The White House announced that President Joe Biden is lifting the refugee cap introduced by his predecessor Donald Trump by May 15.
"The President was urged to take immediate action to reverse the Trump policy that banned refugees from many key regions, to enable flights from those regions to begin within days; today’s order did that. With that done, we expect the President to set a final, increased refugee cap for the remainder of this fiscal year by May 15," White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said in a statement.
In recent weeks, Biden was criticized by fellow Democrats in Congress for failing to take action on this issue sooner.
