The Biden administration’s roadmap to allowing up to 100,000 Ukrainian war refugees into the United States is drawing concern that the program may end up putting some of the most desperate refugees at the back of the line.
“While the new parole program for Ukrainians is welcome progress, it is by no means a substitute for rebuilding the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program,” said Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, president of the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, a refugee resettlement organization. “Multiple crises in the last year alone have added to unprecedented global displacement, all of which require the administration to lead by example in using refugee resettlement to the fullest extent possible.”
The program, “Uniting for Ukraine,” was announced last week as the formalization of a long-promised process for getting Ukrainian refugees into the country. Under the process, eligible Ukrainians with a fiscal sponsor in the United States who undergo background vetting will be authorized to enter the country for up to two years.
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After that period, refugees will be eligible for employment authorization. Both individuals and organizations can apply to sponsor Ukrainian refugees through the Department of Homeland Security—with an initial requirement of financial support for the refugee.
The majority of those who enter will receive humanitarian parole, which does not grant benefits or create a pathway for permanent legal status in the United States.
“We will help deliver on the president’s commitment to welcome 100,000 Ukrainian citizens and others forced to flee their homes in Ukraine,” said Secretary of State Antony Blinken, a grandson of refugees and longtime supporter of expanding admissions, “and our partnership with the Department of Homeland Security will help us fulfill that commitment.”
Since Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine two months ago, more than 5 million people have fled the country, putting an enormous humanitarian strain on American allies in Central Europe. But due to visa restrictions preventing Ukrainians from seeking traditional entry, as well as a refugee admissions process that the previous administration actively dismantled, the United States only resettled a dozen Ukrainian refugees in the entire month of March.
On Thursday, Biden called the plan a “direct means” by which Ukrainian refugees can enter the United States without having to take circuitous routes through the U.S.-Mexico border.
“Fly directly to the United States,” Biden told reporters following remarks from the Roosevelt Room, calling on Congress to allocate increased aid to meet the embattled country’s military and humanitarian needs. “We set up a mechanism whereby they can come directly with a visa.”
But the program’s emphasis on Ukrainians who have familial connections to the United States, and its reliance on relatives who have the money to be the fiscal sponsors of would-be refugees for up to two years, risks privileging refugees with resources over those who are even more disadvantaged.
“We are disappointed to see the administration outsource its moral obligation to support newly arrived Ukrainians,” O’Mara Vignarajah said. “Without access to traditional refugee resettlement benefits, we urge policy makers to consider implementing some semblance of a safety net for those rebuilding their lives from scratch.”
The administration has defended the temporary nature of the resettlement program for Ukrainians—which could result in some eventually losing their residency status—by saying the majority of refugees hope to return to their homeland as soon as they can safely do so.
“Our goal is to see to it that this conflict is put to an end as quickly as possible, and that Ukrainians and others who have been forced to flee Ukraine are able to return to a secure, stable, peaceful, democratic Ukraine just as soon as possible,” Ned Price, press secretary for the State Department, told reporters last week. “For many Ukrainians, they are looking for a temporary safe haven, and the United States for some individuals may be appropriate.”
Biden’s initial vow to admit as many as 100,000 Ukrainians echoed the commitment he made in May 2021 to increase the ceiling for refugee admissions into the United States to 125,000 people. But fewer than 6,500 people were granted entry through refugee resettlement programs five months into the fiscal year. The anemic pace has refugee advocates concerned, both over the beleaguered system’s capacity for processing refugees and over the perceived focus on resettling white Ukrainians over others who have waited for years to be admitted.
“Clearly, Uniting for Ukraine is a major and important re-envisioning of our refugee processing capacity in the U.S. and this kind of innovative and creative solution has the opportunity to be life-changing for people who have been torn from their homes and communities,” said Ben Johnson, executive director of the American Immigration Lawyers Association. “But the obvious differences in treatment of disparate populations is inexcusable. America should be welcoming refugees and asylum seekers who are being persecuted in an equitable and just manner.”
Many who have lobbied the administration on refugee policy are frustrated by the juxtaposition between the government’s response to the Ukrainian refugee crisis and its mishandling of the Afghan refugee crisis.
“U.S. agencies dragged their feet and threw up their hands at logistical obstacles of their own making, all while Afghans spent millions of dollars on application fees for humanitarian programs it now appears the U.S. never had a real plan to administer,” said Adam Bates, the policy counsel at the International Refugee Assistance Project. “The Uniting for Ukraine program shows that if the Biden administration truly cared about its promise to protect Afghans, the U.S. can do so much more. It should start now.”
Like much of Biden’s immigration policy, the root of many critiques of the state of refugee and asylum admissions lies in Title 42, the public health order implemented under President Donald Trump that effectively bars asylum seekers at the U.S.-Mexico border from pursuing their legal right to asylum in the United States. The ability of Ukrainians to sidestep the Title 42 restrictions—now suspended with the implementation of Uniting for Ukraine—has infuriated immigrant advocates who have fought the policy for years while hundreds of thousands of would-be refugees have waited on the Mexican side of the border since the pandemic began more than two years ago.
“Many Ukrainians who are already en route or at the U.S. southern border and are being expelled based on the Title 42 border expulsion policy,” Johnson said. “Their plight is drawing a huge spotlight on the President’s continued use of an unjustifiable policy to expel and block asylum seekers at the U.S. border.”
The White House, which did not respond to a request for comment about whether it had considered direct government sponsorship of Ukrainian refugees, has maintained that its continued enforcement of Title 42—which is scheduled to be repealed at the end of May, although some Democrats are hoping to stall it—is a public health decision, rather than a political one.
