Congress

Obama wants more refugees to come to U.S. This man wants to stop them.

By Lindsay Wise

lwise@mcclatchydc.com

September 16, 2016 11:10 AM

In this June 19, 2015 file photo, a Syrian refugee child walks at a refugee camp in Suruc, on the Turkey-Syria border. Some 28 million children around the globe have been driven from their homes by violent conflict, with nearly as many abandoning their homes in search of a better life, according to a UNICEF report released Tuesday, Sept. 6, 2016. The report found that while children make up about a third of the world's population as of 2015, they accounted for nearly half of all refugees, with the number of child refugees having doubled in the last decade.
In this June 19, 2015 file photo, a Syrian refugee child walks at a refugee camp in Suruc, on the Turkey-Syria border. Some 28 million children around the globe have been driven from their homes by violent conflict, with nearly as many abandoning their homes in search of a better life, according to a UNICEF report released Tuesday, Sept. 6, 2016. The report found that while children make up about a third of the world's population as of 2015, they accounted for nearly half of all refugees, with the number of child refugees having doubled in the last decade. Emrah Gurel AP
In this June 19, 2015 file photo, a Syrian refugee child walks at a refugee camp in Suruc, on the Turkey-Syria border. Some 28 million children around the globe have been driven from their homes by violent conflict, with nearly as many abandoning their homes in search of a better life, according to a UNICEF report released Tuesday, Sept. 6, 2016. The report found that while children make up about a third of the world's population as of 2015, they accounted for nearly half of all refugees, with the number of child refugees having doubled in the last decade. Emrah Gurel AP
WASHINGTON

The U.S. will open its doors to tens of thousands more refugees next year, the Obama administration announced this week.

But not if Sam Graves can stop them.

The Republican congressman from Missouri has proposed a bill that would cut off the funding needed to implement the president’s plan or any other refugee increase.

Graves argues the increase puts an “undue burden” on communities and national security officials.

“Over the past year, we’ve seen all the dangerous unintended consequences of uncapped refugee programs in Europe,” Graves said in a statement. “We can’t let the same thing happen here.”

A total of 1,614 refugees — including 340 from war-torn Syria — have resettled in Graves’ home state of Missouri so far this year. Seven hundred and fifty-eight moved to neighboring Kansas. Of those, 32 were from Syria.

They were among 85,000 refugees who have arrived to start new lives in the U.S. in 2016. The Obama administration has proposed increasing the number of refugees admitted to America by 30 percent in 2017, to 110,000.

An unprecedented 65 million people were displaced by conflict or prosecution last year, even more than were uprooted after World War II, United Nations statistics show.

That works out to an average of 24 people around the world who were forced to flee their homes each minute.

Lindsay Wise: 202-383-6007, @lindsaywise

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