The Trump administration’s latest executive order to toughen vetting procedures for refugees drew criticism Wednesday from representatives of resettlement agencies in New Jersey who say the enhanced measures are not needed and only serve to prolong the suffering of those fleeing dangerous situations in their homelands.

“They are not in need of an ounce more of vetting, and to even suggest that we haven’t been doing a solid job is a misnomer,’’ said the Rev. Seth Kaper-Dale, who founded Interfaith Refugee and Immigrant Services and Empowerment, which has helped resettle more than 40 refugees near Highland Park this year. “We don’t have a history of letting dangerous people in who are missed through a vetting process. The president is creating an issue when there isn’t an issue.”

The new directives, announced by the White House on Tuesday, allow the United States to resume its refugee admissions program with "special measures" to screen refugees "whose entry continues to pose potential threats to the security and welfare of the United States."

He ordered nationals from 11 countries believed to pose a higher risk to U.S. security to face even tougher screenings. Officials refused to identify the countries, according to The Associated Press, but said refugee applications from those nations will be judged on a case-by-case basis.

Farrin Anello, an attorney with the New Jersey Chapter of the ACLU, said it is most important that the refugee screening process proceed in a normal way. She said the ACLU will be watching to see how the executive order will be implemented.

“As more details come out about the program, and if it turns out that the administration does try again to implement a Muslim ban, I’m sure that there will be more litigation in response to that,’’ she said.

READ MORE:For refugees, escape to U.S. comes with a cost

ARCHIVE:Refugees find a haven in North Jersey

READ MORE:Picnic gives Syrian refugees some fun and connections

The new procedures for all refugees include collecting additional biographical information to better determine whether they are being truthful about their status; improving information-sharing among agencies; stationing fraud detection officers at certain locations overseas; and using biometric information to check against various federal watch lists and databases.

Refugees already wait years for their background screenings to be completed and their applications to be approved.

“Refugees are in situations of extreme duress oftentimes, and the last thing we need to be suggesting from our country is that folks experiencing extreme duress need to wait longer than they already do,’’ said Kaper-Dale, who is running for governor of New Jersey as a Green Party candidate,

Courtney Madsen, office director for Church World Service in Jersey City, said the White House announcement was another effort by the administration to dismantle the country’s refugee program. She said the new orders will make it difficult for refugees who are already here to reunite with family members who are still living abroad. A program that enables some resettled refugees to reunite with family members in the United States is also on hold., she said.

“It is separating people that live here in New Jersey that we were hoping would be reunited with their spouses and children,’’ she said. “We don’t know when we will be able to see them again. It could be never.”

When Trump was on the campaign trail, he made curbing immigration a central point of his agenda. Since he took office, he has signed executive orders and announced policy changes to that end, ordering a wall to be built on the U.S.-Mexico border to prevent illegal crossings, terminating an Obama-era policy that protected from deportation undocumented immigrants who were brought to the country as minors, and banning visitors from Muslim-majority countries.

Last month, the Trump administration announced that it would cap refugee admissions to 45,000 over the next year, a historic low.

In the last year that President Barack Obama was in office, he increased the number of refugees to be resettled to 110,000, a 29 percent increase from fiscal year 2016.

The Trump administration's tough stance on immigration, and his four-month ban on refugee admissions, which expired Tuesday, has affected local agencies and the work they do.

Madsen said her the agency resettled 88 refugees in the fiscal year that ended on Sept. 30, a decline from the nearly 150 it resettled the previous year.

“It’s hard to see how this would not impact us,"’ said Madsen, whose agency has four full-time employees. “We are trying to find other sources and we welcome donations from the community. We are trying to find a way to stay at our current lean staffing, because we feel that this is a program that the community here values a lot.”

Email: alvarado@northjersey.com