The establishment media has largely ignored Donald Trump’s June 22 speech in New York, but it is definitely worth reading or watching because of Trump’s precisely targeted attacks on the soft underbelly of Hillary Clinton’s campaign and its deft exposure of the hypocrisy of the left on lifting America’s cities out of the mire of drugs, poverty and violence in which they have been consigned by decades of Democratic misrule. [Here is a link to a transcript of Trump’s speech.]
Trump made the case this way:
Hillary wants to spend hundreds of billions to resettle Middle Eastern refugees in the United States, on top of the current record level of immigration.
For the amount of money Hillary Clinton would like to spend on refugees, we could rebuild every inner city in America.
And Trump is right.
The Obama administration (aided and abetted by Paul Ryan and the Republican establishment) has entered into a corrupt bargain with the far-Left refugee resettlement industry.
As our friend Ann Corcoran of Refugee Resettlement Watch has documented, refugees and other smaller humanitarian admission groups are eligible for ALL federal, state and local welfare programs 30 days after arrival.
Refugee access to welfare on the same basis as a U.S. citizen has made the program a global magnet.
The federal programs available to them include:
- Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), formerly known as AFDC
- Medicaid
- Food Stamps
- Public Housing
- Supplemental Security Income (SSI)
- Social Security Disability Insurance
- Administration on Developmental Disabilities (ADD) (direct services only)
- Child Care and Development Fund
- Independent Living Program
- Job Opportunities for Low Income Individuals (JOLI)
- Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP)
- Postsecondary Education Loans and Grants
- Refugee Assistance Programs
- Title IV Foster Care and Adoption Assistance Payments if parents are qualified immigrants – refugees, asylees, etc.
- Title XX Social Services Block Grant Funds
As some Americans are pushed off of time-limited welfare programs, many refugees are going on to lifetime cash assistance programs.
For instance, 12.7% of refugees are on SSI—a lifetime entitlement to a monthly check/Medicaid for elderly or disabled. This rate of usage is at least 4 times higher than the rate of usage for SSI among the native-born population and is reportedly rising from these already very high levels.
Permanent and intergenerational welfare dependence has been allowed to take hold and, truth be told, encouraged to a significant degree in some refugee groups.
Nothing captures how the “iron triangle” of entrenched Washington insider interests uses its influence on Congress to raid the Treasury and betray the American people as does the refugee “resettlement” industry.
As James Simpson documented in a recent article for The American Thinker, taxpayer-funded so-called “Voluntary Agencies,” such as Catholic Charities, are paid close to $1 billion a year to bring U.N. designated refugees to America.
And their leaders, who are paid in the high six figures, meet regularly with Congress to lobby for more refugees to be brought to America, and more taxpayer spending to support them.
Refugees from Somalia, Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere establish their own little enclaves. They are not taught to assimilate. They are, however, taught how to game the system.
With 74.2 percent of refugees on food stamps, 56 percent on Medicaid and 47.1 on SSI cash assistance, Simpson calculates refugee “resettlement” costs are currently running at well over $10 billion per year.
Jim Simpson’s estimate is in our opinion on the low side, but let’s go with a conservative number.
If the numbers of refugees now flowing into the country rise to the outside levels proposed by Clinton and Obama and endorsed by Speaker Paul Ryan, we would not double the number of refugees admitted, or even triple them—refugee admission would rise to five times their current rate.
That $10 billion we are now spending would become—conservatively—more like $50 billion.
So when Donald Trump says “When I see the crumbling roads and bridges, or the dilapidated airports, or the factories moving overseas to Mexico, or to other countries, I know these problems can all be fixed, but not by Hillary Clinton—only by me…” he’s not really exaggerating.
That $10 billion would pretty much cover the entire Florida state highway budget; it would be more than ten times the operating budget of the Cleveland, Ohio Metropolitan School District; and it would be four times the $2.5 billion budget for the K-12 public schools in the entire state of Mississippi.
Trump remarks that:
- For the amount of money Hillary Clinton would like to spend on refugees, we could rebuild every inner city in America.
- Hillary’s Wall Street immigration agenda will keep immigrant communities poor, and unemployed Americans out of work. She can’t claim to care about African-American and Hispanic workers when she wants to bring in millions of new low-wage workers to compete against them.
Trump is exactly right about Hillary Clinton and her refugee resettlement agenda.
Why would we rob poor inner city Americans to bring into our country welfare dependent refugees, who also represent an existential security threat to constitutional liberty?
And more importantly, why would an American in an inner city or poor rural community or Rust Belt town that has been losing jobs for decades vote for Hillary Clinton?
The only reasons we can think of are that they didn’t hear Trump’s speech and they haven’t seen the analysis our friend Jim Simpson has done of how the leaders to whom they have entrusted their government have systematically robbed them to fund the refugee resettlement industry.
We urge you to forward this article to your friends and let them know that whether they like Trump’s brash style or not, he’s right on the facts of Hillary Clinton’s refugee plans—and it is the poorest and neediest Americans who are being robbed to pay for them.
George Rasley is editor of ConservativeHQ, a member of American MENSA and a veteran of over 300 political campaigns, including every Republican presidential campaign from 1976 to 2008. He served as lead advance representative for Governor Sarah Palin in 2008 and has served as a staff member, consultant or advance representative for some of America’s most recognized conservative Republican political figures, including President Ronald Reagan and Jack Kemp. He served in policy and communications positions on the House and Senate staff, and during the George H.W. Bush administration he served on the White House staff of Vice President Dan Quayle.
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