Uprooted: Uncovering the Refugee Crisis Globally, Nationally and Locally
As the number of forcibly displaced people worldwide rises to 89.3 million, with 27.1 million classified as refugees, it is apparent that the global humanitarian refugee crisis is becoming larger and increasingly multifaceted. The need for action is more urgent than ever. From Ukraine to Afghanistan and Syria to Sudan, the causes of these wars and conflicts may be disparate—ranging from religious divisions, political instability to civil unrest—but their human impacts are remarkably similar.
The pain and struggles of refugees and displaced people are universal, driven by the only realization that can force people to uproot themselves from their homes and country, leaving everything they have known behind: it is their only chance for survival. The heartbreaking acts of desperation during the Afghanistan evacuations of women throwing babies over barbed wire fences, or Syrian refugees risking their lives crossing the Mediterranean on overcrowded rafts, can seem incomprehensible. For those of us who are lucky enough to never have experienced those moments when the veneer of order and civility dissolves and is replaced by a basic human urge for survival, fully grasping the gravity of the impossible odds and unimaginably dire situations refugees must contend with, is impossible. But the privilege of not knowing the visceral grief, horror, and tragedy of war which composes the refugee experience comes with a collective moral responsibility: to enact policies—on both a national and local level—to help refugees rebuild and restart their lives, guided by compassion.
AMERICA’S ROLE
America has historically taken a significant role in providing safe haven for refugees—from accepting displaced Europeans post-WWII to those fleeing the communist regimes of Cuba, China and Eastern Europe during the Cold War. The US has accepted nearly 3 million refugees since the establishment of the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP) in 1980. But waves of racism and xenophobia have also tainted America’s history and present: Similar strains of the nativist currents which drove the Chinese Exclusion Act and anti-immigrant “Know Nothing” party in the 1920s, can be seen in attitudes toward the Mexican border crisis and anti-Asian racism more than a century later.
The U.S. has also had a hand in creating some of the conflicts which have resulted in mass displacement, triggering major humanitarian crises. Cold War policies of repeated military intervention to oust regional governments in favor of preferred anticommunist (yet often corrupt) regimes in Vietnam, Korea, Latin America and even Iran, seem to strongly suggest that foreign intervention intended to fundamentally alter a distant country’s political and social structures is ineffective and calamitous. Yet despite these failures, in the 21st century, the U.S. has developed a complicated legacy in the turbulent Middle East beginning with the Afghanistan War. While the motivations, morality and consequences of these conflicts are incredibly complex, some have drawn parallels between the military withdrawals from Vietnam in 1973 and Afghanistan last summer (2021). The harrowing images of people hanging from planes attempting to flee during the airlifts seem to display evidence of similarly chaotic evacuations in Saigon and Kabul, respectively. Though the wars had distinct impetuses (Vietnam was part of the war on communism, Afghanistan the war on terror), both evacuations represented the ends of multi-administration decades-long wars caught in stalemate, with heavy U.S. involvement, ultimately unsuccessful in building the modern democracies they had intended.
But in other ways, when comparing Vietnam to Afghanistan, the two refugee resettlement efforts are starkly different—a reflection of shifting public views on immigration and refugees, and current concerns over terrorism and the pandemic. While the US welcomed 300,000 refugees from Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia in the wake of the Vietnam War (and created the USRAP in response), political experts believe a similar “extensive refugee resettlement [and] mass mobilization” following Afghanistan are unlikely. With the rise of political rhetoric used by the media and prominent political figures dehumanizing and portraying refugees as threats, nationalist sentiment and xenophobic ideas have intensified in recent years. For most of the Trump-era, Islamophobia was blatantly expressed and instituted in policies like the infamous “Muslim ban” executive order, barring immigration from six majority-Muslim countries and the decision to lower the refugee cap, plummeting it to historic lows. These actions have resonated with a significant subset of the American population.
At the center of the alarming trend is this: much of the ignorance and prejudice toward refugees stem from people’s perception of the dangerous people in the refugees’ home country, such as terrorist groups, drug cartels or religious extremists. What many fail to understand is that the refugees are fleeing from those very same people and forces who threaten their human rights and pose a danger to their survival. This false narrative has severe consequences, as many refugees endure racism, scapegoating or even outright violence.
CHALLENGES OF RESETTLEMENT
In the backdrop of these prevalent political attitudes, resettling refugees comes with a dual challenge of finding a balance between community and opportunity: the places where refugees are most needed are not always the places where they are most welcomed. The recent influx of Afghan refugees following the US withdrawal has posed a particular challenge. Places such as Little Kabul in Fremont, California, the world’s largest Afghan enclave with a population around 30,000, established over half a decade ago, could provide much needed support for the new Afghan refugees as they adjust to a new country and recover from the trauma of war. With numerous mosques and Afghan groceries, Little Kabul is an ethnic enclave much like the ones that emerged in urban areas during the Gilded Age, similarly providing a sense of community and social support. But simultaneously, Fremont has fewer jobs available and living costs in the Bay area surrounding the Silicon Valley are simply unattainable for most Afghan refugees. On the other hand, in places like Tulsa, Oklahoma, or Fargo, North Dakota, which are in dire need of workers to fill vacant jobs and have cheap housing (~$730 monthly for a one-bedroom apartment), xenophobic and anti-refugee sentiment is high among certain segments of the population, possibly leaving the refugees without crucial support or at risk of violence.
Resettlement agencies ultimately decide how refugees will be distributed between states, but one prevalent fear has been that refugees will take away jobs from other Americans. However, the majority of economic research finds that this perception is false. In fact, economists point out that with the huge need to fill in thousands of jobs in the current labor market, refugees can play a significant role in bridging the gap and boosting the economy, rather than “stealing” American jobs.
HELPING LOCAL REFUGEES
The intersection of these national issues can also be examined at a local level. New York State has welcomed 2,297 refugees since the troop withdrawal in August, and more than 350 refugees have relocated to Albany since the fall of Kabul according to the only refugee resettlement agency in the area, the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants (USCRI).
Organizations, like the USCRI, help refugees find employment and housing, provide services including cultural orientation and English lessons, set up health appointments, and help children get adjusted at school. Along with the Afghan community base, the Albany chapter of the USCRI is dedicated to helping local refugees resettle and transition. But the severe lack of affordable housing has been a significant challenge for the organization, as they are usually given only four days of notice before the refugees’ arrival to prepare housing arrangements. This shortage of affordable housing has been a decades-long problem in Albany, and has only been exacerbated due to the pandemic. It also isn’t unique: it is a statewide and national trend. The search for affordable housing is also constrained by the need of proximity to public transportation, which is essential for the refugees since the majority of them cannot afford a car or cannot drive. Compounded with this, some of the only housing available tends to be in areas with high poverty and crime rates. Despite having built well-established careers back in their home countries, many refugees do not speak English (or have limited knowledge). As a result, they are often relegated to menial jobs and positions which they are overqualified for, as they struggle to overcome the language barrier. In some Afghan families, the male member who had assisted the U.S. military and knew English tragically did not survive the war, and the women, who had more domestic roles, are having to resettle their families in a completely foreign environment.
A LOCAL STORY
If statistics can blur human impacts, then stories have the power to magnify them. One local story which the USCRI was involved with and gained national attention, can be viewed as a microcosm of the volatile and terrifying realities in Afghanistan preceding the withdrawal:
Suneeta, an Afghan mother, arrived at Albany, was forced to leave her four children (ages 17, 15, 9 and 7) behind in Kabul, after she lost custody of her children following the disappearance of her husband, who was presumed to be killed by the Taliban as a result of his work as an American ally. Even after being granted humanitarian parole, her children were stuck in Kabul due to bureaucratic red tape, living alone for extended months while being potentially at a greater risk because of their father’s work, as they waited for an interview in the final step of approval. But when the Taliban took over Kabul, the time window was compressed and all evacuations had to be conducted in a matter of days. Suneeta made the decision to go viral with her story, a significant risk, as it meant her children could be identified, but one that paid off when a long series of connections through USCRI volunteers raised CNN anchor Jake Tapper’s attention to the case. Tapper’s office was able to connect with a US Army veteran who rescued the children and safely brought them to the airport, eventually landing in Albany Airport where they were reunited with Suneeta.
Suneeta and her children’s story was in some ways an exception: her family’s reunification was only made possible by a chain of compassionate volunteers leading to media connections, raising her case to national attention, and daring acts of courage and goodwill defying the odds. But her eight-year long battle to be united with her children was only the first hurdle in her journey as a refugee. Though they are in safety, she still struggles to provide financially for her children as they navigate a new world in a language they barely understand.
Suneeta and her children’s story exposes a dysfunctional bureaucracy and multi-administration failure to address it. Afghanistan evacuees entering the U.S. have qualified under three main channels: refugee protection (through USRAP), humanitarian parole, and special immigrant visas (SIVs). For people whose lives are at risk in a war-torn country and are specifically being targeted because they helped the American cause, every week, day and hour is a struggle for survival. But alarming evidence suggests that the Trump administration deliberately dismantled the existing USRAP refugee program through mass funding and budget cuts, stalling bureaucratic processing and essentially debilitating the department's ability to approve refugee and SIV applications. The Biden administration inherited this dismantled, understaffed system with a backlog of tens of thousands of applications, but also failed to implement or scale up the system to the extent that it could handle the mass evacuations during the withdrawal.
When the Taliban’s gains accelerated leading to the unexpectedly early fall of Kabul, the Biden administration relied heavily on humanitarian parole (instead of usual refugee status) to expedite the process, a decision that brings with it other loopholes, such as complications with family reunification, and also doesn’t provide a clear path to citizenship. SIV, started during the Bush administration, offers an established path for citizenship, specifically providing a path for those who risked their lives to support the American cause–including interpreters, guards, and other close American allies– and their families. However, the stringent requirements, lengthy processing times and bureaucratic red tape make what could be a months-long process (from submitting the application to final approval) take an average of three years. For some, it has even taken a decade.
And that is only if qualifications are met through the 14-step application process, including a letter of recommendation from an American who worked closely with the applicant, proof of serious threat/risk as a result of American connections, and a live interview at the U.S. embassy in Kabul. The latter of these requirements may seem innocuous, but made the process literally impossible for nearly a year, when the embassy was closed, starting in March 2020 due to the pandemic. Live interviews only restarted in February 2021, before being halted again in June 2021.
TAKING ACTION
We have a moral obligation to analyze the structural, and even intentional, flaws of a system which failed the people who made America’s mission in Afghanistan possible—many of whom paid for it with their lives. We may not be able to retrospectively right those wrongs when uncovering government failures, but frameworks can be put into place to bolster these programs so they cannot be so easily dismantled in the future.
Action can also be taken at a community level too. Volunteering with local organizations like the USCRI to help resettle refugees and donating needed items, are small but impactful steps. Raising wider public awareness is just as critical. Bigotry, racism and religious intolerance stem from ignorance, and educating students in schools about refugee crises, historically and currently, can grow empathy, fighting the problem at its root. In the educational sphere, it is also especially critical that refugee children attend school, and are given the resources they need to learn or improve their English and have access to other opportunities.
As Americans, it is critical that we are cognizant of these complex foreign policy issues in which the U.S. has played a prominent role, so that we can be educated citizens and voters, who have the capability to influence these far-reaching decisions. What matters is what we do now, when the cameras have been turned off and the spotlight has moved away from the streets of Kabul and the mountainous villages of Kunar. As members of the international community, we must stand up for and champion human rights in Afghanistan—and across the globe.
