CNSNews reports that the U.S. government did not grant refugee status to any people from Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador or Mexico in fiscal year 2013. Democrats in Congress have tried to portray the surge aliens as refugees escaping violence in these countries as opposed to people who were encouraged to enter by recent Obama Administration policies.
CNSNews analyzed data from the U.S. State Department that shows only five Guatemalans and 25 Hondurans were granted refugee status from fiscal years 2007 through 2013, and no individuals from El Salvador or Mexico obtained that status.
Under U.S. law, the term refugee refers to a person who is located outside of the United States, is of “special humanitarian concern to the United States” and has demonstrated that they were persecuted or have a well-founded fear of persecution because of race, religion, nationality, social group or political opinion in their country of origin.
The article examines murder rates in Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador and quotes Senate testimony from Econometrica economist Bryan Roberts, who said crime rates alone could not explain the surge. “When one considers the evidence across the three countries, changes in crime rates and other underlying conditions are not compelling as an explanation for why all surges began in Fiscal Year 2012,” Roberts said. “There are no changes in murder rates in 2012 that suggest an upsurge in violence in that year that would have triggered the surges…In El Salvador, the murder rate fell significantly in 2012,” and has been stable in Guatemala. “Given that the dramatic rise in Honduras’s murder rate and other reported crime began in 2009, it is surprising that its surge didn’t start before 2012.”
Read more in CNSNews.
