Fiscal Year 2018 Refugee Arrivals

In September 2017, the Trump Administration set a refugee admissions ceiling of 45,000 for Fiscal Year (FY) 2018, the lowest in the history of our nation’s resettlement program. Despite the low admissions ceiling, the administration resettled less than half of the refugees pledged for Fiscal Year 2018. During Fiscal Year 2018, the United States resettled 22,491 refugees, an almost 60% decrease from the 53,716 refugees settled during Fiscal Year 2017.

Although there have been decreases in admissions across all religions, during Fiscal Year 2018, admissions for Muslims were down by 85% compared to Fiscal Year 2017. In Fiscal Year 2017, 43% of admitted refugees identified as Muslims, however in Fiscal Year 2018 only 16% of admitted refugees identified as Muslim.

In the first months of 2018, President Trump implemented refugee bans, which barred refugees from 10 Muslim majority countries from entering the United States, only 598 refugees from the 11 banned countries were admitted to the U.S. during Fiscal Year 2018. In comparison, 23,357 refugees from the 11 banned countries were admitted during Fiscal Year 2017. Notably, only 140 Iraqis were admitted during Fiscal Year 2018, which includes U.S.-affiliated Iraqis who provided aide to our military and government. Currently the backlog for U.S.-affiliated Iraqis is approximately 100,000 people.

Despite record breaking levels of global displacement, overall refugee admissions in the United States are down by almost 60% from last fiscal year. Notably, admissions from Near East and South Asia, Africa, and Latin America and the Caribbean are experiencing large drops in admissions.