the refugee ceiling from 90,000 a year to 70,000. president obama worked to rebuild the resettlement system when the world needed it most. millions of middle eastern refugees were fleeing several bleed conflicts in the region. the bmw administration raise the ceiling to 85,000 refugees in 2016 and the next year obama proposed an increase to 110,000, but then a new president who had launched his campaign in a zeal of xenophobia came along and slashed that number. by 2020 the american refugee cap was just 18,000 a year, the absolute lowest in u.s. history at a time when america had received its highest number of applicants ever, mostly from central america. under the trump administration and the minds of many americans today there was this assumption that refugees pose a national security threat to the united states, a false narrative that
in this country, here in the united states, starting to take steps to prepare if the arrival of more ukrainian refugees to our country. i want to read some reporting in reuters that i actually found pretty stunning. the united states admitted only 514 ukrainian refugees in january and february during russia s build up to the war. that s according to u.s. state department data. only seven ukrainian refugees were resettled in the united states from march 1st through march 16th. that s according to internal state department data seen by reuters. how can that be? what are some of the barriers keeping more ukrainian refugees from coming to our country? yeah, so candidly, craig, part of the concern is the refugee resettlement system, even the asylum system are beset by backlogs. they are not systems that work nimbly in terms of processing
wen ben when america agreed to take in thousands of afghan refugees it was with the understanding they would be thoroughly vetted before being resettled across the country. turns out that s simply not happening. according to rioters at least hundred afghan refugees have just walked off the u.s. military bases where they were being temporarily housed without completing the resettlement process. not only are these migrants now unaccounted for but this exposes a major crack in this administration s vetting and resettlement system. joining me now is wisconsin congressman mike gallagher. congressman, i certainly am sure that you are concerned about this news regarding the vetting process. you know, i can t i can t imagine that it s all that surprising though given how much this entire process has been botched from the beginning? unfortunately, not surprising at all. we have one of these bases in wisconsin, fort mccoy, i visited a few weeks ago. and a few things shocked me.
of the divisions that exist in europe. european leaders were patting themselves on the back that they made this agreement in three weeks, remembering it took them four months to bring in 40,000 refugee the reality is to push this through to show they are united and credible as a european union. what they re doing is sewing the seeds for division in the future. deep, deep divisions, nic, it s clear, these leaders have different ideas on how to solve this let me ask you this, what are the eu leaders prebareing to do, you have a resettlement system that has to be put together. facilities that have to be built and organized and they need to address the root cause, the violence and instability at the heart of this in the yunts other people are leaving. reporter: sure. we are going to have today the leaders coming in, you have the justice minsters and interior ministers, you got british