Marking the Biden Administration's Progress in Restoring the US Refugee Admissions Program

The US Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP) has provided a lifeline to millions of refugees, with over 3 million having been resettled over the past fifty years. Despite this success, the resettlement program has experienced setbacks at times in its history, from the period immediately following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, to the four year period under the Trump administration, when resettlement numbers hit an all-time low. USRAP also has met turbulence at other points in its history, but not to the degree that the survival of the program was in question.

In truth, the USRAP has been a useful tool in extending US influence globally by helping to ease humanitarian crises around the world and encouraging other nations to keep their borders open to refugee flows. The combination of US foreign aid and resettlement capacity has been effective in mitigating refugee crises and preventing the further destabilization of volatile regions. It is a vital component of the US foreign policy tool box which has served the national interest.

Moreover, the USRAP represents a prime example of a successful public-private partnership, in which the government has partnered with non-profit service agencies to provide comprehensive resettlement and integration services to newly arrived refugees. Refugees received through the program obtain employment in an average of one year and full self-sufficiency within five years, fully contributing their talents to the US economy and US communities. According to a 2024 report by the Department of Health and Human Services, refugees and asylees contributed a net $124 billion to the US economy over a 15-year period. [1] The program is also one of the most secure in the US government, as refugees are strictly vetted, undergoing numerous government-wide security checks.

The Negative Impact of the Trump Administration

In measuring the progress made by the Biden administration in restoring the USRAP, an assessment of the policies pursued by the Trump administration—and the damage they caused—is required. In one of his first acts after his inauguration, President Trump suspended refugee admissions for several months, until May 2017, and reset the refugee ceiling from 110,000 to 50,000 for FY 2017. He also imposed a Muslim ban, banning refugees from seven Muslim-majority countries. As a result, the number of refugees resettled from the last year of the Obama administration to Trump’s first year dropped from 84,994 refugees in FY 2016 to 53,716 in FY 2017—a reduction of 34 percent. [2]

From the initial suspension of the program, the numbers resettled dwindled in successive years, leaving thousands of refugees already vetted for US resettlement in limbo overseas and placing them at increased risk. In FY 2018, Trump’s first full year, the number of admissions fell to 22,666, and then increased slightly to 30,000 in FY 2019. [3] In FY 2020, Trump set a record low refugee ceiling of 15,000 and suspended the program again for part of the fiscal year because of the COVID pandemic. As a result, the program resettled 11,814 refugees in FY 2020 and 11,411 in FY 2021, an all-time low. [4] From 2016-2020, the number of refugees admitted to the United States dropped by 86 percent.

Trump’s refugee admission reductions led to a severe drop in funding to the program during these years, significantly weakening the infrastructure needed to support the resettlement program. Overseas processing, including identification, adjudication, and orientation services, were drastically reduced, stalling the refugee pipeline.

On the domestic side, resettlement sites, operated mainly by non-profit partners, were reduced by over 30 percent due to funding cuts. Trump’s executive order to allow governors to deny the resettlement of refugees in their States also had a detrimental effect. The overall impact of these policies led to the serious weakening of the program. Had the Trump administration won re-election, it is possible that the USRAP would have been so crippled as to nearly kill the program altogether.

The Biden Administration’s Slow But Sure Efforts to Restore the Program to Health

In 2020, the Center for Migration Studies of New York (CMS), in cooperation with Refugee Council USA, issued a report [5] outlining the improvements needed to restore the US Refugee Admissions Program. Among its findings, the report concluded that the Trump administration had severely underfunded the program and that drastic steps were needed to save it.

The primary recommendations of the report included restoring the infrastructure of the program by providing sufficient funding to the refugee resettlement agencies to rebuild their capacity; establishing higher refugee ceilings each year to increase admissions, consistent with the capacity of the agencies; and involving the public in helping to welcome refugees to the United States. How has the Biden administration done in meeting these goals?

Taking office in early 2021, the Biden administration inherited a program on life support. On February 4, 2021, President Biden issued an executive order outlining steps to rebuild the USRAP. The executive order revoked the Trump rule that allowed states to opt out of the resettlement program. It also emphasized the need to expedite refugee processing without sacrificing security and to increase the number of “circuit rides” globally by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to interview refugee resettlement candidates. As a result, DHS conducted 91,000 interviews in FY 2023, more than double the interviews in FY 2022.

However, President Biden made a strategic mistake by telling program supporters shortly after his election that he would set a ceiling of 125,000 refugees in his first year, then reversed course—first establishing a record low ceiling of 15,000 before increasing it to 62,500. Given the time it would take to get the program back to regular processing and resettlement, Biden’s pledge turned out to be an unrealistic goal which created unrealistic expectations among Capitol Hill allies and advocates.

Once Congress began returning funding to historic levels, however, the resettlement arrivals inched up to 25,465 in FY 2022 and jumped to 60,014 in FY 2023, with both years having a presidential determination of 125,000. For FY 2024, the pace of resettlement projects to be over 90,000 by the end of the fiscal year, about 75 percent of the 125,000 target originally promised by President Biden. [6]

Figure 1. US Refugee Admissions and Admissions Ceiling by Fiscal Year

Source: Department of State, Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration, Admissions as of May 31, 2024

* Year in progress—projected total of 90,000

In increasing the resettlement numbers from 11,411 in FY 2021 to a projected 90,000 in FY 2024, the administration has focused upon resettling refugees from needy regions which were neglected under Trump. For example, under the Trump administration, only 1,348 refugees were taken in from Latin America in FY 2020 and FY 2021, while nearly 23,000 refugees from the Latin American region are expected to be resettled in FY 2023 and FY 2024. Under Trump, only 10,379 refugees were taken from Africa—perhaps the region most in need—in FY 2020 and FY 2021, while Biden will have resettled over 70,000 refugees from Africa during his term by the end of FY 2024. [7]

Additional Initiatives

The Biden administration has used other legal tools to bring in large numbers of refugees outside of the USRAP. The primary tool, which has engendered opposition from Republicans, is humanitarian parole. Humanitarian parole can be used by the president to protect immigrants or refugees, which provides them legal status and work authorization. It does not, however, grant a path to permanent residency like refugees who come through the USRAP. This can become a problem, as Congress must pass legislation, such as the Afghan Adjustment Act, to provide them a path to permanent status, an unlikely outcome in the current political environment.

Two large refugee populations—Afghans and Ukrainians—have benefited from this legal avenue. Biden paroled approximately 76,000 Afghans in 2021 when the United States pulled out of Afghanistan—a needed policy to help avert a humanitarian catastrophe. In addition, over 190,000 Ukrainians who have fled the Russian invasion of Ukraine have benefited from humanitarian parole under the Uniting for Ukraine program.

The Cuban, Haitian, Nicaraguan, and Venezuelan (CHNV) parole program, created by the Department of Homeland Security in early 2023, has brought in 435,000 total arrivals from the four countries to the United States as of the end of April 2024. While technically not considered refugees, they hail from nations beset by civil unrest and political oppression.

Finally, the administration has increased the capacity of the Special Immigrant Visa Program (SIV), a category created by Congress in 2010. These visas are allocated mainly to Afghan and Iraqi nationals who worked for the United States during the conflicts in those countries and are at great risk of reprisal in their countries. In FY 2024, the United States has accepted 21,219 as of the end of May 2024, with a projected 30,000 expected by the end of the year.

Other initiatives of note which could grow in future years include the Welcome Corps, a new model in which US citizens can support refugee families using their own resources. In the first year of the program, which began in January 2023, more than 15,000 US citizens applied to sponsor 7,000 refugees for resettlement to the United States. The introduction of Safe Mobility Offices (SMOs), a series of offices in Latin America which allow refugees to have their case reviewed by the US government in their area and be considered for resettlement, has also helped. Since its creation in April 2023, the USRAP has accepted 21,000 refugees for admission identified and referred by the SMOs, with 9,000 already having arrived in the United States.

Although in their infancy, these initiatives have the potential to aid, support, and protect refugees who otherwise might not have access to the USRAP. The State Department also has launched a small program to consider refugee cases referred by non-governmental organizations in the field, opening access to the program to refugees beyond those identified and referred by UNHCR.

Back to the Future: Retrenchment or Moving Forward?

Of course, the outcome of the presidential election in November will significantly impact the trajectory of the USRAP over the next four years. A Trump victory would likely lead to a dismantling of the Biden administration’s structural improvements, as his administration could seek to downsize, if not eliminate, the program permanently.

Under a second Trump term, the program likely would remain open to a small number of refugees deemed worthy for resettlement by the administration, as was done in his first term. The use of humanitarian parole to provide protection to populations in emergency situations would certainly not be used, if not eliminated altogether. Afghans and Iraqis who helped us in the wars might be left behind and the extensive NGO refugee resettlement network would again be severely weakened, forcing a future administration to help resurrect it in the years ahead.

A second Biden term would certainly help him achieve his initial pledge of resettling 125,000 refugees a year, plus could allow for other administration initiatives, such as the Welcome Corps and SMOs, to take root. The USRAP also could continue to be deployed as an effective US foreign policy tool to help address difficult political situations globally and to reduce human suffering.

Looking at the facts, it is clear that the future of the USRAP will be greatly affected—positively or negatively—by the outcome of the November presidential election. The fate of hundreds of thousands of refugees around the world could be at stake, as it is unlikely that other nations would or could fill the void to protect them.

Using the 2020 CMS/RCUSA report as a barometer, the Biden administration has made major steps in advancing the resettlement and integration of refugees globally. Refugee admissions are on pace to reach 90,000 refugees by the end of the fiscal year, and, through the introduction of the Welcome Corps and other resettlement initiatives, public involvement in the program is growing. Should the administration continue, the program could reach greater heights in the years ahead, giving the United States a strengthened humanitarian tool to extend its influence globally.

[1] US Health and Human Services Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, “The Fiscal Impact of Refugees and Asylees at the Federal, State, and Local Levels from 2005-2019.

[2] Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration. US Refugee Admissions Program, Admissions and Arrival Report, November, 2017.

[3] Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration. US Refugee Admissions Program, Admissions and Arrival Report, FY 2018-2019.

[4] Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration. US Refugee Admissions Program, Admissions and Arrival Report, November 2021.

[5] Center for Migration Studies of New York and Refugee Council USA, “Charting a Course to Rebuild and Strengthen the US Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP): Findings and Recommendations from the Center for Migration Studies Refugee Resettlement Survey: 2020. February 16, 2021. cmsny.org.

[6] Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration. US Refugee Admissions Program, Admissions and Arrival Report, June, 2024.

[7] Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration, US Refugee Admissions Program, Admissions and Arrival Report, June 2024.

June 12, 2024