USCCB-CRS Letter to Congress on Foreign Operations Appropriations March 17, 2017

USCCB-CRS Letter to Congress on Foreign Operations Appropriations, signed by Bishop Oscar Cantu, Chairman, Committee on International Justice and Peace, Bishop Joe Vasquez, Chairman, Committee on Migration, and Sean Callahan, President & CEO, Catholic Relief Services, March 17, 2017

Year upon year, the State, Foreign Operations and Related Programs subcommittee has had a bipartisan commitment to meeting our country’s moral obligation to the growing humanitarian poverty reduction needs overseas.  As you contemplate fiscal year 2018 appropriations for programs and activities under the Subcommittee’s jurisdiction, we urge you to maintain that leadership by protecting funding for poverty-focused humanitarian and development assistance as well as by maintaining adequate levels of funding for assistance, protection, and durable solutions for those who are forcibly displaced. (See the FY 2017 chart attached for your reference.) 

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) and Catholic Relief Services (CRS) evaluate budgets in accord with two critical guidelines: first, every budget decision should be assessed by whether it protects or threatens human life and dignity; second, a central moral measure of any budget proposal is how it affects “the least of these” (Matthew 25). The needs of those who are hungry and homeless, vulnerable and at risk, without work or in poverty, forced to flee their home or country, should come first.  Americans have led the world in responding to the immense needs of vulnerable persons and communities for decades.  Privileged to serve more than 100 million people in more than 100 countries last year, Catholic Relief Services can attest first-hand to the significant impact of poverty-reducing international assistance; and to the gratitude it engenders.  USCCB’s Migration and Refugee Services, likewise, was privileged to work with the U.S. Departments of State, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, thirty-seven states, and numerous local communities across the country to welcome and resettle over 23,400 people through the U.S. refugee admissions program last year. 

Our world is experiencing more food emergencies now than we have seen in decades, and the related phenomenon of forced displacement is at an all time high. Nearly 20 million people face starvation in the next six months, according to the UN.  A famine has already been declared in South Sudan’s Unity State, which could spread to other areas of the country. Large areas of Yemen, Nigeria, and Somalia are on the brink of famine.  The lives of as many as 1.4 million children are at “imminent risk.”  We appreciate the fact that Congress has increased the International Disaster Assistance account in recent years to respond to the significant needs of refugees and internally displaced persons. That same funding is now being tapped to respond to the food insecurity.  We urge you not to reduce the allocations to International Disaster Assistance (IDA), Migration and Refugee Assistance (MRA), nor Emergency Refugee and Migration Assistance (ERMA); all humanitarian accounts which are critical to responding to the 65 million displaced and hungry around the world. 

Joint-Letter-to-Congress-on-State-Foreign-Ops-2017-03-17.pdf