Skip to main content

Lawmakers Call on Obama to Suspend Refugee Plan

Share This article

Lawmakers are calling on the Obama administration to limit or halt the admission of Syrian refugees into the United States.

The move comes after French authorities found a Syrian passport near the body of one of the Paris attackers.

"In light of the terrorist attack in Paris, I call on you to temporarily suspend the admission of all additional Syrian refugees into the United States pending a full review of the Syrian refugee resettlement program," Republican House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Michael McCaul wrote in a letter to President Barack Obama.

Other GOP lawmakers echoed that sentiment.

Christian agencies are calling on lawmakers to keep the doors open to Syrian refugees. Click here to see Caitlin Burke's interview with Stephan Bauman of World Relief.

"At this time, President Obama should stop any refugees from coming into our country until we have assurances that effective safeguards are in place to prevent radical terrorists from using the system to their advantage," Sen. David Perdue, R-Ga., said.

"Filling your country up with people who have a completely different belief system ... and expecting they won't rise up against their benefactor is foolish," Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa charged.

Some congressional Republicans have threatened to use critical spending legislation to limit the president's plan of bringing 10,000 additional refugees to the U.S. during this fiscal year.

"President Obama's plan to bring 10,000 Syrian refugees to the U.S. — just like his statement made a day before the Paris attacks that ISIS was 'contained' — is outrageous and irresponsible," Sen. David Vitter-R-La., said in a statement Sunday.

"That's exactly how at least one, maybe more of the Paris terrorists got there," he continued. "These Syrians have already started arriving in Louisiana. That needs to stop immediately."

Meanwhile, a growing number of governors are halting efforts to allow Syrian refugees into their states.

"I will not stand complicit to a policy that places the citizens of Alabama in harm's way," Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley said.

Others, like Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, are calling for a breakdown of the vetting process before refugees are brought into the country.

"I demand information about the Syrian refugees being placed in Louisiana in hopes that the night of horror in Paris is not duplicated here," Jindal wrote in a letter Saturday.

But President Obama said the Paris attacks should not affect the small intake of Syrian refugees into the United States.

Speaking Monday from the G-20 economic summit in Turkey, he said, "Slamming the door in their faces would be a betrayal of our values."

Share This article

About The Author

CBN
News

CBN News is a national/international, nonprofit news organization that provides programming 24 hours a day by cable, satellite and the Internet. Staffed by a group of acclaimed news professionals, CBN News delivers stories to over a million viewers each day without a specific agenda. With its headquarters in Virginia Beach, Va., CBN News has bureaus in Washington D.C., Jerusalem, and elsewhere around the world. What began as a segment on CBN's flagship program, The 700 Club, in the early 1980s, CBN News has since expanded into a multimedia news organization that offers today's news headlines