Refugee Federalism and Wyoming

Wyoming Law Review Volume 17 Number 2 Article 1 January 2017 One in Fifty: Refugee Federalism and Wyoming Suzan M. Pritchett Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarship.law.uwyo.edu/wlr Recommended Citation Pritchett, Suzan M. (2017) "One in Fifty: Refugee Federalism and Wyoming," Wyoming Law Review: Vol. 17 : No. 2 , Article 1. Available at: https://scholarship.law.uwyo.edu/wlr/vol17/iss2/1 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Law Archive of Wyoming Scholarship. It has been accepted for inclusion in Wyoming Law Review by an authorized editor of Law Archive of Wyoming Scholarship. Pritchett: One in Fifty: Refugee Federalism and Wyoming WYOMING LAW REVIEW VOLUME 17 2017 NUMBER 2 ONE IN FIFTY: REFUGEE FEDERALISM AND WYOMING Suzan M. Pritchett * I. INTRODUCTION ......................................................................................274 II. RESPONDING TO THE GLOBAL REFUGEE CRISIS: A MULTI-LEVELED REGULATORY REGIME ..............................................................................276 A. The United Nations Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees: A Collective International Approach to the Refugee Problem .............276 B. The Immigration and Nationality Act and its Delegated Authority: Translating International Obligations into Domestic Procedures .......279 1. Domestic Asylum Adjudication: Meeting the Definition of a Refugee ..........................................................................280 2. Overseas Refugee Resettlement: A Statutory Basis.....................283 3. Recent Executive Orders: Suspending Refugee Admissions ........286 C. Sub-National Resettlement Implementation ....................................288 1. State Administered Resettlement ............................................290 2. Public-Private Partnerships ...................................................291 3. Wilson-Fish Models ..............................................................292 III. THE PROCESS OF REFUGEE RESETTLEMENT: FROM DISPLACEMENT TO CITIZENS IN WAITING .............................................................................293 IV. ONE IN FIFTY: THE REFUGEE RESETTLEMENT DEBATE IN WYOMING ..........296 * Assistant Professor & Director, International Human Rights Clinic. I would like to thank Bertine Bahige, and his siblings, who have provided me, from the back of a boda boda in Uganda to the hallways of the state capital in Wyoming, with a constant source of inspiration and humility during the ongoing discussions related to refugee resettlement. Thanks also to the Wyoming Humanities Council, the University of Wyoming Outreach School, Saturday University, Wyoming PBS, and Wyoming Public Radio for multiple opportunities to engage with the citizens of Wyoming on the issue of refugee resettlement. I wish to acknowledge Professor Stella Elias whose article The Perils and Possibilities of Refugee Federalism and refugee federalism framework provided a theoretical and structural foundation for my exploration of the refugee resettlement debate in Wyoming. Published by Law Archive of Wyoming Scholarship, 2017 1 Wyoming Law Review, Vol. 17 [2017], No. 2, Art. 1 274 WYOMING LAW REVIEW Vol. 17 V. REFUGEE FEDERALISM AND WYOMING .......................................................303 A. Preserving Exceptionalism: Lessons Learned from the Restrictionist Movement .................................................................304 B. Engaging in Collective Action: Cooperative Refugee Resettlement ......311 VI. CONCLUSION .........................................................................................314 I. INTRODUCTION Since 2011, the conflict in Syria, continued instability in Afghanistan, and ongoing civil strife and international struggle in many parts of the world have contributed to the massive upheaval of individuals from their homes and their countries of origin.1 Approximately one in one hundred individuals around the globe are either internally or externally displaced.2 The current geopolitical reality of large-scale human displacement has led the United Nations to conclude that the world is in the midst of a global refugee crisis.3 As noted by António Guterres, former UN High Commissioner for Refugees, “We are witnessing a paradigm change, an unchecked slide into an era in which the scale of global forced displacement as well as the response required is now clearly dwarfing anything seen before.”4 In bearing its burden in the global refugee crisis, the United States has accepted large numbers of these refugees through the federal Refugee Admissions Program (RAP).5 Since 1975, the United States has welcomed over 3 million refugees inside its borders, allowing these individuals to find safety from persecution and giving them the opportunity to begin their lives again.6 Within the United States, every state participates in the resettlement of refugees, except for Wyoming, which has never been a formal participant in the national refugee resettlement program.7 For reasons discussed in this article, 1 Global Trends: Forced Displacement in 2015, UNHCR, THE UN REFUGEE AGENCY, 3 (2016), http://www.unhcr.org/en-us/statistics/unhcrstats/576408cd7/unhcr-global-trends-2015. html (showing that 54% of the world’s refugees come from Syria, Afghanistan, and Somalia) [hereinafter Global Trends 2015]; International Crisis Group, What’s Driving the Global Refugee Crisis? (last updated Sept. 15, 2016), https://www.crisisgroup.org/global/what-s-driving-global- refugee-crisis. 2 Phillip Connor & Jens Manuel Krogstad, Key Facts About the World’s Refugees, PEW RES. CENTER (Oct. 5, 2016), http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/10/05/key-facts-about- the-worlds-refugees/. 3 Global Trends 2015, supra note 2 (finding that “By end-2014, 59.5 million individuals were forcibly displaced worldwide as a result of persecution, conflict, generalized violence, or human rights violations.”). 4 Id. at 3. 5e Se U.S. DEP’T. OF STATE, REFUGEE ADMISSIONS (last visited Apr. 15, 2017) https://www. state.gov/j/prm/ra/. 6. Id 7 Justin Fisk, State’s Role in Refugee Resettlement, THE CURRENT STATE E-NEWSL., Jan. 2017, http://www.csg.org/pubs/capitolideas/enews/cs41_2.aspx. https://scholarship.law.uwyo.edu/wlr/vol17/iss2/1 2 Pritchett: One in Fifty: Refugee Federalism and Wyoming 2017 ONE IN FIFTY: REFUGEES IN WYOMING 275 refugees still find their way to Wyoming, but there is no formal structure in place to affirmatively welcome refugees to the State.8 Simply put: the State of Wyoming is one in fifty.9 Given the State’s exceptionalism in this regard and in light of the global refugee crisis, the question then arises: should Wyoming join the federal refugee resettlement program or must Wyoming join the federal refugee resettlement program? From a legal perspective, could the federal government require Wyoming to bear its proportionate burden in the national refugee resettlement program and engage in resettlement in the State? This article explores Wyoming’s role in the global refugee crisis. Part II describes the legal framework, both international and domestic, that creates the multi-layered refugee and asylum regime.10 Part III examines how the refugee resettlement program works in practice—from identification of refugees abroad to resettlement in specific communities within the United States.11 Building on this legal and procedural foundation, the article moves to a Wyoming-specific analysis. Part IV describes the Wyoming refugee resettlement discussion to date, including efforts by local advocates to bring refugees to the State and the resistance that has followed.12 Part V builds on the work of immigration scholar Stella Elias, who has written comprehensively on state responses to refugee resettlement and introduced the term refugee federalism to describe the interactions of state and federal government in the refugee admissions and resettlement context.13 Using a refugee federalism theoretical framework,14 Part V brings a Wyoming specific analysis to the scholarship in this area and contextualizes Wyoming’s role in an emerging anti-refugee narrative that has been characterized, in part, by states’ failed efforts to limit refugee resettlement.15 Part V poses the Wyoming-specific questions of whether the federal government would have legal authority to require Wyoming to accept refugees, or, alternatively, whether Wyoming might, as Elias suggests, use the existing federalism framework to affirmatively welcome refugees within its borders.16 The article concludes by suggesting that Wyoming is at a crossroads 8 See id. 9. Id 10 See infra notes 18–146 and accompanying text. 11 See infra notes 147–175 and accompanying text. 12 See infra notes 175–232 and accompanying text. 13 Stella Burch Elias, The Perils and Possibilities of Refugee Federalism, 66 AM. U. L. REV. 353, 358 (2016). 14 See generally Steve Vladeck, Three Thoughts on Refugee Resettlement Federalism, LAWFARE BLOG (Nov. 17, 2015), https://www.lawfareblog.com/three-thoughts-refugee-resettlement- federalism; PRATHEEPAN GULASEKARAM & S. KARTHICK RAMAKRISHNAN, THE NEW IMMIGRATION FEDERALISM 12 (2015). 15 See infra notes 233–310 and accompanying text. 16 Elias, supra note 14 at 407–12; see also infra notes 233–310 and accompanying text. Published by Law Archive of Wyoming Scholarship, 2017 3 Wyoming Law Review, Vol. 17 [2017], No. 2, Art. 1 276 WYOMING LAW REVIEW Vol. 17 in the refugee resettlement debate. Given the possibilities for economic growth, demographic diversity, and service provision to refugees and asylees already within

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