Welcoming Made Wisconsin Work: Resettlement at Risk
How resettlement revitalized Wisconsin, and why the future of "America's Dairyland" depends on a reliable refugee minimum.
Welcoming Made Wisconsin Work
For generations, Wisconsin’s welcoming spirit has driven the state’s prosperity.
From German and Polish immigrants who fueled Milwaukee’s industrial rise, to Hmong families resettled after the Vietnam War, to Afghan and Rohingya refugees rebuilding their lives today, Wisconsin knows that resettlement is not only a humanitarian commitment—it’s an investment in shared community prosperity.
That legacy now faces a reckoning.
As federal funding and refugee admissions freezes ripple across the state, the very system that has helped Wisconsin counter labor shortages, population decline, and an aging workforce is at risk.
Without a reliable refugee resettlement program, Wisconsin risks accelerating the demographic and economic decline its communities have worked for decades to reverse.
Wisconsin needs a refugee minimum to sustain the state’s prosperity.
A State Built—and Revitalized—by Migration
Since its founding, Wisconsin’s communities have been defined by newcomers.
In 1850, more than 55% of Milwaukee’s residents were born outside of the United States. Immigration powered the city’s explosive growth through the late 19th century, helping Milwaukee become the 12th largest city in America by 1910 and a center for manufacturing, labor organizing, and political innovation. As Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson put it, welcoming newcomers is “a tradition that has served Milwaukee well for more than 175 years.”
That tradition was tested in the late 20th century. Population growth slowed, industries hollowed out, and younger workers left the state. By 1990, the foreign-born share of metro Milwaukee’s population had fallen below 4%, an all-time low. Between 2012 and 2016, the state of Wisconsin lost roughly 8,000 taxpayers a year to other states.
Only in recent years has the trajectory begun to shift towards growth.
What caused this economic and demographic shift? International migration.
Between 2017 and 2020, the outflow of taxpayers was finally neutralized by the inflow of refugee and immigrant taxpayers. Communities that once faced shrinking school enrollments are seeing classrooms fill again, with 47,000 Wisconsin children being raised by at least one immigrant parent. Cities are experiencing net population growth for the first time in over a decade, and Wisconsin’s critical industries—healthcare, education, technology, hospitality, agriculture, and dairy—increasingly rely on refugee and immigrant talent to fill essential labor gaps.
From Wausau to Milwaukee, refugees and immigrants are rebuilding Wisconsin.
In Wausau, refugees fill vital jobs as older workers retire. In the Fox Valley, resettlement offices have sustained employers and schools for decades, dating back to Hmong arrivals whose children are now judges, educators, and civic leaders. Milwaukee is now home to the largest Rohingya population in the United States, alongside thriving Afghan, Congolese, and Syrian communities. Immigrant-owned businesses line the South Side, driving foot traffic, entrepreneurship, and school enrollment.
Refugee resettlement has become Wisconsin’s quiet engine of renewal, bolstering local economies, stabilizing local populations, expanding the tax base, and reopening pathways to growth.
Holding the Line as a System Frays
That progress is now under threat.
Across Wisconsin, refugee agencies are in crisis mode as federal funding and admissions freezes disrupt long-standing resettlement programs. Local communities are stepping up—keeping Wisconsin’s infrastructure of welcome alive.
In Madison, Jewish Social Services—whose roots trace back to resettling Jewish refugees fleeing the Holocaust in the 1940s—has been rocked by frozen federal funds. Executive Director Kai Gardner Mishlove described a cascading “domino effect:” without predictable funding, agencies cannot plan budgets or coordinate with employers and health providers. Still, the agency “refuse[s] to abandon them,” staff said, turning to crowdfunding to replace lost federal support.
In Milwaukee, Hanan Relief Group lost much of its federal funding and was forced to lay off staff. “It was a big blow to us,” said Program Director Uma Abdi. “There was a lot of chaos and confusion because those individuals still needed services.” Wisconsin’s state-funded refugee support has helped organizations like Hanan continue serving families already here—an essential backstop as federal funds disappear.
“What more human thing can you do than help somebody live out their days in dignity with their family? That’s what we’re about here—being part of the solution.” — Hanan volunteer Barry McCormick
In the Fox Valley, World Relief Wisconsin was forced to layoff staff; among them was Deng Lual, a former refugee who fled civil war in Sudan, became a U.S. citizen, and later returned to refugee resettlement work as a refugee caseworker. Even as jobs were lost, support poured in. Services were sustained by strong county partnerships with Outagamie and Winnebago, in addition to more than $300,000 in private donations from the community.
In Eau Claire, volunteer Good Neighbor Teams have stepped in to cover the practical, everyday needs resettlement agencies normally coordinate—“cleaning supplies, sheets, toys…making meals…helping find a vehicle…filling out job applications.” Community churches and volunteers step in not because it is easy, but because Wisconsin communities understand what it means to stand by neighbors in need.
Notably, Catholic Charities has been forced to withdraw nationally from the federal Refugee Admissions Program. While communities in Green Bay and Sheboygan Falls will no longer be able to resettle refugees due to this forced withdrawal, Catholic Charities has pivoted to focus on integration and support services for the refugee and immigrant communities who already call Wisconsin home.
Even private sponsorship efforts have been shaken by the freeze. In Milwaukee, one circle raised $13,000 to bring an Afghan family to safety—a family at risk because their daughter helped relocate 150 college-aged women during the 2021 Afghan evacuation. With resettlement paused, those efforts have been thrown into uncertainty, leaving loved ones stranded abroad.
This resolve is visible at every level of civic life. The City of Milwaukee and Governor Tony Evers issued proclamations in celebration of World Refugee Day this year, affirming that refugees remain part of Wisconsin’s shared story, even as the federal resettlement system falters.
But volunteer resolve and local stopgaps cannot truly substitute for a functioning federal refugee resettlement program—especially in a state relying on immigration to sustain its population and workforce.
Wisconsin Needs a Refugee Floor
Wisconsin has been here before. When immigration slowed, the population stagnated. When newcomers returned, communities revived.
Economists are clear about what’s at stake: without immigration, Wisconsin’s population would be shrinking, the workforce aging, and key industries facing acute labor shortages.
As Marquette Law School Research Fellow John D. Johnson warned, declining immigration means “fewer kids in schools, less funding for those schools, and prices going up as labor shortages worsen.”
Refugee resettlement has helped counter these trends, but only when the system is reliable. Without a predictable refugee admissions floor, agencies cannot plan, employers cannot hire, and communities cannot stabilize. Programs lurch between surges and shutdowns. Staff are laid off just when they are needed most. Families already here are left in limbo.
A statutory minimum refugee admissions floor would give Wisconsin what it needs most:
Stability for resettlement agencies and integration providers;
Predictability for employers, schools, and local governments; and
A steady inflow of new residents to sustain population growth and economic vitality.
As economists and civic leaders agree, communities that attract newcomers thrive. Those that don’t fall behind.
Making The Congressional Case
As communities across Wisconsin work to hold together a fraying system, Wisconsin’s congressional delegation has a responsibility to ensure that the infrastructure their constituents rely on does not collapse.
That path forward does not require ideological consensus. It requires aligning refugee policy with the interests Wisconsin’s leaders already share: workforce stability, fiscal responsibility, and community resilience.
Bipartisan Senate Leadership
Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D) has a strong history of supporting improved refugee admissions and ensuring Afghan and Ukrainian newcomers have quick access to work authorization, in addition to a demonstrable willingness to engage her Republican colleagues in bipartisan immigration reform.
As chair of a Senate Appropriations subcommittee with jurisdiction over Labor and Health and Human Services funding, Baldwin oversees the very accounts that sustain refugee resettlement nationwide. Wisconsin’s agencies are living proof that appropriations alone are insufficient without statutory certainty.
On the Republican side, Sen. Ron Johnson (R) brings a different but equally relevant lens. As chair of a Homeland Security investigations subcommittee focused on government efficiency and effectiveness, Johnson has repeatedly raised concerns about waste and mismanagement in federal programs. The executive volatility that governs the current refugee system—in which refugees are vetted but never admitted, agencies funded and then shuttered, and communities left to absorb the fallout—is a textbook example of government waste.
Advocates engaging Johnson should focus on process and accountability: a predictable admissions floor prevents waste, protects prior federal investments, and ensures that resettlement operates as an orderly system rather than an ad-hoc patchwork of duplicative programming.
In-District Impacts Across the House
In the House, the effects of resettlement disruptions are already being felt in districts represented by members whose committee roles intersect with fiscal and workforce policy.
Rep. Gwen Moore (D) represents Milwaukee, home to the state’s largest refugee communities and multiple resettlement agencies. As a member of the Ways and Means Committee, Moore understands that population growth, workforce participation, and a stable tax base are inseparable. Milwaukee’s experience shows that refugee resettlement strengthens all three.
Rep. Mark Pocan (D) whose district includes Madison, has seen firsthand how funding freezes destabilize agencies like Jewish Social Services. As a member of the House Appropriations Committee, Pocan can reinforce the case for statutory certainty: appropriations alone cannot provide reliability.
Other members of Wisconsin’s delegation represent rural and small-city districts where population decline, school closures, and labor shortages are already acute. For these communities, advocates can emphasize how resettlement is one of the few proven tools available for sustaining local economies and public services.
Contacting Your Reps
The message to Congress is straightforward:
Establish a statutory minimum refugee admissions floor to restore predictability and protect federal investments;
Stabilize funding for resettlement agencies so communities are not forced into perpetual crisis mode; and
Recognize refugee resettlement as a key population and workforce strategy, not a discretionary afterthought.
Wisconsin’s communities are doing their part. What they cannot do alone is replace a functioning federal system. Without a reliable refugee admissions floor, Wisconsin risks sliding backward—toward population loss, workforce shortages, and communities left behind and left out of Wisconsin’s future.
With a refugee admissions floor, Wisconsin can continue doing what it has always done best: turning newcomers into neighbors, workers, and future Wisconsinites.
Thanks for reading Save Resettlement.
Next week, Wyoming & Wrapping-Up 2025.
Until our next newsletter, we would recommend listening to Episode 3: “We don’t have choices: The last-arriving refugees in Wisconsin” from Milwaukee’s NPR podcast “Status Pending.” This episode details Maryam Durani’s story, founder of Kandahar’s Women’s Advocacy Network, and her flight from Kandahar, to Kabul, to Qatar, and eventually Milwaukee as part of the Afghan evacuation in 2021.
Really apreciate the depth of research here, especially the historical context about Milwaukee. The economic argument is compelling and I didnt realize how much Wisconsin's population recovery depended on refugee resettlement. My hometown in the midwest went through similar population declines in the 90s and never really bounced back cause we didnt have these kind of programs. When you lay out the numbers like this it becomes pretty clear this isnt just compassion, its actually smart policy for communities that want to grow.