Washington, D.C., and Statewide, Iowa (RI) – Hundreds of new Iowa residents face more challenges as the Trump administration has ordered all resettlement agencies in the U.S. to stop providing services to refugees.
Agencies are no longer allowed to access federal funding to rehome those fleeing persecution. Nick Wuertz, director of refugee services for Lutheran Services in Iowa, says more than 800 individuals in Iowa have now lost access to this transitional program, and more than half of them are children.
Wuertz says resettlement agencies provide financial assistance for basic living expenses, while Lutheran Services in Iowa covers those expenses for the refugees’ first 90 days in the U.S.
Wuertz says roughly 80 percent of LSI’s funding comes from the federal government.
