XPost: alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, alt.politics.republicans, talk.politics.guns XPost: misc.immigration.usa
No wonder the Pope is pissed at Trump.
It's all about money.
'Biden immigration crisis was a boon for Catholic Charities, which raked
in billions in grant money'
<
https://justthenews.com/government/federal-agencies/biden-immigration-policies-were-boon-catholic-charities-which-raked>
'President Joe Biden’s border policies were a boon for private religious charities associated with the Catholic Church, which collectively
received billions in grant money while helping house and resettle
migrants, while a federal watchdog warned about mismanaged funds and a potential for fraud.
The funding for these humanitarian programs that came through the
Departments of Health and Human Services and Homeland Security as well
as the Federal Emergency Management Agency has come under renewed
scrutiny by President Trump and his administration, who seek to reverse
years of financial incentives for the crisis of border crossings under
their predecessor.
Catholic Charities USA, comprised of 168 local member agencies across
the United States, is one of the largest private recipients of
government funding under several immigration-related programs that
critics have said allowed the Biden administration to relocate and
shelter migrants in the United States.
According to data from USAspending.gov, Catholic Charities branches
across the United States collected over $2 billion in federal grants
over the last four years of the Biden administration, primarily through
the Department of Health and Human Services which granted about $1.93
billion for programs. Other agencies, like the Department of Homeland
Security and Housing and Urban Development also doled out significant—if smaller—sums, about $156 million and $138 million, respectively.
Catholic Charities USA did not respond to a request for comment from
Just the News.
Grants to Catholic Charities across the U.S.
Many of Catholic Charities’ local subsidiary offices received a
game-changing influx of cash during the Biden administration. The money
was allocated for migrant settlement and other services. For many local chapters, these new funds dwarfed the previous grants they had been
awarded in previous years.
For example, the endowment associated with Catholic Charities for the
Diocese of Fort Worth in Texas experienced a more than 34 fold increase
in funding from government grants from FY 2021 to FY 2023. In FY 2021,
at the beginning of the Biden administration, the group had only
received $11.7 million in grant money. By FY 2023, that amount had
ballooned to $401.7 million. A majority of that funding was earmarked
for a “Refugee and Entrant Assistance” program, according to the
financial records.
Catholic Charities Fort Worth offers comprehensive immigration services, including legal support for defending an immigrant against removal
proceedings from the United States, according to the group’s Immigration Services website.
“Having legal representation is the single most important factor in successfully winning a removal case,” the website reads. “Catholic Charities provides quality, affordable and effective representation with
the goal of keeping families safe and keeping them together.”
Other local offices experienced a comparable influx of cash geared to
refugee and migrant assistance.
For example, Catholic Charities of Louisville, Kentucky also experienced
a similar growth in funding over the same period. In FY 2021, the group
took in roughly $10 million in federal grants, but by FY 2023, that
number had exploded to about $122 million. That chapter also offers
similar immigration services, including legal support against
deportation.
FEMA enters the immigration business
Under the Biden administration, the Federal Emergency Management Agency
became one of the conduits for providing taxpayer funding to local organizations for immigration services. The agency faced scrutiny from Republicans who say providing services to migrants falls outside the
scope of the disaster management agency.
The criticism of the agency’s Shelter and Services program reached a
zenith last year after Biden Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro
Mayorkas told Congress that FEMA did not have extra funds to help
Southern states like Florida and North Carolina recover from dual
hurricanes last year after it had dispersed funds for immigration
services.
In the midst of the last major budget crisis in Washington, Democrats
diverted money and the legal authority to put the nation’s disaster
relief agency into the business of caring for the millions of illegal immigrants who crossed the border on the Biden-Harris administration’s
watch, Just the News reported last year. At that time, the White House
laughed off the claims as another "right-wing conspiracy theory."
The new Shelter and Services program first established by a Democratic
Congress in 2022 would “support sheltering and related activities
provided by non-Federal entities, including facility improvements and construction, in support of relieving overcrowding in short-term holding facilities of U.S. Customs and Border Protection,” according to the Congressional Research Service.
Inspector General raises potential for fraud and misuse of funds
The Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General raised
concerns that funding being diverted from FEMA to local nonprofit
organizations for immigration-related services was ripe for misuse or
potential fraud.
The OIG found “local recipient organizations” did not always use funding
in line with federal guidance and in some cases did not “provide the
required receipts or documentation for claimed reimbursements.” The watchdog’s probe also found that some local organizations “were unable
to provide supporting documentation for families and individuals to whom
they provided services” and some families or individuals served “did not have a DHS encounter record.”
You can read the OIG report below:
File
OIG-23-20-Mar23.pdf
“These issues occurred because FEMA did not provide sufficient oversight
of the funds and instead relied on local boards and fiscal agents to
enforce the funding and application guidance,” the inspector general concluded. “As a result, FEMA, as the National Board Chair, cannot
ensure the humanitarian relief funds were used as intended by the
funding and application guidance.”
“When you look at the way some of these charities have applied for
money, through the FEMA emergency disaster program, through the Office
of Refugee Resettlement, and then realizing that it is HHS and DHS and
the Office of Refugee Resettlement that have lost track of 300,000
children and they're still getting money,” Senator Marsha Blackburn,
R-Tenn., told the "John Solomon Reports" podcast.
“Totally rewarding failure and incompetence and what we have to do is
realize that, especially when it comes to FEMA, we've got people in
Tennessee and North Carolina that never expected a hurricane to end up
in the Great Smoky Mountains, which it did with Hurricane Helene, and
that they would be pushed out of their mountain homes because of a
flood, and FEMA has been slow to respond, and these are individuals that
are desperate to get some help and support,” she continued.
Some Catholic Charities accused of misusing FEMA funds
Catholic Charities San Antonio, which received more than $27 million in
total from FEMA, was accused by a Democratic congressman of misusing
funds it received for the program by purchasing airplane tickets for
migrants in its care.
Democratic Rep. Henry Cuellar, the then-ranking member of the House
Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee and member who helped
create the program, and Rep. Monica de la Cruz, a Republican, told the
Border Report that the program was never intended to support long
distance travel but rather things like food and shelter.
“When I first started this program, I said it would only be used for
food and shelter, maybe transportation inside a city, but not to be
sending them up there. The family or somebody should pay for that, not
the taxpayer dollars,” Cuellar told the outlet last April.
However, Catholic Charities San Antonio said that nothing in FEMA rules prevented them from purchasing plane tickets for migrants in their care
and confirmed that his organization did help migrants travel outside the
city, but had not purchased any plane tickets since the end of 2023.
“The funds were given to us to provide food, clothing, all these
activities, including transportation,” Jose Antonio Fernandez, CEO of
the chapter, told the National Catholic Register.
“It’s not my interpretation, it is a fact; many companies in the U.S. provide transportation because it is allowed,” he said. “If you contact FEMA, they will tell you that, yes, you are actually allowed to provide transportation.”
Pope Francis criticizes Trump administration policy
Pope Francis on Tuesday wrote a letter to the Catholic Bishops in
America that called the Trump administration’s “mass deportation” policy a “major crisis.”
“The rightly formed conscience cannot fail to make a critical judgment
and express its disagreement with any measure that tacitly or explicitly identifies the illegal status of some migrants with criminality,” the
Pope asserted. “At the same time, one must recognize the right of a
nation to defend itself and keep communities safe from those who have
committed violent or serious crimes while in the country or prior to
arrival.
“That said, the act of deporting people who in many cases have left
their own land for reasons of extreme poverty, insecurity, exploitation, persecution or serious deterioration of the environment, damages the
dignity of many men and women, and of entire families, and places them
in a state of particular vulnerability and defenselessness,” the Pope continued, and urged the bishops to continue their work with “migrants
and refugees.”
The Pope’s position on mass deportations has rankled Catholics in the
Trump administration. Tom Homan, the administration’s border czar, is a Catholic and has argued that facilitating illegal immigration does more
harm than good, citing incidents of sexual assault, human trafficking,
and even death on the journey to America through Mexico.
When asked about Pope Francis’ prior criticism of the administration’s policies, Homan fired back, saying he “ought to stick to the Catholic
Church and fix that. That’s a mess,” in an interview with Newsmax'
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