The Immigration Industrial Complex: Global Refuge

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Global Refuge

Global Refuge, formerly Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, began in 1939 as American Lutherans responded to the needs of Europeans displaced in World War II.

Global Refuge does not appear to have weighed in on H.R. 2, but it has condemned Title 42, the COVID-19 health policy the Trump administration used to curtail immigration.

When Biden won the 2020 election, Global Refuge President Krish O’Mara Vignarajah called the results “a new dawn in America for immigrants, refugees, asylum seekers, DREAMers, and all those who stand for welcome.” (DREAMer refers to a child brought to the U.S. as an illegal immigrant, who would have received legal status and rights through the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act. While the DREAM Act failed in Congress, President Obama created the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, program. That program remains in legal limbo after President Trump tried to reverse it and states sued Biden to block it.)

Vignarajah called the Trump years “a dark chapter for our immigrant brothers and sisters.” She called his pause on immigration from countries of terror concern a “xenophobic Muslim ban,” and accused him of an “assault on DACA and DREAMers,” among other things.

The nonprofit has also condemned the Biden administration’s more lax policies.

Global Refuge condemned what it called Biden’s “punitive enforcement and deterrence measures.” The nonprofit launched a campaign urging Americans to “tell the Biden administration to end the asylum ban and restore access to asylum at the border! Let elected leaders know we want welcome, not harsh policies!”

The campaign also urges readers to “join us in urging [elected leaders] to … develop solutions that welcome and honor the dignity of the protection-seeking migrant and support organizations assisting migrants at the border and across the country.”

Vignarajah, the nonprofit’s president, previously served as policy director to first lady Michelle Obama. She has visited Biden’s White House six times, taking a one-on-one meeting with President Biden on December 9, 2022.

One Global Refuge leader’s resume reveals the ties between the administration and the nonprofits that send illegal aliens to settle across the country.

Ashley Feasley spent two years as a migration policy advisor at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, then joined Catholic Legal Immigration Network as director of advocacy for about a year, and then returned to USCCB to become director of migration policy and public affairs. After leading USCCB’s migration policy from September 2016 to March 2021, she joined U.S. Customs and Border Protection for eight months, and then hopped over to the White House where she became “Director of Transborder Security” at the National Security Council.

In January 2023, she joined the Administration for Children and Families at HHS (which oversees many of the grants groups like USCCB receive). She worked there through March 2023 before hopping over to become vice president of policy and advocacy at Global Refuge in April 2024.

Church World Service

Seventeen Christian denominations came together to form Church World Service in 1946, mobilizing more than 11 million pounds of food, clothing, and medical supplies for Europe and Asia in the aftermath of World War II. The group also resettled more than 100,000 refugees in its first 10 years, according to CWS’s website.

The Arabella Network’s Sixteen Thirty Fund donated $25,000 to Church World Service between 2014 and 2015.

On May 9, 2023, Church World Service urged its members to contact their representatives in Congress to vote against H.R. 2. CWS presented a script for a phone call, urging Americans to tell their representatives to “reject legislation that would further entrench anti-asylum, anti-immigrant, anti-family policies.”

The script continues, “Proposed legislation—in particular the Secure the Border Act (H.R. 2) in the House and legislation proposed by Senators [Kyrsten] Sinema and [Thom] Tillis in the Senate—would abdicate our responsibility to those seeking protection and do nothing to effectively manage the border.”

CWS also denounced Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott for signing SB 4, a bill making it a felony for a person to illegally cross the U.S.-Mexico border into Texas. Church World Service dismissed the fact that federal law already prohibits illegal entry, claiming that the law “will charge migrants seeking safety in the United States a state crime.”

Church World Service has urged Americans to contact their representatives in Congress, urging them “to robustly fund key refugee and immigrant accounts, include key authorizing language to improve and expand services, and reallocate funding away from border militarization and ICE detention facilities.”

The organization launched its campaign after Congress passed an appropriations bill that included fewer funds for migrant grant programs—programs from which Church World Services directly benefits. Church World Services urged Americans to write their legislators, saying “I urge you to support … $4.447 billion for the Migration and Refugee Assistance (MRA) account.” Between November 15, 2022, and September 30, 2023, Church World Services received $28 million from the Migration and Refugee Assistance Program.

The U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants

The U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants, also known as USCRI, provides legal services, social services, and health services to “refugees, unaccompanied migrating children, trafficking survivors, and other immigrants in all 50 states, El Salvador, Honduras, Kenya, and Mexico,” according to its website. The committee also advocates for refugees and immigrants in law and policy.

The U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants has received $75,000 in grants through the Open Society Foundations between 2017 and 2021. The 2021 grant supported the committee in developing “a community sponsorship program that will expand resettlement support for refugees and other forcibly displaced populations.”

The committee condemned some of the provisions in H.R. 2, calling them “anti-asylum” and “anti-immigrant proposals.”

In the next installment, the influx of at least 9 million illegal immigrants may impact America’s elections.