Believe it or not, when it comes to welcoming a few hundred Syrian refugees onto Floridian soil, Florida Governor Rick Scott can't go for that.
Scott joined a dozen other governors from states that are not good at electing governors in calling for a halt to the federal government's plan to place thousands of people escaping the violence and horror that has overtaken Syria in the U.S., including about 425 that are expected to come to Florida.
In a letter to U.S. House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Scott said he was concerned that there could be Islamic State terrorists among those who come. A member of ISIS was allegedly hiding among refugees who fled to France, and reportedly helped plan last week's deadly attack in Paris.
“Following the terrorist attacks by ISIS in Paris that killed over 120 people and wounded more than 350, and the news that at least one of the terror attack suspects gained access to France by posing as a Syrian refugee, our state agency will not support the requests we have received,” he wrote.
Since the refugee placement is a federal deal, there's nothing Scott can really do to prevent them from coming, other than perhaps withhold support the state might have offered through the Florida Department of Children and Families (so…we don't want more terrorists but we want to make conditions miserable for non-terrorists, which if we're not mistaken is part of the reason people become terrorists … got it).
That's why Scott reached out to his amigos at the federal level.
He asked the two congressional leaders to cut federal funding for the Obama Administration's plan to house Syrian refugees unless there is a thorough analysis of the risk doing so would entail.
The White House has already said it will do extensive background checks on those on the list, but Republicans like Scott are skeptical because Obama.
The president maintains that welcoming the refugees — again, after vetting them all — would be demonstrative of who we are as a nation, or at least who we aspire to be, fearmongering notwithstanding.
“We also have to remember that many of these refugees are victims of terrorism themselves. That’s what they’re fleeing,” Obama said earlier Monday. “Slamming the door in their faces would be a betrayal of our values.”
Not every Republican is so adamant that we keep the refugees out. Presidential hopefuls Jeb Bush and Ted Cruz have said the U.S. should focus on admitting Christians, which the president criticized, what with the First Amendment and all.
This article appears in Nov 12-18, 2015.
