A refugee family has arrived in the U.S. as part of a federal court order requiring the Trump administration to restart the resettlement program in cities across the U.S. – including in Arizona.
President Donald Trump shut down refugee admissions in one of his first executive actions. Aid groups filed a lawsuit to restart the program and included a group of refugees like Plaintiff Pacito — the pseudonym for a 22-year-old refugee from the Democratic Republic of Congo who had his Jan. 22 travel plans canceled as a result of the freeze.
Mevlude Akay Alp is an attorneys with IRAP, one of the groups filing suit. She says Pacito and his family arrived in the U.S. on Friday, but many more still remain in limbo.
“There are still over 100 refugees stuck outside the United States who the court ordered to be processed and admitted immediately back in May,” she said.
Akay Alp says the court ordered the government to process the small group of refugees right away. But, in June, a travel ban enacted by the Trump administration outright blocked U.S. entry for nationals from a dozen countries — government attorneys now argue refugees could be included in that restriction.
The Pacito family’s arrival is good news, but more steps are still needed.
Thousands of other refugees are still awaiting processing under a different court order granted to plaintiffs in February. A federal judge is expected to soon rule on whether the government is upholding those court orders and how the other court battles will impact the case.
-
Arizona has for a long time been one of the leading states for refugee resettlement, but now with the numbers cut so low, refugees in our state and the resettlement agencies that are built up to help them adjust are feeling the impact. -
The standoff began Oct. 5, when Border Patrol agents swarmed a protest camp situated in and around a cottonwood tree slated for removal to make way for two steel border walls — the last of a border-hugging grove on the U.S. side that was estimated to be as much as 250 years old. -
His comments come after the Arizona Sheriff’s Association accused his office of refusing requests for assistance from Border Patrol. -
The Arizona Sheriff’s Association issued an open letter calling out the Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office over its response to the public safety concerns surrounding the border wall construction in that area. -
Thousands of refugees in the U.S. lost health coverage on Oct. 1 as new Medicaid eligibility rules took effect. In Arizona, unlike in most states, even children and pregnant women are being dropped.
