Things I learned at my training to be a refugee helper
9:47 AM
*There are 65 million people on this planet who have had to flee their
homelands. That is 1 in every 113 people on Earth. Of those, 19.5
million are currently classified as "refugees."
*The first hope is to get them back to a stabilized situation in their home countries—they want to go home. The second option is to let them stay where they are in the location to which they initially fled. The third and final option is to resettle them to a new location, at which point they've left their home never to return and then have to leave the camp or whatever couch they've been sleeping on to fly across the world to an unknown situation, sometimes with and sometimes without their family members.
*The actual vetting process (interviews, background checks, etc.) takes 18-24 months for our government to complete, but that doesn't start immediately because of options one and two. Average total time to resettlement is 6-10 years. Only 1% of refugees get resettled in their third location.
*When a refugee arrives here, they get one-time direct assistance of $1,125. From that is deducted things like the security deposit on an apartment and furniture. After that they receive eight months of cash assistance from DHS at $339/month and $194/month in food benefits from SNAP. If you think that is enough to live off most places, you are incorrect.
*Some arrive with almost no English skills. Upon arrival, they receive training in English so they can get a job, but they only have eight months to learn English and get that job before their DHS benefits run out.
*They are documented, legal immigrants and have a pathway to citizenship.
If a terrorist wanted to attack the US and the best option he could come up with was a 6-10 year entry process that involved a lot of background checks, uncertainty about where you'd end up going, volunteers checking up on you once you arrive, and poverty, that would be one lousy terrorist. We need to be doing more for these people, not less. And yes, we need to do more for people who are born here, too, but the one does not negate the other.
*The first hope is to get them back to a stabilized situation in their home countries—they want to go home. The second option is to let them stay where they are in the location to which they initially fled. The third and final option is to resettle them to a new location, at which point they've left their home never to return and then have to leave the camp or whatever couch they've been sleeping on to fly across the world to an unknown situation, sometimes with and sometimes without their family members.
*The actual vetting process (interviews, background checks, etc.) takes 18-24 months for our government to complete, but that doesn't start immediately because of options one and two. Average total time to resettlement is 6-10 years. Only 1% of refugees get resettled in their third location.
*When a refugee arrives here, they get one-time direct assistance of $1,125. From that is deducted things like the security deposit on an apartment and furniture. After that they receive eight months of cash assistance from DHS at $339/month and $194/month in food benefits from SNAP. If you think that is enough to live off most places, you are incorrect.
*Some arrive with almost no English skills. Upon arrival, they receive training in English so they can get a job, but they only have eight months to learn English and get that job before their DHS benefits run out.
*They are documented, legal immigrants and have a pathway to citizenship.
If a terrorist wanted to attack the US and the best option he could come up with was a 6-10 year entry process that involved a lot of background checks, uncertainty about where you'd end up going, volunteers checking up on you once you arrive, and poverty, that would be one lousy terrorist. We need to be doing more for these people, not less. And yes, we need to do more for people who are born here, too, but the one does not negate the other.
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