A fast-growing group of Republican governors have revolted against President Barack Obama’s existing plan to accept 10,000 Syrian refugees next year, saying the Paris terrorist attacks show that it’s too risky to provide a safe haven for those displaced by Syria’s bloody civil war.
In a sign of how quickly the fear of another major attack on U.S. soil has grown, more than two dozen GOP governors said the refugees are not welcome in their states, and two Democratic ones voiced some opposition.
North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory said Tuesday that he would not be fulfilling his oath of office if he were not protecting the people in his state from potential threats, the same responsibility Obama has, he said in an interview with “Fox and Friends.”
“We’re asking what type of background checks are you actually going through? How long is it taking? And can that information be supplied to local state officials, so in case something happens we at least have some record of where these people are within our states,” McCrory said. “And right now, there is almost no coordination or communications between the state, and the federal officials on this issue.”
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie had much harsher language, telling conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt on Monday that his state wouldn’t take in Syrian refugees, even if they were orphaned toddlers.
“The fact is that we need appropriate vetting, and I don’t think orphans under five are being, you know, should be admitted into the United States at this point,” Christie said. “I don’t trust this administration to effectively vet the people that they’re asking us to take in. We need to put the safety and security of the American people first.”
And it wasn’t just Republican governors. Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire joined in the pushback, calling on the federal government to stop accepting Syrian refugees until intelligence and defense officials can say the vetting process is as strong as possible to ensure Americans are safe. Steve Bullock of Montana said while no Syrian refugees have resettled there, it is reviewing its process to make certain Montanans aren’t put at risk. “If there are any safety concerns about any refugees that are requesting settlement, they will be denied,” he said in a statement.
By Tuesday morning, governors from Texas, Florida, Georgia, Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina, Arizona, Maine, Massachusetts, Wisconsin, Indiana, Mississippi, Illinois, Ohio, Louisiana, Arkansas, New Jersey, Idaho, Kansas, New Hampshire, Nebraska, Iowa, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Montana had joined Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley and Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder, who on Sunday led the charge in refusing to accept refugees from Syria. Kentucky Governor-elect Matt Bevin, who won’t take his oath of office until next month, also said on Monday that he is opposed.
With international investigators believing that one of the Paris attackers came to Europe by posing as a refugee, Republicans have been quick to try to undermine Obama’s refugee plan. It’s unclear, however, how much impact they could have. Even if governors bar the organizations that help refugees from officially resettling them in their states, there’s little they can do to stop refugees from moving to their state after their initial arrival in the United States.
That didn’t stop the governors from voicing their concerns. “American humanitarian compassion could be exploited to expose Americans to similar deadly danger,” Texas Gov. Greg Abbott argued in a letter to Obama, adding that neither the president nor any federal official could guarantee the refugees wouldn’t be part of any terrorist activity. “As such, opening our door to them irresponsibly exposes our fellow Americans to unacceptable peril.”
In a statement released Monday evening, New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez spoke out against the administration accepting more refugees “until there is a very clear plan in place to properly vet and place the refugees, and the voices of governors and the public can be heard.”
Indiana Gov. Mike Pence said in a statement, “Indiana has a long tradition of opening our arms and homes to refugees from around the world but, as governor, my first responsibility is to ensure the safety and security of all Hoosiers.” He continued, “Unless and until the state of Indiana receives assurances that proper security measures are in place, this policy will remain in full force and effect.”
Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant, meanwhile, slammed Obama’s “misguided,” “extremely dangerous” policy to take in refugees and said he would notify the president of his plans. “I will do everything humanly possible to stop any plans from the Obama administration to put Syrian refugees in Mississippi,” he said in a statement.
Striking a different tone, Democratic Vermont Gov. Peter Shumlin condemned the Republican governors, announcing the state’s support to take in refugees and noting the U.S.’ “rigorous” screening system.
“The governors who are taking those actions are stomping on the qualities that make America great, which is reaching out to folks when they’re in trouble and offering them help, not hurting them,” Shumlin said at a press conference. “It’s the spirit of all Vermonters to ensure that when you have folks who are drowning, who are dying in pursuit of freedom, that Vermont does its part.”
Potentially blunting the rhetoric coming from the Republican governors, Greg Chen, director of advocacy at the American Immigration Lawyers Association, told POLITICO states have no authority to bar people given refugee status from entering their states. Once admitted as a refugee, Chen said, they have the right to travel the country freely. “It would be positively un-American for a state to set up roadblocks or screening procedures at airports to block refugees from a certain country from entering,” he said. “The civil rights era stopped that kind of discrimination 50 years ago.”
Refugees also undergo strict background checks that often last months or years, making them among the most scrutinized types of immigrants to the United States.
In a letter to House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Florida Gov. Rick Scott pledged his support to keeping out Syrian refugees but acknowledged that states don’t have the mandate to prevent the federal government from funding resettlement programs into states. “Therefore, we are asking the United States Congress to take immediate and aggressive action to prevent President Obama and his administration from using any federal tax dollars to fund the relocation of up to 425 refugees ... to Florida, or anywhere in the United States, without an extensive evaluation of the risk these individuals may pose to our national security,” he wrote.
Key Republican lawmakers also began amplifying calls Monday to halt the resettlement of Syrian refugees, with some threatening to use a must-pass spending bill next month to force the Obama administration’s hand on the issue in the wake of the Paris terror attacks.
Speaking at a G-20 press conference in Turkey on Monday, Obama spoke up about the plight of the Syrian refugees, saying they are the people harmed most by terrorism. “They are the most vulnerable as a consequence of civil war and strife,” Obama said. “They are parents, they are children, they are orphans, and it is very important and I was glad to see that this was affirmed again and again by the G-20, that we do not close our hearts to these victims of such violence and somehow start equating the issue of refugees with the issue of terrorism.”
He also entreated public officials “not to feed that dark impulse inside of us.”
“And when I hear folks say that well maybe we should just admit the Christians but not the Muslims, when I hear political leaders suggesting that there would be a religious test for which person who’s fleeing from a war-torn country is admitted, when some of those folks themselves come from families who benefited from protection when they were fleeing political persecution, that’s shameful,” Obama said. “That’s not American. That’s not who we are. We don’t have a religious test for our compassion.”
GOP presidential candidates have also been vocal with their opposition to Obama’s plan for the refugees, with former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz suggesting that the focus should be on Syrian refugees who are Christian.
“We should focus on creating safe havens for refugees in Syria rather than bringing them all the way across the United States,” Bush said Monday on “CBS This Morning.” “But I do think there is a special, important need to make sure that Christians from Syria are being protected because they’re being slaughtered in the country, and but for us who? Who would take care of the number of Christians that right now are completely displaced?”
Cruz on Sunday expressed similar sentiments, saying Muslim refugees shouldn’t be allowed to enter the U.S. but noting an exception for displaced Christians. Cruz told reporters in South Carolina that Christians don’t pose a “meaningful risk” for perpetrating terror acts.
“If there were a group of radical Christians pledging to murder anyone who had a different religious view than they, we would have a different national security situation,” Cruz said.
“We can’t roll the dice with the safety of Americans and bring in people for whom there is an unacceptable risk that they could be jihadists coming here to kill Americans,” added Cruz, who didn’t specify how Muslim and Christian refugees would be differentiated. “We just saw in Paris what happens when a country allows ISIS terrorists to come in as refugees and the result can be a horrific loss of life.”
Donald Trump and Ben Carson, who are leading the Republican polls, have also called for closing the borders to Syrian refugees. Trump, the billionaire business mogul, said Monday that the refugee effort could be “one of the great Trojan horses.”
“We cannot let them come into this country, period,” he said over the phone in an interview on CNBC’s “Squawk Box.” “And if they did — and I said it — if Obama through his weakness lets them come in I’m sending them out if I win. And, as you know, I’m leading by a lot right now.”
Taking in refugees from that area of the world is a mistake, Carson said Sunday on Fox News, echoing calls to help resettle them there. “But to bring them here, under these circumstances, is a suspension of intellect,” he said. “You know, the reason that the human brain has these big frontal lobes as opposed to other animals is because we can engage in rational thought processing. We can extract information from the past, present, process it and project it into a plan. Animals, on the other hand, have big brain stems and rudimentary things because they react. We don’t have to just react. We can think.”