The United States will launch a pilot program so that groups of individuals can sponsor refugees

By Rebecca Santana -

Americans will be able to help refugees adjust to life in the United States through a program launched by the State Department as a way to give private citizens a role in resettling the thousands of refugees who arrive each year. .

The State Department is scheduled to announce the program, dubbed Welcome Corps, on Thursday.

The agency aims to recruit 10,000 Americans who can help 5,000 refugees in the first year of the program.

“Drawing on the goodwill of American communities, Welcome Corps will expand our country's ability to warmly welcome greater numbers of refugees,” according to the announcement.

Ukrainian refugees enter the El Chaparral border crossing at the U.S. Customs and Border Protection San Ysidro PedWest Port of Entry on April 9, 2022. Patrick T. Fallon/AFP via Getty Images

Traditionally, the State Department has worked with nonprofit groups specializing in refugee issues to help people around the world when they first arrive in the country and are faced with a radically different way of life.

With the program, five or more Americans could form a group and play this role as well.

They would apply for private sponsorship of refugees to resettle in the United States and would be responsible for raising their own money to help refugees during their first 90 days in the country.

A consortium of nonprofit organizations with experience in refugee resettlement will help oversee the vetting and certification of individuals and groups who want to become private sponsors.

It will also offer training so private sponsors know what it takes to help refugees adjust to life in the United States.

The consortium will be in charge of supervising the program.

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The new initiative will be developed in two phases, according to the State Department.

In the first, private sponsors will be matched with refugees already approved for resettlement under the United States Refugee Assistance Program.

This will start during the first half of 2023.

In the second phase of the program, private sponsors will be able to identify refugees abroad they would like to help and refer them to the Refugee Assistance Program and assist them once they arrive in the country.

The Welcome Corps program follows in the wake of a similar, smaller-scale initiative in which Americans could sponsor Afghans or Ukrainians fleeing their country.

That program launched in October 2021 and has helped just over 800 people coming to the United States through a network of 230 certified sponsors.

In just six months, 100 million people became refugees.

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President Joe Biden promised in a 2021 executive order to restore America as the world's haven and called for private sponsorship of refugees.

The previous administration, of President Donald Trump, had largely rolled back the refugee program.