White House Has Remarkable Immigration Policy

[From article]
[White House] directive that the U.S. admit 10,000 Syrian refugees as a humanitarian measure has many hallmarks of his governing style: it lacks a proper legal basis; it will harm rather than help its purported beneficiaries; it will undermine important American interests; and it is designed to signal virtue rather than accomplish anything.
As to the legal basis of the directive, U.S. immigration law is specific. To enter the U.S. as a refugee, one must have a “well-founded fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion.” The program is not a free-floating humanitarian enterprise.
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Whatever one thinks of overall U.S. immigration policy, throwing open the doors to the dispossessed to this extent and in preference to all others desirous of coming here is not going to happen, and should not.
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As Prof. Michael McConnell observes, applying this “persecution test” would lead us to favor “Christians who are being singled out for religious persecution…. So also Yazidis, Mandaeans, and a few other smaller groups.” At present, only two percent of the Syrian refugees admitted to the U.S. are Christian.
McConnell also says that there are “credible reports” that Christians in the refugee camps are terrorized and driven out, which is why they are not in the pool from which the UN draws the candidates for admission to the U.S.. So it should be noted that, under the immigration statute, no person who participated in “the persecution of any person on the basis of race, religion, nationality…social group or political opinion” is eligible for refugee status.
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the incentives for anyone to put much faith in U.S. promises is small. If we want help in the future, we must be able to promise individuals that they will be protected.
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The situation in the nations closest to Syria -- Turkey, Jordan, Lebanon -- is appalling, as almost 10 million displaced Syrians are maintained in camps, where they will remain indefinitely.
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Resettling a refugee in the U.S. costs about $13,000 annually,
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Studies found that 30 percent of displaced Syrians oppose efforts to degrade ISIL, a number consistent with the views of other Middle East populations. So almost a third of the refugees let it will be ISIS sympathizers, assuming that no one would be foolish enough to disqualify him/herself by admitting this during the vetting process.

http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2015/11/the_syrian_refugee_program_has_the_hallmarks_of_the_obama_style_.html

November 28, 2015
The Syrian Refugee Program Has the Hallmarks of the Obama Style
By James V. DeLong