Month: January 2010

It is definite! Haitians have been granted Temporary Protected Status

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

As you can see from my post earlier this a.m., I’ve been confused!  However, The Wall Street Journal has now reported that thousands of Haitians in the US illegally can stay for another 18 months —to work here and send money back to Haiti!

In making the announcement yesterday, Janet Napolitano warned that this only applies to Haitians here before Tuesday of this week.  So don’t try to get here now, you will be turned back, she said!   Good luck with that.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano extended temporary amnesty to Haitians who were illegally inside the U.S. before Tuesday’s earthquake, but warned that the Coast Guard would turn back any new refugees fleeing the devastation.

The so-called temporary protected status, or TPS, doesn’t apply to any Haitians who may try now to get into the U.S. If refugees take to the sea—the normal reaction to turmoil throughout Haiti’s recent history—officials in the U.S. and other countries will have to grapple with how to deal with a new wave of immigrants, most of whom will arrive without visas.

Ms. Napolitano warned that no new arrivals would get amnesty and the U.S. Coast Guard and other authorities would move quickly to stop new migrants. “People should not leave Haiti with the false belief that they will be entitled to TPS in the United States,” she said. She also said, “We are seeing no signs of any sort of migration of that nature at this point.”

TPS has been offered to victims of natural disasters before, particularly to refugees from El Salvador in 2001, as well as from Nicaragua, Honduras, Somalia and Sudan. But until Friday, TPS had never been granted to Haitian refugees, despite calls for relief following hurricanes and civil strife, mainly because successive White House administrations have feared it would trigger a stampede of refugees seeking haven in the U.S.

 Immigration advocacy groups are tickled pink with the decision!

“It’s a good day!” said Cheryl Little, executive director of Miami-based Florida Immigrant Advocacy Center, a Haitian activist group, after Ms. Napolitano’s announcement.

Ms. Little said the tens of thousands of Haitians in the U.S. who now will be eligible to work will be able to remit money back to Haiti, which she said should “discourage some Haitians from risking their lives at sea.”

Ms. Little, where are they going to get jobs?

For information on TPS, go here.

Somali teens appear in court in MN triple-murder case

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

This is the latest from Minneapolis on the supposed robbery gone wrong that we reported here  just over a week ago.

From the Minneapolis Star Tribune:

More than 200 East African immigrants tried to squeeze into back-to-back Hennepin County court sessions Friday for two teenage Somali boys facing murder charges in the shooting deaths of three men last week at a Seward neighborhood store.

More than half those who came to support the families of the victims and the defendants had to wait outside as Mahdi Hassan Ali, 17, and his friend, Ahmed Shire Ali, 17, appeared before a judge for the first time since the Jan. 6 shootings at the Seward Market and Halal Meats in south Minneapolis. (The teenagers are friends and not related.)

During separate hearings, District Judge Gary Larson set bail at $3 million for each.

Mahdi Ali was the alleged gunman in what authorities have described as a robbery turned fatal. Ahmed Ali allegedly confined two people to the back of the store while his friend robbed and shot the men up front, according to a criminal complaint.

A reader sent  me the criminal complaint but it sure looks like if they planned to simply rob the place they started killing before they even gave the victims a chance to give them any money.  Maybe there is more to this story than just a couple of crazy kids gone wrong.

You can read the whole story in the Star Tribune.  It is one more sordid Somali crime. 

If you didn’t see it yesterday, see the story of the crazy Maine Somali Mom, driving without a valid license, who runs down a high school student in Lewiston.

Scandinavia terror watch

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Here is an article from Terrorism Monitor that addresses the recent case of the attempted murder of the Danish cartoonist by a Somali immigrant (the whole story is in this article if you haven’t seen it), but I was most interested in the information that Sweden and Denmark are keeping a closer eye on their Somali communities.

What is clear, however, is that operational networks do exist which link al-Shabaab to Somali diaspora communities in the Nordic countries. Sweden’s security services have repeatedly warned of this threat, while Danish security services have found themselves very busy in the wake of the cartoons. Both have increased their focus on their respective domestic Somali communities. It has been estimated that there are about 20,000 Somalis in each nation, though figures are unreliable. What has alarmed Swedish forces, however, is the growing evidence that non-Somalis are being attracted to the fight from Sweden, something that is supported by a Danish report which claims Somalia is now being seen as the exciting jihad hotspot among young radicals. While the actual numbers are quite small (Sweden claims some 10 nationals are currently in Somalia, and the number from Denmark is unlikely to be much higher), the connection does raise the worrying prospect that al-Shabaab or a similar group might attempt to manipulate the network to carry out an attack in Europe.

Maybe Temporary Protected Status for Haitians has not yet been approved by the Administration

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Update:  It is definite, TPS has been granted as of this past Tuesday, here.

A couple of days ago I reported that it had been approved, but I might be wrong.  This article, granted it’s a couple of days old, says that the Obama Administration only halted deportations of illegal Haitians and had not yet decided on TPS.  Note that it looks like New York Senator Gillibrand is behind this one.   From The Hill:

New York Sen.Kirsten Gillibrand (D), whose state contains one of the nation’s highest Haitian populations, called on the Obama administration to grant Haitian nationals in the U.S. temporary protected status (TPS) so that they are not made to return to their home country.

The Department of Homeland Security halted deportations to Haiti on Wednesday, but an official told The Hill that TPS remains “within the range of consideration.”

Has anyone seen anything official about Temporary Protected Status for Haitians?

Another suggestion for Haitian refugees—Guantanamo Bay

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

This is an article from mid-week, so it’s a little old, but apparently under consideration for housing Haitians is Guantanamo Bay’s Camp Justice.  I just wonder how out of the  thousands displaced, someone (who?) is going to decide who gets to come to any US facility?   Yesterday we heard that thousands are expected in Florida, here.

Haitians left homeless or without food and water by Tuesday’s major earthquake may be sent to live temporarily at Guantanamo Bay, according to two Defense Department officials.

Military planners are considering housing Haitian refugees at the Naval base in Cuba, the officials told FOX News.

“We are certainly keeping that option open,” one official said. “Of course no final determinations have been made as the military is still in its ‘assessment’ mode.”

Guantanamo Bay has a long history of housing refugees from the Caribbean, particularly Haitian refugees.

In 1991, after a military coup ignited a violent power struggle in Haiti, more than 30,000 Haitian refugees passed through Guantanamo Bay, according to GlobalSecurity.org.

If refugees from Tuesday’s earthquake are brought to Guantanamo Bay, they would likely be housed at Camp Justice, where reporters and other visitors have stayed when covering the military trials of terror suspects.

Camp Justice is about a half-hour drive, across the base and over densely forested hills, from where terror suspects are currently being held at Guantanamo Bay.

Asked at an afternoon press briefing whether Guantanamo Bay is under consideration to house Haitian refugees or detain Haitian criminals, a top military official told reporters the naval base is a possibility.