Category Archives: Refugee Issues

Biden 2025 Budget Would Offer ‘Welcome Relief,’ But Not Enough

One expert said that enacting his reforms “will begin to reverse the 40-year one-way ratchet of falling taxes for the wealthy and corporations and instead invest in workers and families.”

By Jessica Corbett. Published 3-11-2024 by Common Dreams

Photto: U.S. Secretary of Defense/flickr/CC

On the heels of delivering the latest State of the Union speech and signing a package of funding bills, U.S. President Joe Biden on Monday unveiled his budget blueprint for fiscal year 2025, a proposal praised by congressional Democrats and progressive advocates who want him to go even further.

The $7.3 trillion budget comes as the divided Congress is still sorting out funding for the current fiscal year. Given those divisions—and that the Republican House majority is already advancing its own budget resolution for the fiscal year that begins in October—the Democratic president’s plan is widely seen as a statement of priorities going into the November election.

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Migrant Drownings in Pacific Soared 3,200% After Trump Raised Border Wall: Study

The Trump administration nearly doubled the height of the border barrier as part of its “zero tolerance” immigration agenda.

By Brett Wilkins. Published 3-8-2024 by Common Dreams

Border Field State Park / Imperial Beach, San Diego, California. Photo: Tony Webster/Wikimedia Commons/CC

The number of migrants drowning in the Pacific Ocean while attempting to enter the United States from Tijuana, Mexico skyrocketed by 3,200% after the Trump administration dramatically increased the height of the border barrier extending into the southern California sea, a study published Thursday revealed.

The study—published in JAMA, the American Medical Association’s journal—found that 33 people drowned while trying to swim across the southern border between 2020-23, compared with just one death in the previous four years. Researchers tied the soaring fatalities to the Trump administration’s decision to raise the height of the border wall from 17 feet to 30 feet as part of its “zero tolerance” immigration agenda.

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Civil War Risks Triggering ‘Epic, Biblical-Style Famine’ in Sudan

“Millions of lives and the peace and stability of an entire region are at stake,” warned the head of the World Food Program.

By Brett Wilkins. Published 3-6-2024 by Common Dreams

South Sudanese children at the Imvepi Refugee camp in Northern Uganda. Photo: UNMISS/flickr/CC

International humanitarian organizations warned Wednesday that Sudan’s civil war risks triggering severe famine unless the fighting stops.

Fighting between rival factions of Sudan’s military government broke out nearly 11 months ago and spread rapidly throughout the northeastern African nation of 46 million people. Around 15,000 people have been killed and nearly 6 million others displaced during the war, while an estimated 1.5 million Sudanese have fled the country as refugees.

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In ‘Massive Escalation’, Texas Sues to Shut Down Faith-Based Shelter for Helping Migrants

“If the work that Annunciation House conducts is illegal—so too is the work of our local hospitals, schools, and food banks,” said the nonprofit organization.

By Julia Conley. Published 2-21-2024 by Common Dreams

Annunciation House volunteers calling upon local and national leaders to welcome asylum-seekers with dignity. Photo: Annunciation House/Facebook

A faith-based migrant aid organization that’s operated in El Paso, Texas for nearly five decades said Wednesday that Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton ordered it to turn over documents about its work earlier this month—but that a lawsuit filed by Paxton has now made clear that his true goal is to shut down the group’s network of shelters.

Annunciation House, which provides food and housing for refugees and undocumented immigrants, received an order from the Consumer Protection Division of Paxton’s office on February 7, demanding that it turn over documents including legal service referrals, identifying information about asylum-seekers and migrants the group helped, and applications for federal funding. The organization was given one day to turn over the documents, and Paxton provided no explanation for the demand.

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Record 50 Million Children Now Displaced as Wars, Climate Crisis Rage

“When children lose their homes, they lose almost everything: their access to healthcare, education, food, and safety,” one advocate said.

By Olivia Rosane. Published 2-20-2024 by Common Dreams

Children in the area of Shangil Tobaya, Sudan. Photo: United Nations Photo/flickr/CC

The 10 biggest global crises—including Israel’s war on Gaza—forced more than 10 million children to flee their homes in 2023.

That figure likely puts the total number of displaced children at more than 50 million, a new record, Save the Children said in an analysis published Tuesday. The number of children displaced worldwide has also more than doubled from around 20.6 million in 2010. While the number of displaced people overall reached a record 114 million in October 2023, children are being pushed from their homes at an even faster rate than adults and face unique vulnerabilities.

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Yes, Republican states are now starting to emulate the Civil War-era south

The Texas governor rejecting federal immigration laws has echoes of the Confederate states

By Chrissy Stroop. Published 2-1-2024 by openDemocracy

A “border security” rally in Eagle Pass, Texas on February 3, 2024. Screenshot: KENS5

We’re not even a full month into a crucial election year in the United States, and it already feels like the country is coming apart at the seams.

In a standoff that has dragged on for weeks now, Texas governor Greg Abbott, a right-wing Catholic, has refused to allow federal Border Patrol agents to enter a public park along the Rio Grande where refugees and asylum seekers are known to cross. As summarised by Camilo Montoya-Galvez, reporting for CBS: “Federal law requires Border Patrol to process migrants who enter the US illegally to determine whether they should be deported, transferred to another federal agency, sent to a long-term immigration detention centre or released pending a review of their asylum claims.”

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GOP Congressman Suggests ‘Pinochet Air’ Death Flights for Migrants

“We wonder why the right-wingers aren’t freaking out about Trump’s dictator talk but we shouldn’t,” said one local Democratic leader in Georgia.

By Brett Wilkins. Published 2-2-2024 by Common Dreams

U.S. Rep. Mike Collins (R-Ga.) is seen here in a December 6, 2023 photo. 
(Photo: Mike Collins/Facebook)

A Republican congressman from Georgia on Thursday suggested a novel way to stem the influx of migrants at the southern border: throw them from helicopters into the sea.

Responding to a photo showing a migrant flipping off the camera following his release without bail from a New York City court, Rep. Mike Collins took to social media to reply to a post by Rep. Anthony D’Esposito (R-N.Y.) advising the young man to “holla at the cartels and have them escort you back.”

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20+ NGOs Condemn ‘Reckless’ Decision to Cut Off UNRWA Aid

“Countries must reverse these funding suspensions, uphold their duties towards the Palestinian people, and scale up humanitarian assistance for civilians in dire need in Gaza and the region.”

By Brett Wilkins. Published 1-29-2024 by Common Dreams

UNRWA school in Rafah, Gaza in 2009. Photo: ISM Palestine/flickr/CC

More than 20 humanitarian aid organizations on Monday condemned the decision by the United States and a growing list of nations to suspend funding for the United Nations agency that provides vital services to Palestinians suffering through a genocidal Israeli assault on the Gaza Strip.

Following Israeli claims—reportedly extracted from Palestinian prisoners in an interrogation regime rife with torture and abuse—that 12 of the more than 13,000 United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) workers in Gaza were involved in the October 7 Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel, the United States and nine other nations cut off funding to the largest humanitarian aid organization operating in the besieged coastal enclave.

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‘Dear Children of Gaza,’ Says Viral Letter, ‘I Am Sorry’

“You may ask the world why there was swift action when trade routes and economic interests were at risk but deafening silence when 10,000 children were killed,” wrote a British lawmaker. “The world might not like your questions, but you deserve your answers.”

By Julia Conley. Published 1=27-2024 by Common Dreams

Photo: Libertinus/CC

In a viral video released Friday, British member of Parliament Naz Shah, who represents the Labour Party, issued an apology to the roughly 1 million children of Gaza on behalf of world leaders who—despite Palestinian journalists’ live-streaming of Israel’s assault on the enclave and an international court’s finding that Israel is plausibly committing genocidal acts—refuse to see the impact the bombardment is having on civilians, including its youngest residents.

The video shows Shah writing a letter addressed to the “children of Gaza,” along with images of children being treated in hospitals, buried under rubble, and living in shelters since Israel began bombarding the enclave in retaliation for Hamas’ attack on October 7. Children are also seen gathered on a playground prior to the air and ground assaults that have so far killed more than 13,000 children.

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Biden Urged to Take ‘Control of the Texas National Guard’ as State Defies Supreme Court

Rep. Joaquin Castro, a Texas Democrat, accused Gov. Greg Abbott of “using the Texas National Guard to obstruct and create chaos at the border.”

By Olivia Rosane. Published 1-24-2024 by Common Dreams

Members of the Texas National Guard patrol the U.S. border with razor wire. (Photo: Greg Abbott/X)

Texas officials are defying a Monday Supreme Court ruling prohibiting them from blocking the federal government from removing razor wire installed by the state along the U.S. border with Mexico, prompting calls for the Biden administration to respond.

The Texas National Guard is barring the federal government from entering an area in Eagle Pass where it has installed the wire, as CBS’ Camilo Montoya-Galvez reported Tuesday.

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