The Trump administration has lowered refugee admissions to an all-time low. Giulia McPherson of Jesuit Refugee Service/USA explains why this is both inhumane and shortsighted.

The administration announced it would bring the refugee cap—the maximum number of displaced people the country decides to resettle in a federal fiscal year—to a historic low: 15,000.

“Asylum on the border is pretty much impossible,” a legal advocate with the Catholic Legal Immigration Network, said. “Covid is being used as an excuse to close the border.”

Pompeo visited sites aiding the Venezuelans in northern-most Roraima state, where many refugees have landed. Since 2015, more than 260,000 Venezuelans have crossed the border into Brazil.

Even as the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees pleaded with countries to take in more of the 79.5 million displaced people worldwide, the Trump administration has consistently lowered the refugee cap each year.

Women, children, elderly people, Indigenous populations and migrants will be among those suffering the most.