Ask Congress to support refugee protection! Call the U.S. Capitol switchboard at 202/224-3121 and ask for your members’ offices. Or visit the Senate website or House website for their e-mail addresses and fax numbers.

Issues

On November 13 Congress began a lame duck session—a session after elections but before newly elected members take office. As the current Congress contemplates what actions to take during this session and the newly elected Congress prepares to take action in 2007, please share the following refugee concerns with your senators and representatives. These concerns may arise in this session, in 2007 or both:

Fund Refugee Protection. President Bush has set the target for refugee admissions in fiscal year 2007 at 70,000. The Senate refugee spending proposal includes sufficient funding to process and admit all 70,000, but the House proposal would only provide funding for 40,000 refugees. Unless Congress works during the lame duck session to rectify the difference, the State Department will have a significant funding crisis on its hands. Without sufficient funding, tens of thousands of refugees we could welcome to America this year will instead continue to languish in often dangerous conditions in camps and urban ghettos throughout the world. LIRS also supports funding for

• repatriating refugees who are able to return safely to their home countries,
• helping uprooted people who are internally displaced in their own countries,
• supplying emergency food aid to refugees throughout the world, and
• helping former refugees in the United States become self-sufficient.

Remove material support barriers. Current U.S. law is preventing many deserving refugees and asylum seekers from receiving safe haven here. And some already in the United States are being kept from becoming legal permanent residents and from bringing their families to join them in America. Ironically, these vulnerable people, themselves victims of terror, have been victimized again by laws intended to protect our country from terrorists. Representative Joseph Pitts (R-PA16) has introduced a bi-partisan bill, H.R. 5918, that would keep out individuals who mean us harm but open the door for protection of deserving refugees and asylum seekers. Read more about the material support issue.

Action

Please call your current members of the House and Senate via the Capitol switchboard at 202/224-3121.

• Congratulate those who won their elections; thank outgoing members for their service.
• Urge them to adequately fund life-saving refugee protection by appropriating $980 million to the Migration and Refugee Account (MRA) and $798 million to the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) for fiscal year 2007.
• Urge your House member to co-sponsor H.R. 5918, the Pitts Bill.
• Urge your Senators to support similar legislation if it arises in the Senate.

Please call your newly elected members of the House and Senate. (Find their websites and phone numbers on campaign advertising.)

• Congratulate them on winning their elections.
• Urge them to adequately fund life-saving refugee protection by appropriating $980 million to the Migration and Refugee Account (MRA) and $798 million to the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) for fiscal year 2007.
• Urge your House member to co-sponsor H.R. 5918, the Pitts Bill.
• Urge your Senators to support similar legislation if it arises in the Senate.

Thank you!

We appreciate your taking the time to make your voice heard on this important issue. For more information about the work of Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service visit www.lirs.org.