The United States Department of State has raised the financing suspension for refugee Jesuit service (JRS) programs in Colombia and South Sudan.
“The Jesuit service to refugees USA today received the news of the Bureau of Population, refugees and migration (PRM) of the State Department that the financing suspensions for our programs in Colombia and South Sudan have been raised,” said Bridget Cusick, representative of JRS USA, in a statement sent by email to CNA – an English agency of Ewtn News – on Friday.
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“The South Sudan program has a value of 1.9 million dollars, and Colombia, 5 million dollars,” was mentioned in the mail.
“So far, we have not received funds, nor as a result of the lifting of the suspensions or by the decisions taken by the US Supreme Court earlier this week,” he said.
JRS USA Opera in Colombia, South Sudan, Chad, Ethiopia, India, Iraq, South Africa and Uganda. The organization provides essential services such as food, medicines, transport, economic assistance, care of orphans and unaccompanied children, as well as psychiatric care. In addition, it receives financing from the State Department through Trianual Cooperation Agreements.
Cusick declared CNA in an interview that last week received a notification that the State Department was “looking to finish” cooperation agreements for their programs in Chad, Ethiopia, India, Iraq and Uganda. So far, the organization has not been informed of any intention to cancel its cooperation agreement for South Africa.
Although the freezing of 90 days of the foreign aid imposed by the administration of Donald Trump initially resulted in a total work stoppage In JRS USA programsCusick indicated that the organization has managed to continue, with limited funds from its Board of Directors, some of its operations considered “critical and vital” at a small level.
Before the suspension of funds, the help of the population bureau, refugees and migrants of the State Department for fiscal year 2025 would have exceeded 18 million dollars. In 2024, JRS received 24,049,039 dollars in government financing and 9,224,422 dollars in private donations, according to their last year’s financial statements.
JRS was founded by the then superior of the Society of Jesus, Fr. Pedro Arrupe, to Serve Vietnamese refugees who fled his country at the end of the Vietnam War in 1975.
Over time, the organization led by the Jesuits grew to attend conflict refugees worldwide. The organization was officially recognized by the Vatican in March of the year 2000.
Translated and adapted by ACI Press. Originally published in CNA.
Low Elhabbal
Madalaine Elhabbal is a CNA journalist based in the Washington DC office in EWTN. He has published articles in Catholicvote and has also worked as a foreign language assistant in France. She is a graduate of Benedictine College.