A northwestern Minnesota county removed a Somali mother’s kids. Somalis want to know why.
Somalis in Minnesota and the worldare watching the case of an East Grand Forks mother whose children were removed by child protective services. Somali community members believe she’s being treated unfairly, but the facts are not black and white.
Nimo Khalif, 33, mother of six surrounded by supporters outside of the Polk County Court House.
CROOKSTON, Minn. — More than 100 Somali people packed the hallways of the Polk County Courthouse Monday, praying and then pressing officials to explain why the six children of a Somali mother had been taken away from her.
Nimo Khalif, 33, a widow who came to America from a refugee camp in Kenya in late 2014, had been raising the children ages 10 months to 16 years alone in East Grand Forks. Suddenly, the kids were in the custody of Polk County child protective services.
A distraught Nimo posted a video pleading in Somali for help. She said she wasn’t told why the children, ages 10 months to 16 years old, were removed and didn’t know what to do. Later, she would describe it as a “kidnapping.”
The Somali community across Minnesota responded. The widely shared video helped deliver supporters to the courthouse Monday, including many who drove nearly five hours from the Twin Cities. [Who helped her create her video to disparage America?—ed]
They left without answers. It turns out the case is more complicated than those responding to Nimo’s pleas might have realized. While concerns remain in the Somali community that Nimo’s being treated differently because she’s Somali, the facts are not yet black and white.
Polk County is five hours from the heart of Little Mogadishu (Minneapolis).
It began when one of Nimo’s daughters allegedly told a teacher in an email that she did not feel safe at home and was afraid to live with her mother.
[….]
The case has reverberated across Minnesota and the world. Somali National TV sent a reporter to cover the hearing. The video it posted on Facebook has nearly 150,000 views.
Somali community members who know Nimo said they couldn’t understand how she suddenly lost custody of her children.
Nimo strived to make sure her children were successful in their academic and Islamic education, said Abdirizak Duale, chair of Al-Huda Islamic Center of East Grand Forks.
[….]
Nimo, 33, works as a teacher’s assistant at Central Middle School, the same school where two of her daughters were taken into protective custody. She remains an employee of the district and has not been put on leave.
She said her husband, the children’s father, died 10 months ago in Uganda, leaving her to raise their children in far northwestern Minnesota without immediate family nearby.
Was it the fact that she, a “widow,” was resettled in Minnesota, or so we were told in 2014, lives alone struggling to raise six children on a low wage job (surely with the help of MN welfare), but now has a 10-month-old.
Where is the baby-daddy?
Why isn’t he helping the family? Or, is it possible that the refugee mom traveled back to where she ‘escaped’ from, Africa, 19 months ago for a conjugal visit with her ‘husband’ who is now conveniently dead.
The next time someone tells you that refugees don’t cost state and county taxpayers anything, remember this story.
Nimo Khalif and her brood will cost plenty—kids’ education, courts, social services, food stamps, housing assistance, medical care! And what does Polk County and America get other than worldwide criticism?
By the way, anyone seen CAIR Minnesota riding to her rescue?
And, they are accompanied by a paper company executive who wants a small community nearly 60 miles from Harrisburg, PA to ‘welcome’ refugees the company wants to employ.
I have been saying for twelve years that there is an unholy alliance between businesses seeking cheap labor and ‘religious’ resettlement contractors acting as their head hunters!
Additionally, in case you thought I didn’t have my facts, here we see clearly that this US Conference of Catholic Bishops’ subcontractor*** is talking about the 100-mile radius from their office in which refugee resettlement agencies can place refugees.
We should be thanking the President for his September Executive Ordereven if the contractors succeed in killing it in the courts because we are learning new things every day and citizens like those in Juniata Terrace, PA, like those in Beltrami County, MN, are being educated.
Catholic Charities is out and about lining up new locations within a hundred miles of Harrisburg!
JUNIATA TERRACE–The public was out in full force Tuesday night for the Catholic Charities group presentation of their refugee resettlement plan to the Juniata Terrace Borough Council.
Anne Lusk and Amin Habeeb [Egyptiansee here.—ed] from Catholic Charities spoke about the resettlement to the public and the council. Lusk and Habeeb wanted to lay out the facts so the council and the public had a better understanding of the program. The resettlement will not be happening any time soon. [But they are getting people primed because they think that when the Dems regain the White House, the gates will open wide.—ed]
Programs like this are popping up all over the country and Pennsylvania is no exception. Lusk spoke on the major presence of resettled refugees in areas like Lancaster County, noting that Cumberland County had also recently passed the program for their area. [Juniata Terrace is in Mifflin County so it appears the county itself has not consented (so far).—ed]
Seeking locations within 100-mile radius!
The program is based out of Harrisburg and is attempting to resettle refugees within a 100-mile radius. These refugees are fleeing issues in their home country, whether religious prosecution, war or other struggles.
Catholic Charities lining up future locations!
For now, the charity is visiting different locations in Mifflin county to provide information to the boroughs so they can decide whether to adopt the program at a later time. The refugees who are part of the program are “very educated and very hard workers and are respectful to the community,”according to Lusk.
She has no idea if the refugees are “educated” and “respectful” because Catholic Charities, nor the county or state, is permitted to choose refugees—they will get what they get from anywhere in the world: impoverished and uneducated Congolese or demanding Somalis, or Iraqis who think low-skilled work is beneath them, for example!
We are paying for Catholic Charities to act as an employment service!
Here we see that Catholic Charities is working with business interests to supply them with workers! What the h*** ! Why are we, taxpayers, paying for this!
Donald Chapman III, president of Nittany Paper, was also present. Chapman contacted the Catholic charity for help finding workers for the paper company as they look to expand. The positions would be full-time. According to him, bringing in the refugees would not take away from the jobs for county citizens. The program is meant to have a positive impact on the local area as a whole.
The program would integrate, at most, 10 families and settle them into the area. They would have a jobs at Nittany Paper and a living space near the company, making transportation to work easier. [Living space near the company? Is the company paying for that, or are the taxpayers shelling out for the housing?—ed]
Attending members of the public expressed concerns about the program. Several citizens were worried about crime and an increase in drug problems if the resettlement were allowed. The public also expressed concern for how the community will support the influx of people. Tensions ran palpably high during the presentation, with several agruements breaking out between citizens. The Catholic Charities group will be present at next month’s Lewistown Borough Council meeting, according to Lusk.
Many thanks to The Sentinel!
*** I’m going back to correct my ‘Knowledge is Power III’post where I said I didn’t have a list of the Bishop’s subcontractors. I found it in the course of researching this story. Go hereto see the long list of subcontractors working for the US Conference of Catholic Bishops.
Colorado Gov. Jared Polis has a message for the Trump administration: Refugees are welcome in Colorado.
Colorado Governor Jared Polis, send us more refugees! He may get his wish if the refugee flow destined for Texas is diverted elsewhere.
[….]
Polis said at the governor’s mansion Tuesday that refugees add to Colorado diversity and economy.
“They’re entrepreneurs and they’re filling jobs in important parts of our community,” he said, citing economic impact statistics that suggest that for each refugee who joins the economy, helps create four jobs.
“We’re proud to continue to make sure Colorado is open to the oppressed from across the world and we hope the loss to any other states that don’t want to accept refugees will be Colorado’s gain, as we seek to continue to grow a Colorado for all,” Polis said.
Now see this!
I’ve heard horror stories like this coming out of struggling cities for years, but nothing like this one since Trump was elected President.
The media is usually all too willing to hide any bad news about refugees, like these in the Denver area and they surely don’t want to provide ammunition for Trump and company.
If this is how refugees are living in ‘welcoming’ Colorado, the President is right that the flow must be curtailed.
At least four members of a refugee self-help group called Street Fraternity died from car wrecks and guns in 2019. The Street Frat soccer team got booted from an indoor league. Rising rents and urban renewal — the City Council recently designated an east Denver area where refugees are resettled as “blighted” to hasten a high-density overhaul — raised economic pressure on refugee families.
And, Governor Polis wants more!
Denver and other American cities historically have offered immigrants an upward path. Federal census data shows 15% of Denver residents and 19% in adjacent Aurora are foreign-born — higher than the 13.6% nationwide. But the relatively small subset of immigrants who are refugees — people who fled persecution in Africa, Asia and Central America and were legally admitted into the United States — face an increasingly difficult environment.
[….]
In economically booming Denver, the rising rents and gentrification already have driven some refugee families away, according to directors of the Street Frat, which is run from a Disabled American Veterans basement between Xenia and Xanthia streets off East Colfax Avenue.
Send us more poor people says Governor Polis!
Yet the Street Frat endures as a hub that helps 40 or so young men and their families get by in one of metro Denver’s toughest areas. City data shows that 48% of children in the East Colfax neighborhood live in poverty, and 80% of third-graders aren’t up to par in their reading.
[….]
“I just want to get a job,” said Amisi Mbuyi, 27, whose mother and four siblings moved with him in 2017 to escape tensions in the Republic of Congo, where he graduated from high school.
A construction site accident left his right forefinger scarred and ended that job. Living at home with his mother became difficult due to her discomfort with his U.S.-born girlfriend, and living mostly on the streets with the girlfriend has exposed them to taunts. Mbuyi said he’s been sleeping in a dilapidated laundromat lately, bundling up as much as possible to endure the cold.
But, wait, didn’t the governor say that refugees not only have jobs, but are helping to create jobs? So he wants more!
Street Frat directors have scrambled to meet needs. They began a fresh food giveaway on Thursdays, working with food rescue groups that collect fruits and vegetables. The idea is to help young men, who agree to a code of hard work, respect and obeying the law, by also helping their cash-strapped mothers.
At a recent giveaway, Muslim women who fled rural Myanmar, formerly Burma, to a UN refugee camp in Thailand — and who now in Denver lack transport to supermarkets — flocked to the cardboard boxes of potatoes and greens set out in a parking lot. [She is part of the controversial resettlement of the Rohingya people to your towns and cities.—ed]
Resettled refugees don’t have enough to eat, but Polis says send us more diversity—what more poor people for the poor vs. rich diversity balance sheet in Denver?
Street Frat volunteers are setting up a recording studio where members rap, dance and produce poetry. A recent talent show featured rap performers and included families. The directors also are looking for a therapist to help refugees who survived horrors abroad that left psychological scars.
[….]
On a recent night, Bility and program coordinator Levon Lyles were doing all they could in a stairwell to stabilize a refugee from eastern Congo who lives on the streets and, not taking prescribed medications from a clinic in Aurora, has struggled mentally.
Yes, the good governor must be saying Colorado needs more mental health diversity too!
Last spring, conflict between student groups at the New America School, a charter school for immigrants in Aurora, led to allegations someone had a gun. A student from Street Frat faced discipline. Street Frat director Yoal Ghebremeskel intervened at the school, trying to clear up misunderstandings, and ended up mediating the conflict between student factions.
Diversity in the schools is so beautiful right Mr. Humanitarian Governor!
In neighboring Aurora (19% immigrant population), Mayor Mike Coffman says its an emotional issue for him and says that tonight the mayor and council will likely virtue-signal by voting to approve the resettlement of even more struggling refugees. However, it is county governments that must opt-in or opt-out according to federal guidelines.
But, never mind, they will soon be pushed out of this neighborhood and into someone else’s neighborhood as the rich move in.
We keep hearing from our young men that they’re trying to find jobs so they’ll be able to afford rent,”he said. “We’re seeing some folks move out.”
[….]
“This area’s going to gentrify, like all of the city. Nobody’s going to stand in the way of gentrification. Hope and vision? We’ve tried to offer some,” he said. “Yes, the streets will be safer. But they will be so boring. So white. So gentrified.I mean, how many more brewpubs, chain coffee shops and cheap workout places do we need?”
“Where do people who are just barely making it go? How about these people who we promised a chance at the American dream? They’re raising families, with cultures and languages that are so rich. What is going to replace them?”
This is what the do-gooder Leftists like this governor (and the federal resettlement contractors!) do—promise the American dream (to feel good about themselves) then shove the problems off on others (you! taxpaying citizens!) to clean up.
Mainer Cynthia Anderson recently published a book about how 6,000 plus Somali refugees are busy resuscitating a supposedly dying Maine city.
No surprise that the Star Tribune, in the heart of Little Mogadishu, MN, reviewed Anderson’s book. One quote in the review stands out and it makes my blood boil!
“I also think journalists, including me, sometimes don’t push for answers lest they appear insensitive or out of fear they’ll provide ammunition to haters.”
Just think about that, she is admitting she might have pulled some punches so as not to give us (haters! and Islamophobes!), critics of the UN/US Refugee Admissions Program, any ammunition. WHAT THE H***!
If so-called journalists were HONEST, for one thing there would be no need for me to write this blog and secondly if they were HONEST then maybe government programs like this one might be reevaluated, reformed or trashed.
Review: ‘Home Now: How 6,000 Refugees Transformed an American Town,’ by Cynthia Anderson
“Home Now” by Cynthia Anderson; Public Affairs (318 pages, $28)
“A moving chronicle of who belongs in America.” Guess you can see the bias right there at Amazon.
At a campaign rally in Portland, Maine, President Donald Trump linked worsening crime in Maine to the influx of Somali refugees there. He blamed their large community in Minnesota for straining the state’s social safety net and bringing potential recruits for Islamic terrorist groups.
“You see it happening,” Trump said. “You read about it.”
The above is a reminder to all those wimpy Republican governorswho are ‘welcoming’ more Somalis, Iraqis, and Syrians to your states that the President wants to rein-in the program. Duh!
Long before Trump turned refugee resettlement into a national flash point, Cynthia Anderson was immersing herself in Lewiston, Maine, a small white town that came to host one of the largest populations of Somali-Americans in the country, for her timely, richly detailed book “Home Now.”
Anderson grew up in a village 45 miles away and recalled the area’s gradual decline leading up to 2001, when the first Somali refugees arrived in nearby Portland.
She reported on Lewiston’s transformation for more than a decade, moving from seeing Somali newcomers as passive victims traumatized by war to people with complex, resilient trajectories.
Anderson also writes about Fatuma Hussein, a community leader and advocate for Somali women who admires Maine’s civility and is optimistic about relations between natives and newcomers. She speaks out in opposition to Trump’s election, yet she is also forthright about the challenges of merging different cultures in Lewiston.
The town is not prepared to absorb the arrivals so quickly; the mayor draws headlines for saying Lewiston is “maxed out.”
Anderson deftly sums up the tension by noting that the new refugees were not ungrateful but nor were they just grateful.
[….]
Though the book paints a mostly rosy picture of how refugees can revitalize a community, Anderson is honest [?—how honest?—ed] about her qualms.
During debates over a state bill aimed at the Somali-American community to ban female genital mutilation (FGM), she admits to being conflicted. Anderson is initially opposed, and doesn’t want to see the Somali community hurt, but nor does she want harm to come to any Somali girls.
[What woman could possibly be conflicted about the brutal practice of slicing off a portion of a girl’s genitals?—ed]
Anderson also acknowledges that the refugee vetting process warrants examination, noting that records can be inadequate in war-torn countries.
She considers it fair to question how long refugees take to become self-sufficient, finding answers inconsistent and hard to find. [No kidding—this program is run in secrecy! The refugee contractors and the government don’t want anyone to find out how poorly the refugees are doing!—ed]
“I also think journalists, including me, sometimes don’t push for answers lest they appear insensitive or out of fear they’ll provide ammunition to haters,” she admits. “But not asking and not knowing provides fertile ground for rumors to flourish. It’s also patronizing; Lewiston’s newcomers can withstand the scrutiny.” [Note that she deftly suggests that those of us with concerns are trafficking in rumors!—ed]
Anderson raises these questions through her portrait of Jared Bristol, driven after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks to become an activist against Islamic extremism. Bristol advocates for the FGM bill during a hearing that’s one of the only times Anderson sees Muslims and anti-Islamists in the same place.
Such activists, Anderson writes, “are wrong if they believe I absorbed nothing they and other anti-Islamists said or that my thinking didn’t shift, however incrementally.” [So what good is absorbing if she then pulls punches?—ed]
Scrutiny comes anew when a man dies of a fatal head injury after being attacked by several teens of African descent.
Nevertheless, and moving right along, the expert concludes:
….that Mainers feel that integrating refugees is worth the effort, even as it has taken time and money.
That is not what I’m hearing!!!
See my extensive, and I mean extensive archive on Lewiston here at RRW (there is more at ‘Frauds and Crooks.’)!
Gee, I wonder if Ms. Anderson used any of the material I’ve compiled over the years? Did she get the story about the Somali teen who burned down four apartment buildings in 2013 for example? Or the one about the ISIS fighter whose wife lived in Lewiston? Or the Somali health care scammers? And, as far back as 2009 Somali ‘youths’ were roaming the streets and attacking people.
I know I’ll hear from Lutherans who disavow everything that Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (LIRS)is doing (and don’t like being lumped in with them), but indeed it is this faction (the Leftwing) of the Lutheran ‘faith’ making all the news.
When I sawthis websitethis morning (thanks to a reader) where LIRS (one of nine federal refugee contractors that monopolize all refugee resettlement in America***) is running a tally of their successes in gaining consents for their placement of refugees, I am struck by a couple of things.
LIRS National Headquarters are in this building owned by the Lutherans and located in a prime Inner Harbor Baltimore neighborhood. Taxpayers fund LIRS about $50 million a year (90% of their budget is taxpayer funded). LIRS is one of three contractors suing Trump to stop the President’s refugee reform plan.
First, where the heck is the Department of State that promised a running tally would be publicly available.
As of this writingthe DOS website is pathetic compared to LIRS.
Of course since LIRS is almost completely funded by the federal government (taxpayers like you and me!), funding based on the number of refugees they place, they have a lot to lose if they can’t get enough consents when applying for their contract with the State Department.
(From its most recent Form 990 (page 9) we see that LIRS is 90% funded from the US Treasury!)
Weak Governors are falling like dominoes as we have been reporting, see here yesterday, but where are the counties?
The US State Department’s Funding Guidance (the rules for the President’s reform initiative) specifically says that in addition to governors, the contractors must get consent from COUNTY governments. There is no mention of Mayors of cities having any say!
By the way, the contractors hate Trump’s new reform plan because they have had free rein for decades to place refugees pretty much wherever they wanted with guidance from friendly and ideologically aligned bureaucrats in the State Department.
And, they certainly never had to solicit support from elected officials to get their MONEY for the year (actually now only a portion of the year from June to the end of September 2020).
Consistent with Section 412(a) of the INA and Executive Order 13888, Enhancing State and Local Involvement in Refugee Resettlement, PRM and the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) seek to promote the involvement of states and localities in the selection of locations for initial resettlement. In addition, PRM and ORR seek strong environments to support resettlement and speedy integration, and regard state and local consent for resettlement activity as important evidence of such strength. For each state and locality where the applicant proposes to resettle refugees during the award period, the applicant should seek written consent for resettlement of refugees from the state governor’s office and the chief executive officer of the local government (county or county equivalent). PRM will take into account such consents to the maximum extent permitted by law, including Section 412(a) of the INA and antidiscrimination laws, in deciding where to place refugees. [A little wiggle room here at the end, but still no mention that mayors must approve.—ed]
Notice that only a small number of counties have submitted consents (29 out of a list of 86 local consents), see if yours is on the list! Also, see if your mayor has said sure send us more poverty we don’t have enough of our own!
So to my readers who have been asking if it’s too late to put pressure on your county to say NO, the answer is NO IT ISN’T TOO LATE!
P.S. Your federal representatives—US Senators and Congressmen—have nothing to do with this plan so don’t waste time on them right now! It is county elected officials and a few remaining governors that matter!
***For new readers these (below) are the nine federally-funded refugee contractors that operate as a huge conveyor belt monopolizing all refugee placement in America.
Church World Service poster girl!
For decades they have decidedin secrecy where to place refugees and they don’t want to lose that power because even as they pontificate about their religious convictions and humanitarian zeal, they are Leftwing political activist groups working to change America by changing the people and using your money to do it!
And, they do not limit their advocacy toward only legal immigration programs, but are heavily involved in supporting the lawlessness at our borders.
The question isn’t as much about refugees per se, but about who is running federal immigration policy now and into the future?
(I plan to say this once a day from now on!)
I continue to argue that these nine contractors are the heart of America’s Open Borders movement and thus there can never be long-lasting reform of US immigration policy when these nine un-elected phony non-profits are paid by the taxpayers to work as community organizers pushing an open borders agenda.
(If you are new and are confused because your local resettlement agency doesn’t have one of these names, just know that they are a subcontractor of one of the nine and you can usually find out which one by going to their website.)
