Among his first wave of executive orders signed on Jan. 20, President Trump suspended the U.S. refugee program.

“As one of the 10 refugee resettlement agencies in the U.S., HIAS is dismayed at the Trump administration’s decision to suspend the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program,” the immigration and refugee group said. “While the suspension indicates the opportunity for case-by-case exceptions, it will place refugees waiting overseas for admission in immediate potential danger.”

“America is at its best when we welcome refugees,” said HIAS President Mark Hetfield.  “We are appalled by the callousness that this administration is taking toward victims of violence and persecution. Refugee resettlement is a safe and legal pathway, it is a longstanding, bipartisan tradition, it strengthens our national security, and it brings enormous economic and cultural benefits to our communities.” HIAS is ready to work with the Trump administration to restart the program as quickly as possible and to continue to provide an orderly and secure pathway for refugees who have fled religious and other forms of persecution. “

Global Refuge, one of the nation’s oldest and largest refugee resettlement nonprofits, expressed profound concern over today’s suspension of the USRAP.

“The refugee program is not just a humanitarian lifeline through which the U.S. has shown global leadership. It represents the gold standard of legal immigration pathways in terms of security screening, community coordination, and mutual economic benefit,” said Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, President and CEO of Global Refuge.

She noted that refugees “undergo rigorous vetting, including multiple background checks by national security agencies, before ever setting foot on American soil. Their integration is coordinated through close collaboration between federal agencies, local stakeholders, and nonprofit organizations, including many faith-based groups, positioning them to quickly become vital contributors to their new communities. The US Refugee Admissions Program was designed and ameliorated over four decades precisely to address the concerns used to suspend it today.”

“As an emboldened Trump Administration prepares for a new crackdown on immigrants, history offers lessons on the cost of silence,” writes Michael Luo in the New Yorker, drawing parallels with Chinese exclusion efforts in the U.S. in the late 1800s.

“The scale of what Trump has promised is difficult to fathom and without recent precedent. A century and a half ago, however, a movement to cast out a different group of people began to accelerate in the United States,” he writes in his piece, “History’s Lessons on Anti-Immigrant Extremism.”

Luo notes that much of the anti-Chinese sentiment in the 1800s in the U.S. was driven by economic anxiety experienced by white workers in the West.

But he cites studies showing that the removal of Chinese workers did little in the way of helping those workers.

“One of the tragedies of Chinese exclusion is that the anger toward the immigrants was likely misplaced. Chinese workers were not usually in direct competition with white workers.”

This past fall, a group of economists released a working paper on the impact of the Chinese Exclusion Act on Western states, noted Luo.

“They found that it took a significant toll on the economies of Arizona, California, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, Washington, and Wyoming—the states with the largest Chinese populations––until at least 1940.”

The economists also found “no evidence that the average white worker benefitted from the departure of the Chinese” and concluded that the positive effects of Chinese immigrants in the workforce, “including the economies of scale achieved by their presence, outweighed any employment opportunities that emerged from their absence,” the article noted.

Pope Francis has named Cardinal Robert McElroy, bishop of San Diego, “to be the next Roman Catholic archbishop of Washington, moving one of his most vocal allies on immigration to one of the most prominent posts in the American church,” the New York Times reported on January 6.

Speaking at the Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle in Washington, McElroy said, “The Catholic church teaches that a nation has the right to control its borders and our nation’s desire to do that is a legitimate effort.”

At the same time, “we are called always to have a sense of the dignity of every human person. And thus, plans that have been talked about at some levels of having a wider, indiscriminate, massive deportation across the country would be something that would be incompatible with Catholic doctrine.”

The recent fall of Syria’s longtime dictator Bashar Al-Assad is causing the Syrian diaspora across the globe to consider a key question — is now the right time to return home to Syria or does the instability that has been caused by Assad’s fall mean it remains too risky to depart from their host countries?

“Until last week, the idea of being able to go back home seemed an impossible dream for many Syrian refugees. Now, the fall of Syria’s dictator Bashar Assad has opened the door for their return,” writes Politico’s Clothilde Goujard. “While some have already headed back, many more harbor worries about the future of their country or feel reluctant to leave the lives they’ve built over as much as a decade abroad.”

For many Syrian refugees, “the decision to repatriate depends on where they now live. Millions of Syrian refugees reside in countries bordering Syria — Lebanon, Turkey, and Jordan — and endure precarious conditions in crowded and destitute refugee camps. Others are internally displaced within Syria,” Vox reported

Meanwhile, some host countries are encouraging and in some cases providing financial incentives for Syrian refugees to return to Syria.

For example, Austria’s conservative-led government said on Friday it is offering Syrian refugees a “return bonus” of 1,000 euros to move return to their home country, Reuters reported.

Canada’s immigration minister plans to propose measures “to reform the country’s refugee system, potentially fast-tracking refusals of cases deemed to have little chance of succeeding,” Reuters reported on Nov. 26.

“Experts and advocates warned that could violate asylum-seekers’ right to due process and could be challenged in court,” wrote Reuters reporter Anna Paperny.

“I plan to put forward more measures. I want to reform the system. It’s not working in the way it should,” Immigration Minister Marc Miller told a parliamentary committee on Monday.

The UN refugee agency (UNHCR) has launched a $10 billion appeal for 2025 to meet critical needs and implement sustainable solutions for millions of refugees, displaced persons and stateless people worldwide.

The agency’s Global Appeal “comes amid escalating humanitarian crises, as conflict, persecution and the growing impacts of climate change continue to force millions from their homes,” UNHCR said.

The appeal focuses on three primary areas: emergency response, inclusion, and long-term solutions.

In an era where xenophobia is on the rise across the globe and countries are looking to restrict the flow of immigrants and refugees, Spain is going against the grain by recently announcing it will legalize 300,000 undocumented migrants a year, starting next May and through 2027.

“The policy aims to expand the aging country’s workforce and allow foreigners living in Spain without proper documentation to obtain work permits and residency. Spain has largely remained open to receiving migrants even as other European nations seek to tighten their borders to illegal crossings and asylum seekers,” the Voice of America reported.

Spain “has been largely receptive to migrants even as other European countries such as Italy and Germany seek to tighten border controls,” Reuters reported.

Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez “has often described his government’s migration policies as a means to combat the country’s low birthrate. In August, Sánchez visited three West African nations in an effort to address irregular migration to Spain’s Canary Islands,” the Los Angeles Times reported.

The Biden Administration recently committed to the admission of up to 125,000 refugees to the United States during Fiscal Year (FY) 2025.

“We commend the Biden administration for its steadfast efforts to rebuild the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program,” said Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, President and CEO of Global Refuge.

“Resettling 100,000 refugees, a figure surpassing the three previous fiscal years combined, represents a milestone achievement signaling renewed U.S. humanitarian leadership. Thanks to this administration’s commitment, these families have found safety, hope, and a sense of belonging in communities that are eager to embrace them as neighbors, friends, congregants, and co-workers,” she said.

“The IRC commends the Biden administration’s efforts to rebuild and revitalize the refugee admissions program of four years prior, through which the IRC has been a proud partner by resettling 29,611 refugees that arrived through the refugee pipeline since FY21, as well as an additional 12,228 Afghan allies arriving on Special Immigrant Visas (SIVs),” the International Rescue Committee said.