, they are more likely to show gratitude rather than malice toward the United States.
As you can see, “How many refugees does the United States accept?” is a complicated question. The number of refugees that will be allowed into the United States may change as the 120-day ban ends this summer.
– Jennifer Taggart
