SYRIAN REFUGEES; Congressional Record Vol. 161, No. 171

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SYRIAN REFUGEES

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of

January 6, 2015, the Chair recognizes the gentleman from Texas (Mr.

Gohmert) for 30 minutes.

Mr. GOHMERT. Madam Speaker, these are the times that try men's souls.

After so many Americans have given the last full measure of devotion

for their country, for our freedom, for the freedom of so many others,

we are at a time in our history when we have enemies reporting that

they are entering the United States. That is confirmed by the Director

of the FBI and others in this administration. As is now reported, there

are active ISIS elements in every State in the Union.

Some say, well, those who want to suspend bringing in Syrian

refugees, wouldn't that be like telling the Jews during World War II

they couldn't come to America? Actually, it would be more like saying

we are going to suspend bringing Germans--we are going to keep bringing

in German Jews because clearly they are being persecuted. We are going

to try to save them from the Holocaust, but we are going to suspend

bringing in those who appear to have similar backgrounds to the Nazis

because we are not sure who is Nazi and who isn't.

Can you imagine dealing with what France has dealt with after we

welcomed with open arms Nazis before and during World War II, if that

had been the policy of the Roosevelt administration? Thank God it

wasn't. But, unfortunately, Jews were turned away before and during

World War II.

The President wants to continue bringing in refugees, continue the

mass migration of illegal aliens into the United States. We have this

report from yesterday by Brandon Darby and Ildefonso Ortiz. They report

on eight

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Syrians being caught at the Texas border in Laredo yesterday.

The story says:

\\\`\\\`Two Federal agents operating under the umbrella of U.S. Customs and

Border Protection are claiming that eight Syrian illegal aliens

attempted to enter Texas from Mexico in the Laredo Sector. The Federal

agents spoke with Breitbart Texas on the condition of anonymity,

however, a local president of the National Border Patrol Council

confirmed that Laredo Border Patrol agents have been officially

contacting the organization with concerns over reports from other

Federal agents about Syrians illegally entering the country in the

Laredo Sector. The reports have caused a stir among the sector's

Border Patrol agents.

\\\`\\\`The sources claimed that eight Syrians were apprehended on Monday,

November 16, 2015. According to the sources, the Syrians were in two

separate \\\`family units' and were apprehended at the Juarez Lincoln

Bridge in Laredo, Texas, also known officially as Port of Entry 1.''

The President has also stated in recent days--it's been played over

and over as the President condemns Republicans and conservatives and

liberals and moderate Americans across the specter of politics,

Americans who are concerned about one thing: the safety of their

homeland.

The President comes out and condemns, and he said: \\\`\\\`When I hear

political leaders suggesting that there would be a religious test for

which a person who's fleeing from a war-torn country is admitted . . .

that's shameful. . . . That's not American. That's not who we are. We

don't have religious tests to our compassion.''

It doesn't violate the rules of the House to point out when an

elected official is ignorant. It is a violation to insinuate some ill

motive. I am insinuating no ill motive. I am stating that the President

is completely ignorant of what our laws are because the law is very

clear, if you look at 8 U.S.C. 1158--and I need to tip the hat to

Andrew McCarthy. I have got his article in front of me from yesterday,

from nationalreview.com.

He points out that under Federal law the executive branch is

expressly required to take religion into account in determining who is

granted asylum. Under the provision governing asylum--and again, that

is 8 U.S.C. section 1158--\\\`\\\`an alien applying for admission''--and this

is the law--\\\`\\\`must establish that . . . religion . . . was or will be

at least one central reason for persecuting that applicant.''

Now, there are other potential reasons that can be given for

establishing the persecution, but religion is a very important one, and

we have always looked at that issue as being important. If you are

being persecuted for your religious beliefs in the world, that is

always historically American to look at that fact and determine, yes,

there is a religious test, and these people are being persecuted

because of their religious beliefs, and only if we look at their

religion and whether or not that religion is being persecuted can we

determine whether they are entitled to asylum.

So to answer the question that is raised by the ignorant statement by

our President, the truth is, yes, it is American. It is the law. We

need to know what religion you are to determine whether or not you are

being persecuted for your religion.

In another place, and this is over from 8 U.S.C., this is in section

1101, and this is the section regarding refugee status, but to qualify,

the applicant must be a refugee as defined by Federal law, and then

that definition is what is at section 1101(a)(42)(A).

\\\`\\\`The term \\\`refugee' means (A) any person who is outside any country

of such person's nationality . . . and who is unable or unwilling to

return to . . . that country because of persecution or a well-founded

fear of persecution on account of . . . religion.''

Religion is important to take into account in determining whether

someone is truly a refugee. It is American. It is not shameful. It is

what we have done historically, and that is why I would have a Baloch

minority in my office today talking to me about persecution against the

Baloch people in Iran, because, as he says, Americans have

traditionally been compassionate when people are being persecuted

unfairly. And we have. And to take such persecution into account, we

look at whether religion is a factor in their persecution. That is

American. It is recognized even in Iran as being American and being

unshameful--not only not shameful, but being to the glory and credit of

the United States of America that we do care.

Mr. McCarthy's article goes on. He says:

\\\`\\\`In the case of this war, the Islamic State is undeniably

persecuting Christians. It is doing so, moreover, as a matter of

doctrine. Even those Christians the Islamic State does not kill, it

otherwise persecutes as called for by its construction of sharia

(observe, for example, the ongoing rape jihad and sexual slavery).''

From my discussions when I have been in Nigeria with the poor

Africans whose children have been kidnapped, they explained it was only

the daughters that were being kidnapped and that the school was

attacked.

I asked: Was it attacked because it was a girls school and they don't

want girls having education?

They said they don't want girls having education, but that is not the

reason they attacked it. They attacked it because it was a Christian

school.

So these radical Islamists associated with the Islamic State, they

attack schools, particularly Christian schools; and after they attack a

Christian school, the Nigerians explained they bring the children out,

and if they are boys, they just go ahead and kill them immediately

because they are Christian boys, and they don't want that to spread.

{time} 1500

If, however, they are girls, the Nigerian Africans who were victims

of Boko Haram explained, they don't kill them. No. But you couldn't

really say they weren't persecuted because they are kidnapped and they

are kept strapped to beds and they are repeatedly raped until such time

as they are sold into sexual slavery.

And this administration, according to some in Nigeria, has said: We

may help you, but you have got to adopt a same-sex marriage provision,

or we are not going to be such help to you.

And as one Nigerian bishop said, to his deep credit: Our religious

convictions are not for sale--not to President Obama, not to anybody.

God bless them.

The same effort was made to push Kenya into adopting same-sex

marriage laws against their religious beliefs in that country. I was so

proud of the Kenyan President. And I have heard other African leaders

say they were so proud. They were also proud in Africa of the Kenyan

President not being intimidated by President Obama's demand that they

change their marriage laws to go against the teachings of the man whose

profile is right up here above the main door to our Gallery--a man

named Moses--who said he was speaking for God. And according to God's

law, a man shall leave his father and mother and a woman leave her home

and the two will become one flesh. That was to be marriage.

When Jesus was asked about marriage and divorce, he quoted Moses

perfectly--the man we have depicted up here in our House Chamber. He

quoted Moses perfectly: A man shall leave his father and mother and a

woman leave her home and the two will become one flesh. And then he

added to Moses' perfect quote: And what God has joined together, nobody

put asunder.

Anyway, our President was in African in the past trying to push them

into changing their laws, but unfortunately for people in areas where

radical Islamist's have reigned, if you are a Christian, you are being

persecuted for your religious beliefs. And if you are a Christian boy

in a school that Boko Haram attacks, they will most likely just shoot

you, kill you; and if you are a girl, they take you into sex slavery,

in all likelihood.

McCarthy goes on: \\\`\\\`To the contrary, the Islamic State seeks to rule

Muslims, not kill or persecute them.''

I think that is a very important point Mr. McCarthy makes. The

radical Islamists are not seeking to kill or persecute Muslims like

they are Christians. They are seeking to rule them.

Mr. McCarthy goes on:

\\\`\\\`Obama prefers not to dwell on the distinction between the jihadist

treatment of Muslims, on the one hand, and

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of Christians, Jews, and other religious, on the other hand, because

he--like much of Washington--inhabits a world in which jihadists are

not Islamic and, therefore, have no common ground with other Muslims .

. . notwithstanding that jihadists emerge whenever and wherever a

population of sharia-adherent Muslims reaches critical mass. While

there is no question that ISIS will kill and persecute Muslims whom it

regards as apostates for refusing to adhere to its construction of

Islam, it is abject idiocy to suggest that Muslims are facing the same

ubiquity and intensity of persecution as Christians.

\\\`\\\`And it is down right dishonest to claim that taking such religious

distinctions into account is \\\`not American,' let alone \\\`shameful.' How

can something American law requires be \\\`not American'? And how can a

national expression of compassion expressly aimed at alleviating

persecution be \\\`shameful'?''

That is Andrew McCarthy yesterday, the NationalReview.com.

\\\`\\\`The State Department Turns Its Back on Syrian Christians and Other

Non-Muslim Refugees'' is an article by Nina Shea, November 2. She says:

\\\`\\\`Over the past 5 years of Syria's civil war, the United States has

admitted a grand total of 53 Syrian Christian refugees, a lone Yazidi,

and fewer than 10 Druze, Baha'is, and Zoroastrians combined. That so

few of the Syrian refugees coming here are non-Muslim minorities is due

to American reliance on a United Nations refugee-resettlement program

that disproportionately excludes them. Past absolute totals of Syrian

refugees to the United States under this program were small, but as the

Obama administration now ramps up refugee quotas by tens of thousands,

it would be unconscionable to continue with a process that has

consistently forsaken some of the most defenseless and egregiously

persecuted of those fleeing Syria.

\\\`\\\`The gross underrepresentation of the non-Muslim communities in the

numbers of Syrian refugees into the U.S. is reflected year after year

in the State Department's public records. They show, for example, that

while Syria's largest non-Muslim group--Christians of the various

Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant traditions--constituted 10 percent

of Syria's population before the war, they are only 2.6 percent of the

2,003 Syrian refugees that the United States has accepted since then.

\\\`\\\`Syria's Christian population, which before the war numbered 2

million, has since 2011 been decimated by what Pope Francis described

as religious \\\`genocide.' ''

I want to insert at this point, Madam Speaker, that I have been

advised that this administration is now saying that the persecution of

Christians is not being deemed a genocide. Perhaps it is because this

administration feels like if you are taking the young girls and putting

them into sex slavery and you are not outright killing them--you are

just raping them and putting them into sex slavery--then maybe that is

not a genocide. You are letting the girls live.

So maybe they are so callous that they would consider it is not

genocide if you just rape and put these young girls who are Christians

or from Christian families into sexual slavery.

This article from Nina Sea says:

\\\`\\\`Clearly, far more than a dozen members of Syria's religious

minorities should qualify as refugees under the legal definition of a

refugee as someone with a \\\`well-founded fear of persecution based on

religion.'. . . Instead minorities have difficulty getting to step one

in the U.N. process. The religious terror that drove them from Syria

blocks their registering. The Office of the United Nations High

Commissioner for Refugees is largely limited to collecting refugee

applications and making resettlement referrals from its own camps and

centers--the burden of feeding creates strong incentives for this

practice.

\\\`\\\`In an email to me, Knox Thames, the State Department's new Special

Adviser for Religious Minorities wrote that \\\`many minorities have not

entered the U.N. system because they are urban refugees.' That is,

because they live far from the remote U.N. camps and aid centers, they

lack the information and access to register. And, as is widely known,

many non-Muslim refugees try hard to avoid these camps.''

The reason Christians try to avoid these U.N. camps is that they are

Muslim.

In fact, in this article, it is pointed out:

\\\`\\\`According to British media, a terrorist detector asserted that

militants enter U.N. camps to assassinate and kidnap Christians. An

American Christian aid group reported that the U.N. camps are

\\\`dangerous' places where ISIS, militias, and gangs traffic in women and

threaten men who refuse to swear allegiance to the caliphate.

\\\`\\\`Such intimidation is also reportedly evident in migrant camps in

Europe, leading the German police union to recommend separate shelters

for Christians and Muslim migrant groups.''

The article goes on to point out:

\\\`\\\`According to a recent UNHCR posting, 19,000 Syrians picked straight

from \\\`refugee camps in Turkey, Lebanon, and Jordan,' have received U.N.

approval and are awaiting resettlement in the United States. In

October, President Obama ordered their expedited admission. Without

further action, however, only token numbers of non-Muslim minorities

will be among those rescued. George Carey, former Archbishop of

Canterbury, called it right about the Christian refugees, and his words

equally apply to Syria's other non-Muslim communities: They are being

\\\`left at the bottom of the heap.' ''

There is an article from Todd Starnes, November 18--yesterday--

entitled \\\`\\\`Obama is Importing Muslims, Deporting Christians.''

Well, if this is true, so much for his test--that we don't care about

religious tests.

But this article says:

\\\`\\\`When individuals say we should have a religious test and that only

Christians--proven Christians should be admitted--that is offensive and

contrary to American values, the President said--just one day after he

called such behavior un-American.''

But as Todd Starnes says:

\\\`\\\`What is offensive and contrary to American values is refusing to

properly investigate those wanting to come to our Nation--especially

those coming from regions that are hotbeds of Islamic extremism.

\\\`\\\`Those of us who fear that Islamic radicals might be lurking among

the refugees have been called every name in the book: bigots,

Islamophobes, and un-American . . . But the President says such

prudence only further enflames the Islamic jihadists.''

The President warns that it is counterproductive and needs to stop.

The truth is, I will insert parenthetically, what has been a huge

recruiting tool for ISIL, ISIS, and the Islamic State, has been

American weakness and unwillingness to confront radical Islam head up

and call it what it is.

We found back when we were engaged in Iraq that one of the big

recruitments that was used by radical Islamists is they would go back

to 1979 and the fact that Jimmy Carter did not after they attacked our

Embassy and took over 50--51 people or so--as hostages. We did

basically nothing to them.

And they point out that we pulled out of Beirut after our Marines

were killed there. And they go out and point out the 1993 attack on the

World Trade Center under Bill Clinton. We really did nothing after that

in response. And after the USS Cole was hit, we basically did nothing

effective.

And they go on to point out each time that America has been hit and

we did nothing effective to counter the attack upon us, that is the

biggest recruiting element that ISIS or any radical Islamist group has

had, when they can show that they have attacked and we have been weak.

And nothing has been shown to be less effective in responding to

attacks against us, against Americans, against Christians, against

minority groups, against moderate Muslims, then what has happened

during this administration. Call George W. Bush what you will, but the

fact is the world knew that while he was President, if you messed with

America, he would strike back.

{time} 1515

That is what led Qadhafi to abandon his nuclear efforts. It led him

to open up his doors. You tell me what weapons I can keep. He was

afraid we were going to invade them next.

According to this article, it says, \\\`\\\`But the cold, hard reality is

that Protestants, Catholics and Jews aren't

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the ones beheading people. The Lutherans and Nazarenes aren't gunning

down young folks in concert venues.''

Nevertheless, the President remains steadfast. The Muslims will come.

\\\`\\\`We don't have religious tests to our compassions,'' he told

journalists from high atop his soapbox.

But that is not entirely accurate. Last year the Obama administration

led a fierce legal battle to have a German Christian family thrown out

of the United States.

The Romeikes fled their homeland in search of a nation where they

could homeschool their children. A judge initially granted them asylum,

believing they were escaping from religious persecution. However, the

Obama administration waged a fierce campaign against the Romeike

family, demanding they be returned to Germany.

The family lost court battle after court battle, but, at the eleventh

hour, the White House relented and begrudgingly let them stay.

But just a few months ago a Federal Immigration judge ordered a dozen

Iraqi Christians deported from a facility in San Diego. An Immigration

Customs Enforcement spokesperson declined to tell the San Diego Union

Tribune why the Iraqi Christians were being sent back to their native

land.

So the next time President Obama wants to lecture the Nation about

religion, maybe he could explain why his administration is importing

Muslims and deporting Christians.

I realize that I just have a few minutes left, Madam Speaker. Our

hearts, our prayers and thoughts have been with the people of France

and Lebanon and Russia, victims of radical Islamist attacks and

anywhere they have been occurring, Brussels, as well.

There is great irony. On Wednesday of last week, the European Union

announced what it had been building to for some time. In essence, it

announced it was declaring economic war on Israel.

Anti-Semitism has grown all over the European Union to levels I never

would have dreamed, as a little boy, would ever come back to Germany,

where we read and studied about the Holocaust and the persecution of

Jews not just in Germany, but around Europe, and there were other

countries that actually assisted the Germans.

There were people like George Soros, who was Jewish, that helped

finger other Jews. I never thought we would get to the level of anti-

Semitism where Europe, as a whole, as a group, would basically declare

economic war against Israel. Incredible how anti-Semitism has grown

there.

And then, within 48 hours of them declaring war, siding with the

Palestinian Muslims, siding with those--they are attacking the

Christians and Jews in Israel and siding with the wrong people.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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