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![handle is hein.crs/govedhc0001 and id is 1 raw text is: Congressional
f*Research Service
FY2021 Refugee Ceiling Increase
May 11, 2021
On May 3, 2021, President Joe Biden issued an emergency presidential determination (PD) to raise the
FY2021 refugee ceiling to 62,500. It followed an earlier emergency PD on FY2021 refugee admissions
signed by President Biden on April 16, 2021. The first emergency PD revised the allocations in the
original FY2021 PD issued by President Donald Trump, but left the refugee ceiling unchanged at 15,000.
The refugee provisions in the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA @207) authorize the President, after
consulting with members of the House Judiciary Committee and the Senate Judiciary Committee, to issue
a PD before the beginning of the fiscal year. In the PD, the President sets the refugee ceiling for the year
and allocates that ceiling among refugees of special humanitarian concern to the United States. INA
Section 207(b) further allows the President, after congressional consultation, to issue an emergency
determination in the middle of a fiscal year in the event of an unforeseen refugee emergency situation.
In the May 2021 emergency PD, President Biden offered the following explanation for raising the
FY2021 refugee ceiling from 15,000 to 62,500:
Upon additional briefing and a more comprehensive presentation regarding the capacity of the
executive departments and agencies charged with administering USRAP [U.S. Refugee Admissions
Program] to increase refugee admissions while responding to other demands, and given the ongoing
unforeseen emergency refugee situation, I now determine, consistent with my Administration's
prior consultation with the Congress, that raising the number of admissions permissible for FY 2021
to 62,500 is justified by grave humanitarian concerns and is otherwise in the national interest.
The Biden Administration had proposed increasing the FY2021 refugee cap to 62,500 in a report provided
to the Judiciary Committees in advance of February 2021 consultations on an emergency PD. Instead, in
an unexpected move, President Biden retained the preexisting refugee cap of 15,000 in his April 2021
emergency PD.
The May 2021 emergency PD allocates the new 62,500 refugee ceiling by region. It increases the
allocation provided for each region and the unallocated reserve in the earlier emergency PD (see Table 1).
Congressional Research Service
https://crsreports.congress.gov
IN11669
CRS INSIGHT
Prepared for Members and
Committees of Congress](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.crs/govedhc0001&div=1&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)