February 3, 2025
The GRACE Act can fight funding freezes. Here’s what it would mean for Arkansas.
The Arkansas Democratic Gazette reported that “Sixty-five people from among 25 families in Northwest Arkansas will not get assistance from the U.S. State Department previously allocated for them.” These include refugee families fleeing protracted conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Afghans escaping the tyranny of the Taliban, and Venezuelans fearing persecution from the Maduro regime.
These refugees, still within their first ninety-days in the U.S., cannot continue receiving federally-funded services: visits with case managers, assistance enrolling their children in school, or support navigating the U.S. medical system for the first time.
Arkansas’s resettlement agencies are scrambling to raise additional private funds to meet newly-arrived refugee’s basic needs, such as food and winter clothing.
The Director of Catholic Immigration Services in Little Rock described:
“We’ve been told by the government to abandon our clients that have just arrived.”
Fear and uncertainty govern resettlement in Arkansas. The trauma of the funding freeze only compounds the heartbreak of last week’s announcement that eight families in Arkansas will no longer be able to reunite with their loved ones after the Trump Administration banned new refugee arrivals.
Read the full article here.
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