BALTIMORE — In response to President Trump’s State of the Union address Tuesday night, World Relief issues the following remarks:
“We are heartened by the President’s promise to work with Congress in a bipartisan fashion on multiple initiatives. Likewise, we are convinced that our nation is poised to achieve a permanent legislative solution to protect 1.8 million Dreamers and provide for them a pathway to citizenship. While we celebrate this progress, we also pray this is just the beginning of a more compassionate posture toward immigrants who face various kinds of vulnerability.
While recent weeks have sparked hope that we are beginning to turn a corner and make progress on a plan to protect Dreamers, we are still eager for the administration to commit to resettling 45,000 refugees this fiscal year and ensure that we remain a more welcoming country for the persecuted. We in particular are concerned about the 60% reduction in the resettlement of Christian refugees who remain in dangerous situations around the world. The United States must continue to be a beacon of hope and freedom for the world’s persecuted by being more welcoming of them to our shores.
We also remain concerned about the potential cuts to family-based immigration. God ordained the family as the cornerstone of society, and we believe that our country is stronger when our citizens can be quickly reunited with their close family members. For some U.S. citizens, the waiting period can be years or even decades. We urge Congress to facilitate the unity of immigrant families rather than make drastic cuts to our current family-based immigration avenues.
Our conviction remains unchanged, that immigrants and refugees are an asset, not a liability to America. Our policies should facilitate legal immigration so as to reunite families, spur economic growth, and restore our role as a beacon of safety for those fleeing persecution. This nation will not thrive in isolation, but it will thrive when it welcomes families, and the gifts and abilities they bring with them, from all walks of life and from every corner of the globe.”
To learn more about World Relief’s efforts to care for refugees already in the United States and in vulnerable communities around the world, visit: worldrelief.org/welcome.
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World Relief is a global humanitarian aid and development organization that stands with the vulnerable and partners with local churches to end the cycle of suffering, transform lives and build sustainable communities. With over 70 years of experience, World Relief has 25 offices in the United States that specialize in refugee and immigration services and works in 20 countries worldwide through disaster response, health and child development, economic development and peacebuilding.
Website | www.WorldRelief.org Twitter | @WorldRelief
