Suspended U.S. refugee program separates families, stalls resettlement

Last year, Cing Cing Hlamyo and four oth­er Burmese fam­i­lies in Mis­souri pooled their mon­ey to join Wel­come Corps. Launched by Pres­i­dent Joe Biden’s admin­is­tra­tion in 2023, Wel­come Corps allowed peo­ple in the Unit­ed States to spon­sor refugees.

“When it opened, all the Burmese, they were so excit­ed,” she said. 

The group put mon­ey in a bank account for the expect­ed refugee. Then in Jan­u­ary, the pro­gram abrupt­ly shut down. “We’re just wait­ing. That’s all we can do now,” Hlamyo said. 

Wel­come Corps is just one facet of refugee reset­tle­ment in Amer­i­ca that Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump changed dra­mat­i­cal­ly when he began his sec­ond term Jan. 20. As part of a larg­er with­draw­al from inter­na­tion­al human­i­tar­i­an aid, Trump signed an exec­u­tive order halt­ing the U.S. Refugee Admis­sions Pro­gram. The State Depart­ment also end­ed fund­ing to local reset­tle­ment non­prof­its, though a law­suit lat­er restored some of that mon­ey. 

Across the coun­try, non­prof­its have closed their refugee reset­tle­ment pro­grams or are look­ing for new fund­ing sources, with many wait­ing to see if the pipeline will reopen. 

Fol­low­ing the fed­er­al Refugee Act of 1980, the U.S. built a for­mi­da­ble bureau­cra­cy to reset­tle peo­ple who face per­se­cu­tion abroad. Fed­er­al agen­cies vet appli­cants, many of whom live in refugee camps scat­tered across the globe. Once approved, a net­work of non­prof­its uses fed­er­al funds to help new­ly arrived refugees get on their feet. 

Trump’s re-elec­tion last year reflects a grow­ing ani­mos­i­ty among West­ern coun­tries toward glob­al­iza­tion. The pres­i­dent has denounced inter­na­tion­al insti­tu­tions like the Unit­ed Nations, which part­ners with the U.S. and oth­er coun­tries to reset­tle refugees. 

This year’s fed­er­al bud­get bill made refugees with­out a green card inel­i­gi­ble for ben­e­fits includ­ing the fed­er­al food assis­tance pro­gram. It also affect­ed their eli­gi­bil­i­ty for full Med­ic­aid ben­e­fits and the Children’s Health Insur­ance Pro­gram.

Bon­nie Gay of Prince­ton Alliance Church in New Jer­sey has seen the impact of refugees whose arrivals have been blocked.

 “Every sto­ry is one of trau­ma and loss,” said Gay, who leads the church’s Alliance for Refugees. “They come seek­ing safe­ty and a fresh start where they can put down roots in a place of wel­come and peace.”

No money for the American Dream

Some non­prof­its end­ed their refugee reset­tle­ment pro­grams entire­ly. 

Connecticut’s flag­ship reset­tle­ment agency, Inte­grat­ed Refugee and Immi­grant Ser­vices, lost $4 mil­lion in fed­er­al fund­ing. As a result, the agency closed offices in Hart­ford and New Haven.

War drove a Uni­ver­si­ty of Con­necti­cut stu­dent to flee from Bagh­dad, Iraq with her fam­i­ly. IRIS sup­plied the refugee fam­i­ly with food, a stu­dio apart­ment and legal coun­sel upon their arrival. 

The sec­ond-year stu­dent, who request­ed anonymi­ty, said she fears ongo­ing depor­ta­tions, but feels sup­port­ed in her new home­town of New Haven and with­in the com­mu­ni­ty she built at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Con­necti­cut. A uni­ver­si­ty soror­i­ty, Mu Sig­ma Upsilon, held a dona­tion dri­ve for IRIS in late Sep­tem­ber. “I am grate­ful for the edu­ca­tion and oppor­tu­ni­ties Amer­i­ca has giv­en me,” she said.

Some orga­ni­za­tions diver­si­fied their income streams to con­tin­ue offer­ing ser­vices to refugees years after their arrival. 

Trump’s exec­u­tive order con­tends the U.S. can’t absorb large num­bers of immi­grants — par­tic­u­lar­ly refugees — “in a man­ner that does not com­pro­mise the avail­abil­i­ty of resources for Amer­i­cans, that pro­tects their safe­ty and secu­ri­ty and that ensures the appro­pri­ate assim­i­la­tion of refugees.”

Hillary Baez, the refugee ser­vices assis­tant pro­gram man­ag­er of Catholic Char­i­ties of South­west Kansas saw the changes com­ing. “Our orga­ni­za­tion basi­cal­ly took that as an ini­tia­tive to try and find oth­er sources of fund­ing to ask for more dona­tions from our donors,” she said. 

The orga­ni­za­tion opened a thrift store and has plans to open three more “as just anoth­er way for us to keep our­selves run­ning,” Baez said. 

The U.S. Con­fer­ence of Catholic Bish­ops, one of 10 nation­al orga­ni­za­tions that part­nered with the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment to dis­trib­ute reset­tle­ment funds, announced in April it would end its part­ner­ship. Two Catholic Char­i­ties affil­i­ates — North­east Kansas and Cen­tral and North­ern Mis­souri — were among those that end­ed their local refugee reset­tle­ment pro­grams. 

When Catholic Char­i­ties of Cen­tral and North­ern Mis­souri in Jef­fer­son City dis­solved its refugee ser­vices in March, three of its employ­ees moved to City of Refuge in near­by Colum­bia.  

Refugees that the orga­ni­za­tion helped were direct­ed to City of Refuge and Del­la Lamb Com­mu­ni­ty Ser­vices, anoth­er non­prof­it, in Kansas City. 

Vis­i­tors tour­ing City of Refuge on a recent morn­ing saw civics class­es where refugees pre­pared for the cit­i­zen­ship test with ques­tions like: If the pres­i­dent and vice pres­i­dent are unable to serve, who takes over? Tour­ing guests knew the answer (the speak­er of the House) but couldn’t recall the cur­rent speaker’s name. 

“Mike John­son,” a man seat­ed in the class said under his breath. 

City of Refuge has con­tin­ued to pro­vide cit­i­zen­ship class­es even as the Trump admin­is­tra­tion cut fed­er­al fund­ing for sim­i­lar ser­vices to oth­er orga­ni­za­tions. Up to $500,000 in fed­er­al fund­ing for the non­prof­it will expire in Octo­ber 2026, and it’s not clear what fed­er­al fund­ing will be avail­able after. Because of that, the City of Refuge is look­ing to diver­si­fy its finan­cial sup­port.

Hlyamo is one exam­ple of what those who have ben­e­fit­ed from City of Refuge have accom­plished.

By many accounts, Hlamyo, one of more than 3.6 mil­lion refugees who entered the U.S. in the last 50 years, achieved the Amer­i­can dream. 

She was five months preg­nant and owned one jack­et when she and her hus­band arrived, their 18-month-old daugh­ter in tow, in Novem­ber 2009 to face their first Mid­west win­ter. 

Grow­ing up in Myan­mar was fraught. Hlamyo watched sol­diers beat her father – the mil­i­tary want­ed use of his truck, but its engine was bro­ken. They forced her fam­i­ly into unpaid labor. 

Hlamyo now enjoys the fruits of her hard work in Amer­i­ca. The moth­er of four owns an Asian gro­cery store, one of the few places in mid-Mis­souri where shop­pers can find frozen octo­pus, bit­ter mel­on, jack­fruit chips and South Asian spe­cial­ties. Her eldest daugh­ter is apply­ing for col­lege.  

No help for 2025 arrivals 

A court order required the Trump admin­is­tra­tion to admit refugees who had approved appli­ca­tions and con­firmed trav­el plans by Jan. 20. 

An attor­ney with the Inter­na­tion­al Refugee Assis­tance Project, which sued on behalf of reset­tle­ment agen­cies and refugees, said 70–100 peo­ple entered the coun­try as a result of the injunc­tion. 

Baez said Catholic Char­i­ties of South­west Kansas wel­comed three refugees from Eritrea, in East Africa, after Jan. 20 because the group already had flights to the US. 

How­ev­er, fed­er­al fund­ing cuts meant they couldn’t get assis­tance pre­vi­ous­ly avail­able to recent arrivals. Catholic Char­i­ties of South­west Kansas could still pro­vide ser­vices such as employ­ment and Eng­lish assis­tance. 

Tat­jana Bozhi­novs­ki, reset­tle­ment pro­gram direc­tor at Ethiopi­an Tewa­he­do Social Ser­vices in Colum­bus, Ohio, said her orga­ni­za­tion was affect­ed by the exec­u­tive order on day one.

A sin­gle moth­er with four chil­dren arrived on Jan. 17, and three days lat­er, Bozhi­novs­ki had to tell the fam­i­ly that the non­prof­it could no longer help them find hous­ing, enroll kids in school or find jobs. 

“You can’t pos­si­bly do that if you have a heart and if you have a soul,” Bozhi­novs­ki said. Ethiopi­an Tewa­he­do Social Ser­vices lost 75% of its staff, many of them refugees, as a result of the fed­er­al mon­ey freeze. 

Some peo­ple with con­firmed trav­el plans were still unable to enter fol­low­ing the exec­u­tive order.  

Tyler Reeve of Com­mu­ni­ty Refugee & Immi­gra­tion Ser­vices in Colum­bus helped some mem­bers of a fam­i­ly arrive on Jan. 17. The rest were unable to enter, even though they were approved as refugees and had pur­chased plane tick­ets for Feb­ru­ary. The fam­i­ly is sep­a­rat­ed indef­i­nite­ly. Lay­offs left the orga­ni­za­tion with no full-time reset­tle­ment staff. 

Jew­ish Fam­i­ly Ser­vices in Colum­bus lost more than $2 mil­lion.

Tariq Mohamed, the nonprofit’s senior direc­tor of refugee ser­vices, wel­comed a teenage boy and girl right before Jan. 20, expect­ing their par­ents and the rest of their sib­lings to arrive in Feb­ru­ary. The fam­i­ly does­n’t know when they will see each oth­er again.

The non­prof­it has been able to con­tin­ue some of its oth­er pro­grams, includ­ing help­ing refugees already in the U.S. find employ­ment, reg­is­ter their kids for school and get vac­cines, as fed­er­al fund­ing still exists for those.

From Oct. 1 to Jan. 20, Jew­ish Fam­i­ly Ser­vices reset­tled 184 peo­ple, doing an entire year’s worth of work in three months before the order passed, in antic­i­pa­tion of Trump’s actions. 

Under Biden’s admin­is­tra­tion, refugee admis­sions for the fis­cal year 2024, which end­ed last Octo­ber, reached 100,034, the high­est annu­al total since 1995.

“It was a big, big ramp up over the last few years,” said Paul Costi­gan, Missouri’s state refugee coor­di­na­tor. 

Few new arrivals

A spokesper­son for the State Depart­ment, which over­sees the refugee reset­tle­ment pro­gram, did not pro­vide num­bers when asked how many refugees have entered the coun­try since Trump took office this year. 

The Trump admin­is­tra­tion is con­sid­er­ing a new annu­al ceil­ing of 7,500 for fis­cal year 2026, which start­ed Oct. 1, accord­ing to report­ing by The New York Times.

The Mis­souri Office of Refugee Admin­is­tra­tion used to get month­ly reports from the State Depart­ment on how many refugees to expect and how many ulti­mate­ly arrived. Those reports ceased in Jan­u­ary, said Costi­gan. 

Prince­ton Alliance Church in Plains­boro, New Jer­sey, estab­lished refugee ser­vices in 2023 with approval from the State Depart­ment. It wel­comed 135 immi­grants before the exec­u­tive order. The church had expect­ed anoth­er 100 peo­ple this year, but only 26 made it in the wan­ing days of the Biden admin­is­tra­tion.

Two peo­ple sched­uled to arrive in late Jan­u­ary had their tick­ets can­celed, said Gay, the exec­u­tive direc­tor of the church’s Alliance for Refugees. 

Under pre­vi­ous admin­is­tra­tions, Jew­ish Voca­tion­al Ser­vice was Kansas City’s largest refugee reset­tle­ment agency. In fis­cal years 2023 and 2024, the agency reset­tled 409 and 630 refugees, respec­tive­ly. Fol­low­ing Jan. 20, the agency has served only 60 new arrivals.

Reese Taw’s work at Jew­ish Voca­tion­al Ser­vice is per­son­al. A mem­ber of Karen, an eth­nic minor­i­ty group in Myan­mar, Taw and his fam­i­ly arrived in the U.S. as refugees when he was nine. A reset­tle­ment agency helped his fam­i­ly adjust to life in Amer­i­ca. 

“I get to help the same peo­ple that were in my posi­tion a while ago because I can relate to the frus­tra­tion,” Taw said. “Just being able to serve the com­mu­ni­ty, as a whole, it’s ful­fill­ing to me.”

Taw was one of 12 employ­ees the non­prof­it laid off in March. He was rehired, but the orga­ni­za­tion is grap­pling with fund­ing loss. “We’ll try to sur­vive as long as we can, but we’ll see what hap­pens,” Taw said.

States assume larger role

Look­ing to the future, Costi­gan of the Mis­souri refugee office pre­dicts an over­hauled refugee reset­tle­ment pro­gram where states have more con­trol. Some states are already putting their own fund­ing behind pro­grams cut by the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment.

New Jer­sey Demo­c­ra­t­ic Gov. Phil Mur­phy cre­at­ed the state’s Office of New Amer­i­cans in 2019, amid Trump’s first-term immi­gra­tion crack­down. New Jer­sey had at least $1 mil­lion cut since Trump returned to office in Jan­u­ary, state bud­get doc­u­ments show. Mur­phy pledged to dou­ble the state’s sup­port for its ini­tia­tives. 

New Jer­sey law­mak­ers this year boost­ed the state-run Refugee Reset­tle­ment Pro­gram to $29.5 mil­lion, six times greater than the pre­vi­ous year. The mon­ey goes to sev­en non­prof­its, which offer refugees cash, case man­age­ment, job assis­tance, health expens­es and oth­er aid. 

Con­necti­cut Gov. Ned Lam­ont signed a bill in March allo­cat­ing $2.8 mil­lion to pro­grams tar­get­ed by the Trump admin­is­tra­tion. IRIS, New Haven’s flag­ship reset­tle­ment agency, and anoth­er orga­ni­za­tion received a total of approx­i­mate­ly $500,000.

Peo­ple involved in refugee reset­tle­ment say the com­mit­ment from local com­mu­ni­ties has remained steady. 

Jew­ish Voca­tion­al Ser­vice saw an out­pour­ing of sup­port from the Kansas City com­mu­ni­ty after los­ing its fed­er­al fund­ing for refugee ser­vices.

At a Sep­tem­ber meet­ing in Joplin, a city of 53,000 in south­west Mis­souri, peo­ple from the fire depart­ment, com­mu­ni­ty col­lege and city gov­ern­ment showed up to coor­di­nate assis­tance for recent­ly arrived refugees. 

“The com­mu­ni­ty com­mit­ment is there,” Costi­gan said.

This arti­cle was pro­duced through the State­house Report­ing Project, a col­lab­o­ra­tive effort by col­le­giate jour­nal­ism pro­grams across the coun­try. Anna Heqi­mi and Kar­la Perez are senior jour­nal­ism majors at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Con­necti­cut.