Mr. President. I am dismayed that the Committee on Appropriations thought it necessary to cut the appropriation request for migration and refugee assistance. and to recommend the elimination of the U.S. refugee program for Europe. Over the years this program has effectively carried out our Nations humanitarian concerns in Europe. and today is serving as a primary channel in our countrys effort to assist Soviet Jews permitted to leave their homeland and resettle elsewhere. The anticipated number of persons who will be assisted by the U.S. refugee program this year is 70.000of whom some 40.000 will be Jews from the Soviet Union and other countries in Eastern Eurqpe. To scrap this humanitarian program now would have a disastrous effect on the international machinery to facilitate their migration and. resettlement. and would bring needless* hardship to those many thousands who have waited so long to join their relatives and friends overseas. I am extremely hopeful that the Senate will support this amendment.