States across the country were flooded with new refugees since President Obama first took office.
According to the U.S. refugee admissions database wrapsnet.org, 437,829 new refugees came to the United States since President Obama first took office. Most (46,351) were placed in Texas, while California took in 44,162 refugees. New York welcomed 26, 293 refugees in the last six and a half years.
Many of the refugees were placed in key swing states like Ohio which accepted 14,855 persons. Florida welcomed 21, 613 new refugees in the last six years, while Virginia took in 9,395 refugees during that period. Almost 11,300 refugees were brought to Colorado and Nevada accepted 3,421 refugees since 2009.
The numbers are a considerable jump since the George W. Bush administration accepted a total of 215,809 individuals over a six and a half-year period between October 2001 and March 2007. The amount is consistent with the six and a half year period between January 20, 2001 and July 20, 2007. The amount of refugees brought into swing states was considerably lower for that period. For example, the commonwealth of Virginia accepted a little over 5,400 refugees while Ohio accepted 6,739.
California, Minnesota, and Washington accepted the most refugees into their states respectively during that six and half year period. The Golden State took in 30, 392 refugees, while Minnesota helped place 20,562 refugees in their state. Washington brought in almost half of the number of refugees that California accepted.
Although initial reports of ISIS show that the terror organization can only “muster” up to 20,000 fighters, the administration accepted 14,723 individuals from Iraq and a just over 1,000 refugees from Syria since July of 2014. A Syrian operative told Buzzfeed in January that over 4,000 ISIS militants infiltrated refugee populations headed to European nations.
Additionally, Michael McCaul, chairman of the House of Homeland Security Committee, sent a letter to President Barack Obama and other cabinet members and national security officials last month, citing his concern that the administration is admitting too many refugees from Iraq and Syria, a hotbed of ISIS terrorism.
“We are increasingly concerned by the decision to accelerate the resettlement of thousands of Syrian refugees here in the United States despite the serious national security implications of doing so,” McCaul wrote.
“There is a real risk that individuals associated terrorist groups will attempt to exploit the refugee resettlement program in order to gain entry into our country,” the congressman sain, later noting that ISIS’s predecessor al Qaeda in Iraq already used the resettlement program when two terrorists were granted entry and resettled in Bowling Green, Kentucky. Both were responsible for killing four Pennsylvania National Guardsman in Iraq in 2005.