Number of refugees resettling in Minnesota rising with more on the way

Minnesota saw a surge in refugees arriving over the last year, and that number is expected to keep growing.

More than 1,500 refugees resettled here in the 2023 fiscal year, almost triple the amount in 2022 and up from 258 in 2021. Local refugee agencies are having to add staff once more to accommodate the new arrivals.

Refugee resettlement figures still are far lower than they were during former President Obama's administration, when Minnesota routinely accepted several thousand a year. The number of refugees accepted nationwide fell to record lows under then President Trump. President Biden's efforts to restore those numbers were thwarted by the pandemic and delays in building back the capacity of resettlement agencies and international staff.

The largest group of 443 people came to Minnesota from Somalia, a dramatic increase after years of low numbers following Trump's crackdown on Muslim arrivals. Other major arrival groups are Congolese, Karen and Ethiopian people, who often have spent years in refugee camps after escaping deadly conflicts.

Minnesota expects to take in about 2,400 refugees in 2024, said Ben Walen, division director for refugee services at Minnesota Council of Churches. His agency now has double the staff it did at the end of the Obama administration, and it's added more case managers, continued to build connections with landlords to house new arrivals and coordinated with public health and government assistance services.

While there are challenges, he said, "by and large I think everybody is preparing and prepared to take on high numbers of refugees."

Biden raised America's refugee admissions ceiling to 125,000 after entering office in 2021, a slightly higher level than in Obama's last year in the White House. Biden has renewed that number in the years since, but challenges in the resettlement system meant that the actual number of people admitted through that pathway fell well below the administration's cap.

Even in 2023, only about half the permitted number of refugees came to the United States. Yet large numbers of people still have arrived through other pathways. More than 170,000 Ukrainians fleeing the Russian invasion have been granted humanitarian parole through the Uniting for Ukraine program, and the Biden administration recently announced a plan to provide humanitarian parole for up to 30,000 Cubans, Venezuelans, Nicaraguans and Haitians.

The annual refugee number set by presidents each year has been considered as a cap by other administrations, "whereas I think the Biden administration has made it clear that it's seen as more as a goal; that's the number we want to see arrive in that year," said Rebekah Phillips, director of refugee services at Arrive Ministries. "So I think there was a lot of resources put around that to make that happen both locally here in Minnesota and also at the national level … and even those who are doing overseas processes for refuges started to add to their staff capacities."

She added: "We saw the refugee resettlement pathway really come back to life a little bit, and I think that's the reason for the increases we did see. Now I think it's challenging to go from a trickle to a full faucet of water again."

Executive Director Annie Perdue-Olson said Arrive Ministries has expanded employment services and increased staffing.

"We're also asking questions of how do we provide additional services beyond resettlement in case things do change and things do shift," she said. "We've resettled a lot of new Americans that we can provide support for," such as classes in English, career advancement and technology. "We have a role to play regardless of what administration changes happen."

Immigration will be a major issue during next year's presidential campaign, and refugee admission numbers could wildly fluctuate again depending on who takes office in 2025. Trump, the presumed GOP nominee, is expected to slash refugee admissions as part of a massive immigration crackdown.

Meanwhile, capacity is growing beyond the Twin Cities. United Community Action Partnership has only resettled small numbers of refugees – primarily East Africans — reuniting with relatives living in the southwest corner of Minnesota. Now the nonprofit's capacity is expanding and it plans to resettle between 75 and 85 people in the coming year.

“We are moving up a notch, where we can take more families from a lot of different countries,” said Executive Director Deb Brandt.