Introduction
On Oct. 30, 2025, the Trump administration announced that it would lower the refugee admissions ceiling to 7,500 individuals for fiscal year (FY) 2026 — the lowest level in U.S. history — and allocate the limited number of slots mostly to Afrikaners from South Africa. On Nov. 21, 2025, an internal memo from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) ordered the review of all refugees who entered the country under the Biden administration and the suspension of their pending permanent residence applications. These measures culminate a series of actions undertaken by the administration to dismantle the U.S. refugee resettlement system, a cornerstone of U.S. policy that has historically received bipartisan support.
Upon taking office in January 2025, President Donald Trump swiftly issued an executive order suspending new refugee arrivals into the U.S. under the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP), stating that it would be “detrimental to the interests” of the country. This meant thousands of refugees who had already been screened and approved to travel to the U.S. were left in limbo. In the days that followed, refugee resettlement agencies in the U.S., which are responsible for providing initial assistance to newly arrived refugees, received stop-work orders, preventing them from providing essential services such as health care, education, and housing to thousands more.
This brief contextualizes the history of refugee resettlement in the U.S. and examines the differing policies under Trump’s first (2017–21) and second (2025–present) terms. It also assesses the impact of the most recent changes to U.S. refugee resettlement on Houston, one of the country’s top resettlement cities, and their global consequences.
US History of Refugee Resettlement
The U.S. has a long history of refugee resettlement that dates back at least to the 1940s, when it admitted displaced Europeans after World War II. However, these efforts were largely coordinated through temporary legislation and private charitable networks, with resettlement remaining ad hoc until large-scale forced migration from Southeast Asia in the 1970s pushed Congress to establish a consistent national framework.
In 1980, Congress passed the Refugee Act, which aligned U.S. law with the United Nations’ definition of a refugee and created USRAP, a program that identifies, resettles, and assists refugees in the U.S. through a partnership between governmental and nongovernmental organizations. The Act also formalized a process in which the president, in coordination with Congress, sets an annual refugee admissions ceiling and outlines national priorities.
Since 1980, U.S. refugee admissions have fluctuated in response to global migration, administrative capacity, and political priorities. During the mid-1980s and 1990s, annual ceilings generally ranged from 70,000 to 140,000, and reflected shifting displacement patterns: Arrivals in the 1980s were largely from Southeast Asia, in the late 1980s and early 1990s from the former Soviet Union, and in the mid-1990s from the Balkans, with increasing arrivals from African countries by the late 1990s.
Over time, the admissions ceiling evolved into both a humanitarian commitment and a tool for signaling foreign policy. For instance, the ceiling rose during periods of mass displacement, such as the resettlement of Bosnian and Kosovar refugees in the 1990s, and fell during moments of heightened security concern, including the years following the Sept. 11 attacks in 2001. As Figure 1 illustrates, these cycles of expansion and contraction reflect how the United States’ approach to resettlement has never been static, but instead shaped by broader geopolitical dynamics and domestic political priorities.
Figure 1 — US Refugee Admissions Ceiling and Actual Admissions, 1980–2025
Despite the fluctuations, the U.S. has consistently remained the world’s top refugee resettlement country, followed by Canada and Australia — although in 2018 Canada surpassed the U.S. in annual arrivals for the first time in history. Canada has long been recognized as a global leader in immigration, with a resettlement program that includes government-based resettlement as well as private sponsorship. Australia, which began resettling refugees after World War II and formalized its refugee program in the 1970s, also maintains a strong tradition of welcoming refugees.
Yet, both Canada and Australia have historically admitted far fewer refugees than the United States. Since 1980, the U.S. has welcomed over 3.3 million refugees. By comparison, Canada has welcomed over 1 million since 1980, and Australia has resettled over 635,000 since 1947. This means the U.S. has resettled more than twice the total number of refugees as Canada and Australia combined. Although the U.S. has a considerably larger population than Canada and Australia, they have the necessary resources to accept more refugees. In 2017 and 2018 both countries increased their pledges for refugees to offset the significant resettlement cuts instituted in the United States.
How Does US Refugee Resettlement Work?
Refugee resettlement to the U.S. through USRAP is a multiagency process that begins overseas. Individuals who have fled their country of origin and sought asylum elsewhere are referred for resettlement to the U.S. — typically by the UNHCR, U.S. embassies, or designated NGOs. The U.S. agrees to admit them and ultimately grants permanent residence. Once referred, applicants undergo extensive screening and vetting before they are approved to travel. This includes biographic and biometric security checks conducted by multiple U.S. national security and intelligence agencies, as well as in-person interviews with USCIS officers.
In addition to security vetting, all refugees complete thorough medical examinations overseas to ensure they are cleared for travel. However, these steps are time-limited and expire after set periods. If vetting takes longer than expected or travel is delayed, screenings can lapse and must be recompleted, which slows movement through the system. These requirements and longstanding capacity constraints in overseas processing help explain why actual refugee admissions often fall below the annual ceiling, even when the government has expressed support for higher admissions.
After all security and medical checks have been completed, refugees are matched with a U.S. resettlement agency from the network of national voluntary agencies, which include the International Rescue Committee, Church World Service, and HIAS, among others. These agencies provide refugees with initial assistance upon their arrival in the U.S., sometimes in partnership with other local organizations, helping them to secure housing, employment, schooling, and with community integration. Importantly, these agencies receive federal funding based on the number of refugees served, meaning the stability and capacity of the system depend on predictable admissions levels from year to year. When admissions fall sharply, agencies must reduce staff and programming, making it more difficult to scale up again when ceilings increase.
Refugee Resettlement During Trump’s First Term
Trump’s first term marked an unprecedented dismantling of the U.S. refugee resettlement system, largely defined by executive orders and historically low admissions caps. Early in 2017, the administration issued an executive order, colloquially dubbed “the Muslim ban,” that temporarily prohibited the entry into the U.S. of individuals from several Muslim-majority countries, suspended the resettlement of Syrian refugees, paused USRAP operations, and lowered the refugee cap to 50,000 for FY 2017 — down from the 110,000 cap from the previous year.
While the order’s provisions were initially stalled by the courts and later blocked, another version went into effect in March 2017, thereby suspending all refugee arrivals for roughly four months. Then the Supreme Court decision in a case led by the International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP) against the Trump administration allowed USRAP to continue admitting refugees as long as they had an established connection to a U.S. national. As a result, 53,716 refugees were admitted to the U.S. in 2017. This number still fell short of the 110,000 ceiling President Barack Obama had originally established for FY 2017.
In October 2017, the administration issued another executive order resuming USRAP with enhanced vetting capabilities. Even though refugees are the most vetted category of individuals arriving in the country, the new measures involved increased data collection, expanded security checks, and further social media vetting. At the same time, the order imposed a 90-day travel ban on refugees from 11 countries — nine of them again Muslim-majority countries. Refugees from those countries, including Iraq, Syria, and Somalia, had accounted for 44% of the resettlement numbers from previous years, a reflection of the continued conflict and stability in those regions.
Further stripping down U.S. refugee resettlement, the cap for FY 2018 was set at 45,000. Stronger security regulations for refugees seeking to resettle in the U.S. were implemented in a Department of Homeland Security memorandum, outlining additional security procedures for the 11 countries listed in the October 2017 executive order. These actions caused widespread confusion, prompting refugee advocates to question they were being used as a smokescreen for further backlogs and keep refugees out of the country.
In the years that followed, the Trump administration continued to lower the refugee ceiling, reaching record lows. By FY 2019, the refugee admissions cap sat at merely 30,000, and only 29,916 refugees were admitted for resettlement. At the end of FY 2020, which had a refugee admissions cap of 18,000, only 11,840 refugees were admitted to the United States. Ultimately, from 2016 to 2020, the number of refugees admitted to the country decreased by 86%, reversing the U.S.’ longstanding role as a welcoming nation and a world leader in refugee resettlement.
The dismantling of the refugee resettlement system during Trump’s first term had severe consequences for refugee resettlement agencies across the country. Before Trump entered office, there were roughly 325 local refugee resettlement offices to service refugees. However, the decreased refugee caps imposed by his administration were accompanied by severe budget cuts, which led 134 of these offices — 38% of all offices nationwide — to close between FY 2017 and May 2020.
After four years of uncertainty, refugee resettlement agencies began to rebuild under the Biden administration (2021–25). Upon taking office, President Joe Biden raised the refugee admission cap and increased resources for these agencies, resettling 222,829 refugees during his tenure. Rebuilding capacity, however, proved challenging for refugee resettlement agencies. Over time, they managed to rehire staff, bring in new personnel, and open 150 additional local offices across the country. This infrastructure suffered another major blow from the start of Trump’s second term in 2025.
Refugee Resettlement in Trump’s Second Term
In January, Trump rolled back the Biden administration’s efforts to expand refugee resettlement. The playbook resembled that of his first administration, but the sweeping changes have gone even further and have decimated the U.S. refugee resettlement system. On the first day, he signed an executive order suspending the entry of refugees into the U.S. through USRAP and halting decisions on refugee status applications. Many of these individuals had already been approved for resettlement in the United States — some even had plane tickets for imminent travel.
Then on Feb. 7, 2025, the administration issued another executive order that created an exception to the resettlement freeze, prioritizing Afrikaners from South Africa. This exception drew criticism from refugee advocates and scholars, who argued that the admission of white Afrikaners reflected the administration was using the refugee program to favor groups aligned with its ideological and racial preferences.
Mirroring his first term, on June 4, 2025, Trump issued a travel ban barring entry for individuals from 12 countries and partially restricting travel from seven other countries. Although on paper this travel ban does not specifically bar refugees, the Trump administration announced that it would apply to them. This triggered concerns as several of the banned countries, such as Sudan and Afghanistan, are suffering humanitarian emergencies.
One of the administration’s latest actions to undermine U.S. refugee resettlement involves decreasing the refugee ceiling. On Oct. 31, 2025, the president released a determination on refugee admissions, setting the refugee cap at 7,500 in FY 2026 — the lowest in U.S. history. This figure marks a 94% reduction from the 125,000 cap set by the Biden administration the previous year.
Refugees already present in the U.S. have not been immune to Trump’s sweeping policies. A few days after USRAP’s suspension in January, refugee resettlement agencies were required to freeze services for recently arrived refugees, leaving over 22,000 refugees who were already in the country without access to necessary assistance. Legislation such as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed into law on July 4, 2025, has limited refugees’ access to certain public services. Under the new law, refugees who have not yet obtained permanent residence no longer qualify for public benefits, including Medicaid, Medicare, and food assistance through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).
On Nov. 21, 2025, an internal USCIS memo revealed that the U.S. could revoke the legal status of thousands of refugees. The memo ordered USCIS to vet and interview for a second time all refugees who were admitted to the U.S. between January 2021 and February 2025 under the pretext that the Biden administration prioritized expediency and quantity rather than thorough vetting and screening. If USCIS finds that these individuals do not meet refugee criteria, their status can be revoked and they can face deportation. At the same time, the memo paused processing of all pending permanent residence applications for refugees who entered the U.S. under the Biden administration. This unprecedented move sparked outrage among refugee advocates, who characterized it as traumatizing for refugees who have already been subject to extensive vetting and are contributing members of the communities where they have resettled.
The infrastructure supporting resettlement has also been targeted. On Feb. 26, 2025, the administration sought to terminate federal contracts with refugee resettlement agencies, a 45-year-long partnership that would have dismantled decades of infrastructure. Although a few months later the Trump administration sent letters to resettlement agencies confirming the contracts would be reinstated under revised terms following a court order, the contract terminations alongside a funding freeze led to resettlement agencies across the country laying off hundreds of employees and closing down offices.
Impacts on Houston
The changes highlighted above have been strongly felt by refugee resettlement agencies in Texas — the state that received the largest number of refugees in 2023 and 2024 — and Houston in particular, which resettled over 5,000 refugees in 2024. Houston’s major refugee resettlement efforts began after the end of the Vietnam War in the mid-1970s. The city now has a well-established network of five refugee resettlement agencies, alongside other nonprofit organizations, which provide legal, social, and educational services to refugees, and assist them in finding employment.
While the first Trump administration’s temporary suspension of USRAP and lowered admissions ceiling required Houston’s refugee resettlement organizations to significantly scale down their operations, the current administration’s policy changes have had a much greater impact.
Shortly after taking office, Trump froze federal funding and ordered refugee resettlement agencies to stop providing services to refugees. The reduced funding forced agencies in Houston to lay off staff members. In February 2025, Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston laid off 120 employees (nearly a quarter of their staff); this was followed in March 2025 by Interfaith Ministries for Greater Houston (101 employees), Church World Service (82), and YMCA of Greater Houston (350). In total, more than 650 employees were laid off or furloughed by the four main refugee resettlement agencies in the city, dealing a major blow to the local refugee support infrastructure.
These four refugee resettlement agencies historically relied on crucial federal funding, together receiving over $100 million annually from the federal government to support newcomers, prior to the cuts. In early February 2025, shortly after the funding freeze was announced, Church World Service and other agencies filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and others seeking release of the funds; this was followed by another lawsuit brought by Catholic Charities of Fort Worth. In March 2025, the federal government agreed to release $47 million to assist over 100,000 refugees in Texas, but much of the damage had already been done and will be challenging to reverse without stable, long-term funding.
The pause in funding and widespread layoffs have also had serious consequences for refugees in Houston. Refugee resettlement agencies and other nonprofit organizations provide newly arrived refugees with immediate assistance during their first months, including temporary housing and food. They also help refugees access health care, enroll their children in school, navigate public benefits, and find jobs. As these programs were halted, refugees were left without support, with some even receiving eviction notices.
Some nonprofit organizations have started to use private funding to help refugees, offering both financial aid, such as rental assistance, and material support, including furniture and food. Despite efforts to fill the gaps left by reduced funding and personnel, many challenges remain. In addition to grappling with emotional and mental health difficulties caused by traumatic and harrowing experiences fleeing their countries of origin, refugees now also face the uncertainty of not receiving the support needed to settle into a completely new environment.
Consequences for Global Refugee Resettlement
The reduction of the U.S. refugee admissions ceiling and funding cuts have impacts not only in communities across the nation but also globally. Having undergone extensive security vetting, many refugees already admitted to USRAP — and with their flights booked — now remain stranded elsewhere. Here are just three examples of the over 10,000 refugees whose travel plans and opportunities to start a new life in the U.S. were abruptly halted in 2025:
- A disabled Somali refugee who lives in the Dadaab refugee camp in Kenya was ready to travel to the U.S. in January until USRAP was suspended.
- A refugee family from Myanmar was hoping to reunite earlier this year after the remaining family members had received U.S. visas, but their February flight was canceled at the last minute.
- Three Syrian refugee siblings who were resettled to the U.S. in 2023 were waiting for their mother’s arrival in February, but her travel was canceled, and she remains stranded abroad.
A lawsuit filed by the IRAP, challenging the suspension of USRAP on behalf of several impacted refugees, led to an injunction that allowed 80 individuals to come to the U.S. despite the executive order. While litigation continues, however, numerous refugees remain in limbo, many of them in precarious and life-threatening situations with no prospects of returning to their home countries due to persecution or ongoing conflict.
Conclusion
Despite the longstanding bipartisan support for refugee resettlement, the current administration has severely reduced refugee admissions into the country, contending that the U.S. has been “inundated with record levels of migration, including through USRAP.” Although controlling the U.S. border and refugee admissions are separate issues, the administration has succeeded in conflating them and emphasizing its narrative that refugees, like immigrants, pose a security threat and a burden for the U.S. government.
However, this perspective understates the economic contributions and long-term societal benefits provided by resettled refugees. These individuals actively benefit the communities where they are resettled by paying billions in taxes, opening new businesses, and filling critical labor shortages.
For instance, between 2005 and 2019, refugees provided a net fiscal benefit of $123.8 billion, having contributed $581 billion in tax revenue, while the government spent $457.2 billion on them during the same period. Furthermore, refugees are more likely to become entrepreneurs than U.S. citizens — 13% of refugees were entrepreneurs in 2019, compared to 9% of U.S. citizens — which fuels economic growth in the country.
Americans have long supported refugee resettlement to the U.S., and that support continues today despite the increased politicization of immigration. A survey conducted in October 2025 found that 69% of respondents agreed that the U.S. should have a refugee resettlement program, demonstrating that the issue not only has bipartisan support from policymakers but also public backing.
Lastly, the dismantling of refugee resettlement not only impacts refugees in the U.S. and abroad but also damages U.S. credibility globally. With record numbers of displaced individuals worldwide, meaningful refugee resettlement is essential to demonstrate that the U.S. continues to be a leader and shares responsibility with major refugee host countries. Abandoning this commitment signals a retreat from a longstanding tradition of humanitarian leadership.
This publication was produced on behalf of Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy. Wherever feasible, the material was reviewed by external experts prior to its release. Any errors are the responsibility of the author(s) alone.
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