After Paris attacks, Kasich asks Obama not to send Syrian refugees -- & Cranley agrees

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COLUMBUS — Gov. John Kasich says he'll ask President Barack Obama to stop bringing Syrian refugees into the U.S. and Ohio, as Republicans warned the U.S. risks welcoming terrorists like those who attacked Paris Friday.

Cincinnati Mayor John Cranley, a Democrat, also called for the federal government to stop welcoming migrants from Syria until it can ensure "exhaustive vetting." Cincinnati "won't be involved" in Syrian resettlement, he said, despite promising last month to make Cincinnati "the most immigrant-friendly city in the United States." Kentucky Governor-Elect Matt Bevin joined in widespread GOP opposition to welcoming Syrian refugees, while Indiana Gov. Mike Pence directed state agencies to stop any work to resettle Syrians.

As of Monday evening, at least 23 governors, most of them Republicans, were seeking to keep Syrians out of the U.S. or their states for now. But President Barack Obama's administration plans to continue Syrian migrant resettlement. And governors ultimately have little power to bar refugees from their states, legal scholars say.

On Friday, in the initial wake of the attacks, Kasich called for vetting Syrian refugees before welcoming them. But over the weekend, Republican governors and presidential candidates started speaking out against accepting migrants who are escaping Syria's civil war and the so-called Islamic State, or ISIS. Authorities in France discovered evidence that one of the Paris attackers had come to the country as a Syrian refugee.

By Monday morning, Kasich said he opposed settling Syrians in the U.S., at least this year. And by the afternoon, a spokesman said he was writing Obama to ask him not to send any more Syrian migrants to Ohio. The Buckeye State had welcomed 52 Syrian refugees through September 30, according to federal data, and Cincinnati's first Syrian family arrived last month.

“The governor doesn’t believe the U.S. should accept additional Syrian refugees because security and safety issues cannot be adequately addressed," said Jim Lynch, a spokesman for Kasich's administration. "The governor is writing to the President to ask him to stop, and to ask him to stop resettling them in Ohio. We are also looking at what additional steps Ohio can take to stop resettlement of these refugees.”

Not all Ohio Democrats joined Cranley in standing with Kasich. Dayton Mayor Nan Whaley said her city would welcome refugees if the federal government asks, although she said cities should receive "security guarantees" from the feds about each migrant. And Northeast Ohio Congressman Tim Ryan issued a scathing rebuke of Kasich's stance, saying the governor and other leaders lack courage to stand up to ISIS and "have caved in to their fears."

Ryan cited the inscription on the Statue of Liberty and a Bible verse about welcoming the stranger. "There are no qualifiers on these statements that say to dismiss them if you are scared," he said in a statement. "I, for one, will not let ISIS or any other terrorist organization scare me into abandoning our deepest principles as a country by turning our backs on refugees, especially women and children, in their time of tremendous need."

Despite Kasich's opposition to accepting migrants, his statement seemed to acknowledge a reality: Governors don't have the authority to keep refugees out, although they may be able to keep departments in their state from helping with resettlement work, as Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is seeking to do.

"The one thing I feel very comfortable saying is there is absolutely no constitutional power for a state to exclude anyone from its territories," said Stephen Legomsky, a Washington University of St. Louis law professor and former chief counsel of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services in the Obama administration.

And Ohio would be able to do little stop Syrian refugees from entering after being officially settled in a neighboring state -- such as Pennsylvania, where Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf says the migrants are welcome.

But the U.S. State Department doesn't seem likely to force refugees on a state where they're not welcome.

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves here," said State Department spokesman Mark Toner. "We have seen some of these letters, some of these public remarks. We’re going to engage with these governments, these localities, and we're going to address their concerns."

Worries about admitting terrorists through the Syrian migration intensified this weekend. That's when authorities in France said a Syrian passport that apparently belonged to one of the Paris attackers had traveled through three countries along the busy migrant corridor in Europe.

Nevertheless, Obama is continuing with plans to accept refugees from Syria. Officials say they're vetting the migrants, but GOP leaders such as Kasich have cast doubt on whether proper vetting is possible.

Responding to the calls of some to admit Christians but not Muslims into the country, Obama said, "That’s shameful. That’s not American. It’s not who we are."

"We don’t have religious tests to our compassion," he said, speaking from the G20 summit in Antalya, Turkey.

But Kasich said the situation calls for more than just compassion.

"There is no way that we can put any of our people at risk," the Republican presidential candidate said Monday morning in an interview on Fox Business Network. "Should anybody come in here before the end of the year? The answer to that should be no. We should not jeopardize our people. And so it's not just an issue of the heart. It's also an issue of the head."

The civil war in Syria, which has raged since 2011, has killed 250,000 people and, according to the United Nations, sent more than 4 million refugees into other countries to flee the violence in what has been called the largest humanitarian crisis since World War II.

The vast majority of the refugees have gone to Europe or neighboring countries. The United States had accepted 1,854 Syrian refugees through September; more than 10 times as many have been admitted from Myanmar. The Obama administration has indicated that it plans to increase that number to 100,000 by 2017, a figure which human rights advocates say is inadequate to address the depths of the crisis. To compare, the U.S. accepted at least 130,000 South Vietnamese refugees in the months after the fall of Saigon in 1975.

Cincinnati is expecting approximately 325 refugees this fiscal year, a 50 percent increase from this past year, according to the Catholic Charities of Southwest Ohio, which handles refugee resettlement for the region. The increase is largely due to the crisis in Syria. But while Cincinnati has already welcomed its first Syrian refugees – a family of nine that arrived Oct. 19 – for the most part, most newcomers to the Queen City are expected to be from the Congo this year rather than Syria.

Tuesday on Cincinnati.com: Kasich speaks on national security

After a rough GOP debate last week hurt his campaign, Kasich is seeking a rebound. He'll tout his national security credentials -- 18 years on the House Armed Services Committee -- in a policy address as the nation seeks answers in the wake of the Paris attacks. At noon, follow The Enquirer's Deirdre Shesgreen on Twitter, @dshesgreen, for live coverage of the speech. And visit Cincinnati.com in the afternoon for analysis.

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Enquirer reporter Hannah Sparling, USA Today reporter Gregory Korte, the Associated Press and other reporters from Gannett and USA Today contributed to this report.