If America is to stop ISIS’s expansion, we must ensure the migrants flooding into Europe receive some social welfare benefits, said Senator Chris Murphy (D., Conn.) on Fox News Sunday.
“The fact is, is that when there isn’t help for these refugees from the United States or our partners, they turn to others that are offering help, like ISIS, like al-Qaeda, to give them the paycheck, to give them nutritional benefits for their kids,” Murphy argued.
“If we are not on the ground helping in some way, shape or form then ultimately, we are just pushing a lot of these individuals into the hands of our enemy,” he cautioned.
#share#Earlier on Fox News Sunday, Senator Ron Johnson (R., Wisc.) reported that it currently takes up to two years for the government to vet a single refugee — an argument Senator Murphy downplayed.
“It can happen faster, but as Ron points out, we can’t kid ourselves that we are protected just because we shove all these refugees in Europe,” Murphy said. “Because eventually, they will migrate from Europe to the United States. So, we shouldn’t be blind to the fact that there is risk no matter where these refugees end up.”
#related#”Listen, it is expensive,” he continued. “I mean it’s not cheap to do this vetting, but we are wasting money right now on a train and equip program that hasn’t trained or equipped one serious soldier against ISIS. We can take that money and use it for refugees.”
Senator Murphy, who has called the U.S.’s hesitancy to accept Syrian refugees “cold-hearted,” described the Obama administration’s pledge to accept 10,000 as insufficient. “My contention here is that if we want credibility in the region, then we have got to be seen as a partner in trying to solve this humanitarian crisis,” he said. “Right now, we aren’t. And that comes with a cost to U.S. credibility when we are trying to solve this problem.”
