And, this time he has a bigger megaphone—The Wall Street Journal which is well-known for its position that businesses need cheap immigrant labor.
Sheesh, I thought they had enough sense in Wyoming to bring Mead’s misguided plan to a halt!
Remember it was one year ago that Republican Governor Matt Mead wrote to the federal government and invited them in to begin a resettlement program for the only state in the Nation wise enough (until now) to stay out of it!
And, get this, these Somali women arriving in Wyoming as secondary migrants are not shy about saying, if they don’t get more “services” they are moving on to a state that is more generous!
Before I launch into the story, readers need to know there is a big difference between secondary migrants who have already been hooked up with their social services in another state by one of the nine major federal resettlement contractors or their 300 plus subcontractors. They have gotten their job counseling, their kids enrolled in schools, their welfare goodies, their health care.
The secondary migrants have chosen, in our free country! to move on after being acclimated (at taxpayer expense) in another state. That does not mean we have to follow them with goodies (holding their hands) as they shop for new cities and states over the years.
However, setting up a resettlement office in Wyoming, is a whole other matter. It means that refugees will be resettled in Wyoming directly from Africa, the Middle East and Asia.
By the way, check out the statistics here (page 9), according to the Office of Refugee Resettlement, zero secondary migrants entered Wyoming in 2013 (so much for their statistics!).
From The Wall Street Journal (hat tip: ‘pungentpeppers’):
CHEYENNE, Wyo.—Draped in a brightly hued robe and veil, Amal Hassan certainly stands out from the locals as she walks along the outskirts of this high-plains city, pickup trucks rumbling by.
Somali refugees such as Ms. Hassan are becoming a more common sight here in the nation’s least populous state, the only one without a refugee-resettlement program. Such initiatives provide social and financial services to refugees such as Ms. Hassan, 29 years old, who were admitted legally into the U.S.
Now, with a hundred or so Somali refugees having arrived in Wyoming’s capital city in recent years, the state is wrestling with whether to create a resettlement program, which in other states is typically run jointly with the federal Administration for Children and Families. The idea, however, has stirred sharp criticism from some people, who have called and emailed state officials, expressing concern that crowds of refugees would flock to Wyoming, stretch resources and spread disease.
The issue repeatedly came up during last month’s Republican primary for November’s gubernatorial election, with one of Gov. Matt Mead’s opponents saying refugees would cause problems for Wyoming. The governor, who won the primary, said his administration is merely exploring a resettlement program.
“Unfortunately people don’t understand or deliberately distort what’s happening,” Mr. Mead said recently on a local radio station, dispelling a rumor that the state planned to set up refugee camps. [By continuing to use those inaccurate words—refugee camps—Mead is able to ridicule and denigrate critics.—ed]
Mr. Mead has said that refugees were coming to Wyoming regardless, and the state needed to know which services they were using. [You can see what welfare they are tapping without inviting more in!—ed].
Here the WSJ didn’t find the latest numbers—we have them here. In FY 2014 we have brought into the US 8,278 Somalis (in 11 months). The federal government and its contractors are scrambling to find new territory in which to resettle them as ‘pockets of resistance’ have developed in some states—thus the Wyoming push!
According to federal data, 4,915 Somali refugees arrived in the U.S. during the 2012 fiscal year, the most recent information available. That figure represents the fourth highest total of refugees from any country to enter the U.S. that year, behind Bhutan, Myanmar and Iraq.
Housing is easier to get, but not enough welfare help in Wyoming!
Ms. Hassan, who lives in Cheyenne with her two young sons and is divorced, said she is considering leaving Wyoming if she can’t receive more help.
The Governor says he is still studying the idea, but this is what he wrote to the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement last September (looks like an outright invite to the feds to me!):
If you live in Wyoming, you need to get on the governor or end up like Maine! Or worse, Minnesota! Never mind ‘Little Mogadishu’ Minneapolis, ask the people of St. Cloud, Minnesota what happened when a Lutheran federal contractor opened a resettlement office there!
See our entire archive on Wyoming Governor Matt Mead by clicking here.
