World Relief Laments Suspension of U.S. Refugee Resettlement Program

Contact: wr@pinkston.co

(Baltimore, MD) January 20, 2025 – Today, President Donald Trump issued an executive order suspending the U.S. Refugee Resettlement Program for at least several months. The order takes effect on Monday, January 27 and instructs the Secretary of Homeland Security, in consultation with the Secretary of State, to advise within 90 days whether the refugee resettlement should be resumed.

World Relief laments and urges President Trump to reconsider this drastic action. The U.S. Refugee Resettlement Program, formalized in 1980 by a law passed unanimously by the U.S. Senate and signed by President Jimmy Carter, allows a limited number of carefully-vetted refugees who have fled a well-founded fear of persecution to rebuild their lives in the United States. 

“We’re heartbroken by this decision,” said Myal Greene, president and CEO of World Relief. “At a time when there are more refugees globally than ever in recorded history, including many persecuted on account of their faith, the United States should be doing more — not less — to offer help to those in need of refuge. Nevertheless, we’re grateful that the president’s order today still leaves room for resettlement to resume later this year, and we pray he will indeed resume resettlement as soon as possible.” 

Last year, more than 100,000 refugees were resettled to the United States, the highest level since the mid-1990s. Of those, nearly 30,000 were Christians from the 50 countries where religious persecution watchdog Open Doors US says that Christians face the most severe persecution in the world. Given today’s suspension, no further persecuted Christians will be admitted to the United States as refugees for at least the next several months, unless they are granted special exemptions or President Trump reverses course.

In the first three months of fiscal year 2025, more than 27,000 refugees were admitted to the United States, 2,241 of whom were resettled by World Relief in collaboration with local church partners across the country. Nearly 70 percent of refugees resettled in the first quarter of this year fled a threat of persecution in five particular countries: Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Burma, Syria and Venezuela. 

World Relief’s work in the United States has always extended well beyond the initial resettlement of newly arrived refugees, so our work will continue despite this suspension. In fiscal year 2024, World Relief resettled 8,947 newly arriving refugees, but we served more than 40,000 individuals total. The others were either refugees who arrived in prior years or other vulnerable immigrants — and even as refugee resettlement is temporarily suspended, we will continue to serve vulnerable immigrant communities in partnership with local churches.

“World Relief remains steadfast in our commitment to serve well each of those who have already been resettled — continuing to rely on the generous financial contributions, in-kind donations and volunteer hours of members of local churches and of our surrounding communities. However, we are deeply saddened by the reality that many in urgent need of protection and freedom — including close family members of those already resettled — will now be denied that opportunity for at least several months, unless this decision reconsidered,” said Aerlande Wontamo, Senior Vice President of US Programs for World Relief. 

A 2022 Pew Research Center study found that majorities of Republicans, Democrats and Independents alike believe that receiving refugees should be a goal of U.S. immigration policy, and a 2024 Lifeway Research study found that 71 percent of evangelical Christians believe that the U.S. has a moral responsibility to receive refugees. 

“Most evangelical Christians voted for President Trump in 2016, in 2020 and again in 2024,” observed Matthew Soerens, World Relief’s Vice President of Advocacy and Policy. “They did so heartened by pledges that he would secure our borders and protect Christians from persecution, but most did not anticipate that he would halt a longstanding, legal immigration program that offers refuge to those persecuted for their Christian faith. We hope and pray he will reconsider.” 

The law gives the president the responsibility to set the maximum number of refugees who will be resettled in a given year. President Biden set the ceiling at 125,000 over the past several years, the highest level since the mid-1990s, but lower than refugee ceilings set by Presidents Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush. 

President Trump set the refugee ceiling at 50,000 in the first week of his first administration in 2017 in an executive order that also noted a particular concern for refugees persecuted on account of their religious tradition. Last week, World Relief released a statement affirmed by a broad range of conservative Christian leaders, urging President Trump “to once again set the ceiling for refugee admissions at that level or higher, consistent with his commitments both to secure borders and to religious liberty and opportunity for all.” Since last week, the statement has been signed by thousands of Christians across the country.

World Relief continues to invite Christians of any background to add their names to that statement by visiting worldrelief.org/christianstatement.