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Alex Molling
English 2010
Professor Courtney
September 21, 2016
Report
Utah Immigration

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With Syrias civil war now in its fifth year, we are currently seeing the worst refugee
crisis of this generation. According to OCHA (the United Nations Office for the Coordination of
Humanitarian Affairs), as of February 2016, there are 13.5 million Syrians requiring
humanitarian assistance, of which 6.1 million are internally displaced within Syria and over 4.8
million are refugees outside of Syria (see below figure). With all of these people having to flee
from their native land, it gives us a sense of responsibility to help our fellow man even if they
come from a completely different continent. With this sense of concern for these refugees, the
United States as a whole as well as the individual states within it are trying to make a difference.
Though many of us want to help these human beings, some American citizens are simultaneously
weary of relocating hundreds of thousands of refugees into our homeland due to the fact that
some of them could be terrorists or could
be planning on doing harm to other people.
Weve seen this happen with countries
throughout Europe whom have brought in
millions of refugees. They brought too
many in and didnt have adequate resources to maintain them, nor did they have a proper way of
distinguishing the individuals to see if they posed a possible threat to the civilians of their
country.
Some of the results of bringing in too many refugees have been seen in bombings and
other terror attacks, as well as women from those countries being attacked and raped, and cities
have become completely destroyed. Because of the unfolding of these events, a majority of
Utahs republican representatives have rejected legislation that would otherwise accept a portion
of these refugees into our elsewise hospitable state. Because of this series of events, there is very
limited room for these Syrian refugees to come to Utah in general. According to an academic

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article written by Matt Canham and published in the Salt Lake Tribune in November of 2015,
Utah takes in about 1,100 refugees a year, most recently for places such as Iraq, Burma and
Congo. Since the Syrian civil war began, the state has resettled just 12 Syrians comprising of two
families (Canham, page 1). This number should rise to a few hundred people in the next year and
will hopefully create a small Syrian community within the state of Utah.
Though the United States has national legislation which effects refugees and immigration
as a whole on a national level, there is legislation that is passed within the separate states within
the country that effects immigration as well. I will now focus more on the legislation being
passed in Utah specifically and the decisions that the Utah legislature is passing that directly
effects these refugees in search of a better life for them and their families in a new country.
Recently, Governor Gary Herbert has taken a very sensible stance on settling refugees
specifically from Syria. It seems as though he is the nations sole GOP governor who has not
refused to accept Syrian refugees. With all five members of Utahs congressional delegation in
favor of keeping Utahs doors closed to Syrian Refugees, and thirty other Republican governors
following these traditions, Governor Herbert is virtually the only prominent Republican willing
to bring these people into our borders. Herbert also has acknowledged the events unfolding in
Europe and to prevent similar events from occurring within the United States he has strongly
agreed that there needs to be a strong screening process for the Syrian refugees we let into the
country and the state of Utah. Herbert supports a bill that passed in the U.S. House that will
strongly tighten security screenings for these refugees to make certain that these people are not a
threat to the American people they will be interacting with (Editorial, page 1).
With legislation being passed within individual states having a key role on immigration
laws, Utah has been rigorously updating their own laws and regulations concerning this issue. A
recent example of this was in June of 2014 when a federal judge gave a split ruling on Utahs
immigration measures and law. In an editorial published by the New York Times in June of 2014

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about the split ruling, the article states, The split ruling upheld one key measure of Utahs
immigration law while simultaneously striking down several other pieces of legislation that was
previously passed amid a wave of immigration crackdowns in recent years. (Utah, page 1). The
ruling by Judge Clark Waddoups of the Federal District Court upheld a provision requiring the
authorities to check the immigration status of those arrested on suspicion of felonies or certain
misdemeanors, such as theft. Though he upheld this measure, he set limits on how it can be
carried out. The article goes on explaining, In addition to that component, the ruling rejected a
provision allowing warrantless arrests based solely on suspicion of immigration status. The
ruling also rejected a specific part of the law that made it illegal and a state crime to harbor a
person in the country illegally. (Utah, page 1).
With all the controversy over immigration, there has been a very dramatic increase in
legislation concerning immigration in general.
With these issues continuing to rise, the federal
government has responded by devoting policy to
the states. As a result of this, we have seen much
innovation on the state level as our policymakers
seek to accommodate, welcome, or resist
immigration within their states with varying degrees of success. For these reasons, the number of
immigration legislation has dramatically risen as you can see in the chart to the right (Stuart,
page 40).
Immigrants have increasingly gravitated towards new destinations, and a large portion
of these immigrants are undocumented. In the past, immigrants mostly settled in six states, these
were: California, New York, New Jersey, Illinois, Texas, and Florida, but now migrants have
dispersed much more widely, and their new destinations include cities and towns in the South,

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he Mid-West, and the Inter-Mountain region. Because of this, Utah and other surrounding states
have had to make changes to their policies in accepting these migrant into their state boundaries,
which as a result pushes the people and culture of those states adapt to the cultural changes
presented by these migrant groups. This can be both positive and/or negative depending on how
open the individuals are to these changes and how willing they are to adapt to them within their
own society.
With all the widespread fear and controversy of immigrants coming into the United States
and into our homeland, it is becoming much more difficult to find unbiased opinions within this
subject. There are many pros and cons to adopting legislation that allows the flow of refugees
into this land, and there will always be controversy with differing opinions on these topics, so as
to say that immigrating numerous refugees into our homeland is a good thing would be otherwise
prejudice. And though many of our elected officials have differentiated opinions on this matter,
we must not believe everything we hear and instead must dig deep and discover our own
personal ideals based upon our individual beliefs. With this being said, to bring in a plethora of
immigrants into our land will not be easy in the least, but does that mean we should abandon our
fellow man in their time of need? We must then choose whether to help these humans who like
us, value life and want to live without the fear of not knowing whether they will survive to see
another day. This is a very important issue currently circulating within our society and within the
media, and though the majority may think that they cannot change what is unfolding before us,
we as Americans must educate ourselves and form a better understanding of the current
situations taking place before us if we ever want to see a brighter tomorrow for not only us, but
for the many human beings among the planet.

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Works Cited
Canham, Matt - The Salt Lake, Tribune. "Slow Migration: Syrians To Be Utah's Next
Refugee Community." AP Regional State Report - Utah (2015): Points of View Reference
Center. Web. 17 Sept. 2016.
"EDITORIAL: Utah's Herbert takes a sensible stance on Syrian refugees." StandardExaminer (Ogden, UT) 22 Nov. 2015: Points of View Reference Center. Web. 17 Sept.
2016.
Stewart, Julie, and Kenneth P. Jameson. "Interests Aren't Everything: An Exploration Of
Economic Explanations Of Immigration Policy In A New Destination." International
Migration 51.4 (2013): 33-52. Academic Search Premier. Web. 17 Sept. 2016.
"Syrian Arab Republic." OCHA. N.p., n.d. Web. 22 Sept. 2016.
"Utah: Judge Gives Split Ruling on Immigration Measures." The New York Times 2014:
A18. Opposing Viewpoints in Context. Web. 17 Sept. 2016.