There has been so much bad news for refugees and other immigrants over the past three years, but one place in which some good news has trickled out is in the US courts. Adding to small checks on Trump’s draconian policies against people trying to enter the US from certain countries is the recent Supreme … More Confronting Racism on World Refugee Day
The following is a guest post by Dr. Breanne Grace, University of South Carolina. Breanne is a world-class refugee scholar and a former student of mine at Michigan State (the latter is unrelated to the former). She’s been doing interviews with imprisoned migrant children, and she kindly took me up on the request to write … More Guest Post – The Consequences of US Incompetence in Processing Asylum Claims
On World Refugee Day, my Twitter feed is nonstop statistics on the growing number of refugees and internally displaced people around the world, and how all of this constitutes a crisis. Photos of desperate people, and the more people the better, right? A problem so expansive, so far-reaching, must surely motivate all of us to … More The Real Refugee “Crisis” Is That Some Places Have Too Few Refugees
(This entry is based on a talk that I gave at the “Keeping Our Door Open: A Multi-Dimensional Approach to Refugee Resettlement” organized by the University of Michigan and Jewish Family Services of Washtenaw County”) I have been writing and speaking about crisis language a lot lately. The term “crisis” gets used a lot for … More Don’t Panic! Or Why We Should Stop Using Crisis Language about Refugees
I have been thinking a lot over this summer about the role of religion in US refugee and asylum policy. In today’s debate over immigration and refugees, religious leaders are taking front stage. This should not be surprising, given the strong historical connection between religion and asylum. The ethic of “welcoming the stranger” is central … More The Religious Roots (and Current Divergences) of Asylum in the United States
I will give Trump credit for one thing; he said that if elected he would ban immigration of Muslims, and he’s doing his best to keep that promise. The ban is not on Muslims per se, but people coming from Syria, Iran, Iraq, Sudan (ostensibly not South Sudan, but I haven’t heard how that has … More Refugees & Immigrants and the Real Threats to Our Security
A Place to Call Home 