This is a story I found more than a week ago, but haven’t gotten around to posting until now (cleaning out my queue before going away for a few days).

Buried in an article about yet another Somali Ethnic Community Based Organization (mini-ACORNS) forming in Maine, we learn that Somali community organizers are pushing for the right to vote for non-citizens.

By the way, the reason these Somali ECBO’s* keep popping up is that Somalis have brought their clan conflicts to American and they can’t get along with each other.  You can see by the tone of the critics of the latest political organizing group that is pretending to be a place for the youth to learn English and keep out of trouble.

From Maine Public Broadcasting Network:

According to the state, Portland’s Somali population now stands at around 5,000. Over the last decade a handful of grassroots groups have cropped up to support that community. But a new group IS aspiring to overcome funding and political challenges to be the largest and most comprehensive of them all, and serve as the voice for the Somali community in its adopted city.

“The most important goal we have is to unify the community,”> said Mahmoud Hassan.

He is helping to lead the brand-new Somali Community Resource Center as vice-chairman of the board. The plan is to hold English and citizenship classes in a space newly-leased on Forest Avenue, to mentor troubled youth, and help people apply for jobs. But leaders also want to use the center to encourage more political participation, to use it as a place.

“Where you can get the word out in terms of what’s happening around us, what they can do to effect the political process, not only in the local level but also statewide and federal level,” Hassan said.

It seems so incredible to me to learn recently that here in Maryland, in Takoma Park the center of the socialist state of Maryland, non-citizens can vote in local elections.  Looks like someone is now teaching Somalis to go for that same idea in Portland.

The past year has seen a spike in political engagement by Portland’s Somali community. Somalis were on the forefront of a campaign to allow non-citizens to vote in city elections. Mohammed Dini, one of the leaders of that campaign, also ran for a state representative seat.

TB in Lewiston

Possibly related story in Lewiston, ME—a high school student has an active case of TB and now there will be a special meeting of parents and students who have had contact with him.  No word on the nationality of the student.

* Learn more about ECBOs which often get taxpayer funding and are community organizing outfits like ACORN but for immigrants—they teach their people how to get taxpayer-funded goodies and then get them engaged in Democrat Party politics in our category on ECBOs here.