Don’t Forget the Refugee Crisis After the Fighting Stops

In the week following Russia’s indefensible invasion of Ukraine, more than 1 million people have fled the country. The lines of refugees at the Ukraine-Poland border stretch for miles. Children cry in the freezing cold as wait times reach 60 hours. Refugees discuss the relatives they had been forced to leave behind — sometimes without knowing whether their loved ones are alive or dead. And the United Nations predicts these refugees could be followed by millions more — potentially resulting in “the biggest refugee crisis this century.”

As Ukrainians seek safe harbor, they fortunately have received an extraordinary outpouring of support from the international community. The U.N. Refugee Agency, the International Rescue Committee and other organizations have sent emergency teams and resources. People around the world, including in Russia, are taking to the streets to condemn the invasion — and donating to organizations offering direct aid to the Ukrainian people. The United States has pledged $54 million in humanitarian aid to Ukrainian refugees, with Congress considering an additional $2.9 billion as the situation escalates.

Though these efforts are vital, they also draw attention to our country’s cruelly inadequate infrastructure for aiding refugees from Ukraine and beyond. Instead of welcoming refugees with open arms, current efforts hold them at arm’s length.

While the United States has offered aid to help other countries welcome Ukrainian refugees, our own annual refugee cap remains at just 125,000. Worse, the United States resettled only about 4,400 refugees in January — a pace well below even the Trump-era annual cap of 15,000.

Read the full article in The Washington Post.