Trump to Cap Refugees Allowed Into U.S. at 30,000, a Record Low

Mike Pompeo, the secretary of state, announced the limit at the State Department, saying it reflected the “daunting operational reality” of addressing what he called a “humanitarian crisis” involving people claiming asylum in the United States.

The number represents the lowest ceiling a president has placed on the refugee program since its creation in 1980...

The move is the latest in a series of efforts the president has made to clamp down on immigration to the United States.

It is also the culmination of a quiet but successful effort by Stephen Miller, the president’s senior policy adviser, to severely restrict the number of refugees offered protection inside the country....

Others inside the administration, including in the Department of Defense and, initially, the State Department, had supported maintaining the 45,000-refugee ceiling.

Mr. Pompeo had privately advocated last month for keeping the number where it was. He was pivotal to the decision, and kept his final recommendation under wraps until Monday afternoon, when he announced it from the Treaty Room of the State Department.

In doing so, he adopted an argument made privately by Mr. Miller: that the United States needed to prioritize hundreds of thousands of people who have arrived at the United States border, claiming a credible fear of returning home, rather than refugees overseas who are by definition already in need of protection and resettlement in another country.

“Some will characterize the refugee ceiling as the full barometer of America’s commitment to vulnerable people around the world,” Mr. Pompeo said. “This would be wrong.”

“This year’s refugee ceiling reflects the substantial increase in the number of individuals seeking asylum in our country, leading to a massive backlog of outstanding asylum cases and greater public expense,” he added.

Mr. Pompeo said refugees had to be weighed against a backlog of 800,000 asylum seekers — people in the United States who claim a “credible fear” of returning home — who are awaiting a decision by immigration authorities about whether they will be granted status to remain...

About 730,000 additional immigrants were waiting for their cases to be resolved by American courts, according to the Justice Department, including people who had asked for asylum after being apprehended. But that number also included people in deportation or other immigration proceedings.

Immigrant and advocates condemned the cuts to the refugee program, calling it a callous decision that would also undermine American national security and foreign policy priorities.

The cap does not require the Trump administration to resettle 30,000 refugees; in years past, governments have accepted far fewer than what is legally permitted.

During the administration of President George W. Bush, for example, the program’s ceiling accepted up to 70,000 refugees annually; it was raised to 80,000 during his final year in office. But the government only resettled about 27,000 refugees in 2002, immediately after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and accepted 28,000 the following year.

Mr. Trump, who campaigned promising a “Muslim ban,” and argued for a halt to the admission of Syrian refugees because he argued that they could be a danger to the country, has targeted the refugee resettlement program for cuts since his first days in office.

His travel ban, imposed a week after he was sworn in, temporarily halted the program and limited the number of refugees that could be resettled in the United States to 50,000. That slashed the program from the 110,000 cap that President Barack Obama had put in place before he left office.

Last year, Mr. Miller led an effort, with the support of John F. Kelly, the White House chief of staff, to cut the program even more, to as low as 15,000.

But pushback from Defense and State Department officials, as well as the Joint Chiefs of Staff and members of the United States mission to the United Nations, who advocated for maintaining the 50,000 level, resulted in a ceiling of 45,000...