Catholic Charities placing Somalis from Uganda refugee camp in Minnesota

The other day when I wrote about the large number of Somalis entering the US from refugee camps in Kenya, I wondered who were all the refugees coming from Uganda and here we learn they are Somalis too!
We have written so many posts about Somalis/Catholic Charities in Minnesota, I have lost track. But, I do remember when I first learned that it was three ostensibly Christian federal refugee contractors who first placed Muslim Somalis in Minnesota decades ago,and they are still at it.  See that 2011 post here.
It was the generous welfare that made Minnesota so attractive to these resettlement contracting agencies.
 

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Somali Muslims are being placed in Minnesota from Nakivale Refugee Camp in Uganda.

 
Here is the story that caught my eye just now, from CNS news:

A Somali couple with three children is seeking a new life in Minnesota thanks to a Catholic Charities’ resettlement program that cites a Christian imperative for its work.

“Now the family is together and thankful for their new home. While they are learning about Minnesota and adjusting to the cold weather, they have a place to live and food in the cupboards,” Julia Jenson, Catholic Charities St. Paul-Minneapolis director of external affairs and communications, told CNA.

The family comes from the Nakivale refugee camp in Uganda, which hosts 100,000 Somalis who have fled conflict at home.

[….]

laurie-ohmann
Laurie Ohmann: the Pope tells us to work with the “poor and the vulnerable in our community.” So why not help the American poor before bringing in third world poor? Photo: https://www.cctwincities.org/our-organization/our-people/leadership/

For Ohmann [Laurie Ohmann, senior vice president of client services and community partnerships at Catholic Charities of St. Paul-Minneapolis], the agency’s motive for refugee resettlement is clear.

“It’s an issue of human dignity and supporting their participation in our economic and cultural life,” she said. [Refugee resettlement is about protecting people from persecution, not about economic and cultural opportunities we can give them. See recent report about a Minnesota Somali safely going home to Somalia!—ed]

She cited the principles of Catholic social teaching and Pope Francis’ prominence in “welcoming the stranger and working with the poor and the vulnerable in our community.”

[….]

Ohmann acknowledged some Americans’ safety concerns about refugees.

Ohmann then goes through the usual talking points about security screening, which we have learned is pretty much useless with nomadic Somalis who have no records and whose children have grown up to become jihadists right here in America!  See my answer, here, to their talking points about their assertion that refugees are harmless.
And, much to the reporter’s credit for bringing up another of Catholic Charities placement—the Ohio State stabber! So much for vetting!

Among those aided by Catholic Charities affiliates was Abdul Razak Ali Artan, the 20-year-old who in November drove a car into a crowd at Ohio State University then started to stab passersby before he was shot and killed by a campus police officer. The attacker hurt 11 people, one critically.

Artan had come to Dallas as a refugee from Somalia in June 2014 and stayed in Dallas with his six siblings and his mother for about three weeks before moving to Columbus, Ohio. They had been aided by Catholic Charities of Dallas after vetting by the U.S. State Department.

Dave Woodyard, the Dallas agency’s president and CEO, said there was nothing that stood out about Artan during his brief stay there. [There are many questions still unanswered about this family’s short stay in Dallas and their abrupt move to Ohio—ed]

More here.
See my HUGE archive on Minnesota by clicking here.
Warning to Trump transition… remember we are bringing in certain potentially dangerous ethnic groups from safe places in the world. So it is important not to say something like: “We will stop refugees from Somalia (the country).” We don’t take refugees from Somalia, we take Somalis who have spread out all over the world!

Fun to watch the Left eat its own: ACLU sues Catholic Charities

Why? Because Catholic Charities, which you all know collects millions of taxpayer dollars to resettle refugees and ‘take care of’ the Unaccompanied Alien Children flooding our borders, won’t offer abortion services to the kids.
If I understand this news correctly, the ACLU has claimed they have “standing” because they represent taxpayers! And, this judge has agreed!

Magistrate Judge, Laurel Beeler, Northern District of California Photo by Jason Doiy 5/20/2013 061-2013
Magistrate Judge, Laurel Beeler, Northern District of California: Taxpayers represented by the ACLU have standing.

The Catholic Bishops and Catholic Charities have been between this rock and a hard place before, but so far their connection to the federal teat has not been severed.
Catholics could face choice: federal bucks or religious principles, hmmmmm!
From Life News:

A California judge refused to dismiss a lawsuit this week that challenges federal funding of Catholic Charities because they refuse to provide young refugees and immigrants with abortions or birth control.

Courthouse News reports the American Civil Liberties Union sued the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) this summer to stop them from giving federal funding to Catholic organizations that do not promote abortions or birth control.

The federal government filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit on grounds that the ACLU did not have standing to sue, but U.S. Magistrate Judge Laurel Beeler denied the government’s motion on Tuesday and allowed the lawsuit to continue, according to the report.

“Congress mandated that the agency provide care to unaccompanied minors, and it authorized disbursements to provide that care,” Beeler wrote. “Because [HHS, through the Office of Refugee Resettlement] makes grants under that statutory mandate, the ACLU – through its taxpayer members – has standing.”

[….]

The ACLU argues that the government should not give money to the Catholic aid programs because the programs do not refer or provide abortions or birth control to young, unaccompanied minor refugees and immigrants like Rosa, the New York Times reports. In the lawsuit, it argues that the agencies are legally required to provide access to contraception and abortion because they receive government funding.

I wonder does the ACLU fully understand how far left the Catholic Church is in America on the issue of immigration and open borders?
Or, does the ACLU figure they can have it all—banking on the Catholic agencies caving in on their religious principles and choosing the federal money as a first priority?
One more thing! Whose money is Catholic Charities using to defend itself?

Maine immigration lawyer: we are too old and too white!

That is the same thinking that got Europe into such deep trouble—the idea that one must welcome hordes of diversity in order to, what? still have enough people to buy cars or rent apartments, or require teachers—to fuel the economy.  And, they pretty much say it in this article at a small town newspaper in Maine, to wipe our old white butts in nursing homes!

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Immigration lawyer Jennifer Atkinson: Maine a “bastion of whiteness.” Not good for Maine or my business! http://www.jatkinsonlawoffice.com/

Watch, I’ll be accused of being a white nationalist (oh wait! I already am labeled as such!) just for writing about this story.
But, it isn’t me saying this, it is an immigration lawyer whose livelihood depends on more immigration just as a used car salesman looking for refugees to sell to (not disparaging used car salesmen!) does, or a nursing home owner who is trying to get workers at the cheapest hourly wage he can get!
Here is the story from Maine. ‘Lawyer, employer encourage hiring more refugees‘ which reports that refugees are now being spread out further from the normal resettlement sites in Maine (thanks to Catholic Charities).

“Why are we so old?” immigration attorney Jennifer Atkinson asked a small crowd gathered Nov. 16 for a talk about her work, hosted by the Camden Conference at Rockport Opera House.

“Look around…” she said. “We’re white. We’re so old because we’re so white.”

She put the area’s demographics bluntly, calling the Midcoast “a bastion of whiteness” within the oldest and whitest state in the country.

[….]

While some residents might be content with this, Atkinson said it doesn’t bode well for Maine’s economy or its future.

When you read these next lines consider this:  I’m white and old enough to remember when the pressure on all of us college grads was to have ONLY two children or risk killing the planet.  Guess who didn’t listen to that—the rest of the brown world didn’t listen! Heck we have 9/11 mastermind KSM telling interrogators that they are going to take us over by outbreeding us!

Statistically speaking, there is a correlation between whiteness, oldness and slow population growth.

[….]

Maine’s aging and decreasing population (the state had a net loss of 928 people last year) leads to cascading problems: low school enrollment, pressures on budgets, strains on services — especially health care — and declines in the working-age labor force. [928 doesn’t sound like a lot to me!—ed]

[….]

“To grow we have to be willing to become more racially diverse,” Atkinson said, “because that’s where the growth is, in non-white communities.

“There’s always the option to reach out to refugees and asylum-seekers,” she added, fully disclosing that doing so would be good for her Friendship-based practice, but also would benefit employers and the community as a whole.

Who is taking care of the old white people in nursing homes?

I don’t have time to discuss the next section, but you should read it, here.   It is about a nursing home owner who has figured out that he can hire refugee labor probably much cheaper than a Mainer.  When making arguments about why they hire refugees they NEVER admit it is about the hourly wage.  They could probably find Americans for this work if they paid a decent wage!  But, that would mess up their bottomlines!
(Your tax dollars subsidize the family’s needs when wages are too low.)
LOL! Big business owners are always pretending they are doing God’s work by hiring refugees!
Having had some experience with nursing homes in recent years, any one of you considering finding one for your elderly family member, especially one with some form of dementia, make sure that all those caring for your loved one (no matter their skin color) SPEAK ENGLISH WELL.  It is hard enough for the mentally impaired as it is, and they need to be able to communicate well with a nursing aid. Something as benign seeming as a urinary tract infection can kill if not detected in time.

Questions I want answered: 

Why is that Leftwingers are always pushing for more population growth (to fuel the economy) when they must know that growth of that sort will necessarily bring some degradation of the environment—more cars, more roads, more houses, more school construction, less open space, etc?  I don’t get it! If there is some Open Borders Leftwinger who would like to explain it to me and our readers, I would very much welcome a guest column.
And this too? Why all the yammering at whites to have only 2 kids, I don’t see any of you nagging the Arabs or the Africans to do the same thing.
See our Maine archive by clicking here.

Storm Lake, Iowa: Filling America's "dead spots" with diversity!

Storm Lake population 10,600 in 2010.
Looks like we have found another of the 47 new resettlement sites we learned that the US State Department has identified to place some of Obama’s 110,000 refugees for FY2017.  Of course, as we just said for Rutland, VT, some locations are on hold as the contractors try to figure out how far out on the limb (financially) they wish to climb.
Since refugee contractors get most of their federal money on a per head basis, any slowdown in resettlement after Trump is inaugurated cuts in to their budgets.

storm-lake-tyson-plant
Surprise (not)! Tyson Foods has a pork processing plant at Storm Lake and the first refugee from Thailand (Burmese?) went to work there. Wikipedia tells us there is a turkey processing plant there too. More refugee labor on the way? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storm_Lake,_Iowa

This is the second story we have seen lately about Catholic resettlement agencies spreading out their responsibilities to smaller organizations (or churches) presumably to make resettlement cheaper for themselves.  We told you about Hudson, Wisconsin here last week.
The problem of transparency is something I will be pushing the Trump Administration on as soon as we know who will be Secretary of State.  It is maddening that here we are nearly 2 months in to FY17 and we have only identified some of the 47 new sites*** we heard the DOS has chosen.   Citizens have a right to know when their towns have been selected for refugee placement.

Once again from a local paper, we learn (inadvertently)   some nuggets that should help all of us.
From the Storm Lake Pilot-Tribune last week:

The Bridge of Storm Lake’s mission has grown in an unexpected direction. The neighborhood ministry has become a refugee resettlement agency along with its other programs.

The first two refugees from Thailand have been successfully settled in Storm Lake, and a mother and small child will be arriving before the end of the year, freed from the desperate conditions of refugee camps.

The role was not one the program expected to play.

Catholic Charities, one of the national agencies charged with resettling refugees accepted to enter the United States, had reached out to The Bridge to see if could help.

There are placement agencies in larger cities like Omaha and Minneapolis, but Storm Lake sits in a “dead spot” in the midst of a vast rural region, unserved by any existing resettlement office.

jay-dahlhauser
Jay Dahlhauser founder and CEO of The Bridge. http://www.thebridgeofstormlake.com/

Jay Dahlhauser of The Bridge explained that the national resettlement agencies [The Contractors—ed] meet each Wednesday to see what refugees are arriving, from where, and figure out which refugees each will handle.

We should demand that the Trump State Department not hold these meetings in secret.  Imagine this! Non-profit groups are sitting around a table in DC every Wednesday making decisions that will effect your community for decades/generations!
Pilot-Tribune:

With the country beginning to reach out to more rural regions for resettlements, The Bridge accepted the challenge from Catholic Charities, but not before wrestling over the decision. [What do they mean the “country” is reaching out to place refugees in rural areas! The Obama State Department and the US Conference of Catholic Bishops may be reaching out, but they are not the “country!”—ed]

So here (below) we learn something completely new—the feds can send up to 30 refugees to a town before making a formal agreement with the agency! BTW, none of this is in the law, this is all decided within the Department of State without any legal underpinning (so it could easily be undecided by a Trump Secretary of State).

Pilot-Tribune:

Storm Lake and The Bridge are currently capped at a maximum of 30 resettled individuals. If the number reaches that level, a more permanent agreement would be necessary, or possibly a formal resettlement office to be located in the community.

Continue reading here.
I would love to know if the contractors get any little rewards from the meatpackers when they supply them with cheap refugee laborers.
***To see if your town is an existing resettlement site check out the US Department of State database.
But when you look at that data base know three things.  1) the data base is out of date, 2) we are told there are 47 new sites not listed and, 3) see if you live within 100 miles of one of these offices because that means your town is fair game to receive refugees.
Here are some of the new sites being chosen by the US State Department (that we know of!).  We are adding Storm Lake, Iowa. If anyone there is interested in learning more, check out our ‘Ten Things Your Town Needs to Know‘ by clicking here.
Asheville, NC
Rutland, VT
Reno, NV
Ithaca, NY
Missoula, MT
Aberdeen, SD (may have been thwarted as a primary resettlement site!)
Charleston, WV
Fayetteville, AR
Blacksburg, VA
Pittsfield, MA
Northhampton, MA
Flint, MI
Bloomington, IN
Traverse City, MI
Poughkeepsie, NY
Wilmington, DE
Watertown, NY (maybe)
Youngstown, OH (maybe)
Storm Lake, Iowa

Refugee resettlement industry held emergency conference call on Friday: What will Trump do?

Update November 22nd: Michael Patrick Leahy at Breitbart investigated and found more details.  In an update to his earlier article, he reports that the US State Department claims they did not organize or participate in the conference call, see here.
They are worried. And, as my good friend Richard (Blue Ridge Forum) would say, it has a lot to do with rice bowls. What? you ask! Have you ever heard the phrase ‘breaking rice bowls?’ It happens a lot when a new administration comes in to power and a lot of people have their livelihoods placed on the line perhaps for the first time ever!
donald-trump-quotes-thinking-big-600x400
In a story ostensibly about what is going to happen to the new resettlement site of Northampton, Massachusetts, the head of the local Catholic Charities tells us a good bit about what went on when 452 worried refugee resettlement workers got on a conference call with presumably leaders of the two main federal agencies that administer the program and dole out the federal bucks in Washington.
BTW, as we have mentioned previously, both the Asst. Secretary of State for Population, Refugees and Migration and the Director of the Office of Refugee Resettlement (as political appointees) will soon be on their way out.
Here is Masslive.com:

NORTHAMPTON — Asked if she thought a city refugee resettlement program would be subject to change under President-elect Donald Trump, Catholic Charities Executive Director Kathryn Buckley-Brawner pulled no punches.

“Of course it is,” Buckley-Brawner said. “Because Trump will be president. It’s less a question about ‘is’ as opposed to ‘will.'”

03/10/11 South Hadley Republican Photo by Mark M.Murray - Bishop Timothy McDonnell, Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield ,annouces the official begining of the 2011 Annual Catholic Appeal, during a press conference inside the St.Patrick Parish center kitchen thursday. Also on hand at right is David Bergeron, head of food services at the center , and Kathryn Buckley-Brawner, Direcor of the Catholic Charities Agency.
Kathryn Buckley-Brawner has been resettling refugees in Springfield, Mass. http://www.masslive.com/news/index.ssf/2012/01/kathryn_buckley-brawner_named.html

Buckley-Brawner participated in a 452-person nationwide “post-election national refugee advocacy” conference call Friday headed up by people in government. [Advocacy on the taxpayers’ dime!—ed]

The call leaders said “don’t overreact,” prepare to advocate and argue in favor of refugee resettlement programs and hold steady until something changes, Buckley-Brawner said.

But feelings of uncertainty permeated the discussion, according to Buckley-Brawner.

“People whose job it is to have their finger on the pulse of what’s going on in our government don’t have a clue,” Buckley-Brawner said in a MassLive interview following the call. “If they don’t have a clue, the rest of us are in the same position.”

Members of the call seemed to think the most likely way a Trump administration might impact U.S. resettlement efforts would be by blocking refugees from certain places — like Iraq and Syria. [LOL! If Trump asks me, I’ll say Somalia, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan and Burma (Rohingya) need to be on the list too!—ed]

Trump told CNBC on Monday he felt more against allowing Syrian refugees into the country than ever, calling the prospect “one of the great Trojan horses.”

[….]

Several different scenarios were discussed during Friday’s conference call, Buckley-Brawner said.

Among these, a complete shut-down of funding for refugee resettlement — thought very unlikely. A tightening of vetting procedures and slow-down of refugee intake — thought very possible. Finally, a dramatic decrease in refugee intake across the board.

“We’re simply going to keep on doing what we’re doing until somebody says ‘stop,'” Buckley-Brawner said.

Continue reading here about the elected libs in Northampton and their enthusiasm for taking Syrian Muslim refugees.
Be sure to visit our archive on Springfield, Mass. where the mayor called for a MORATORIUM and begged for relief from Buckley-Brawner’s resettlement of refugees there for years.
Northhampton is fresh territory and I will bet that although it is only 20 miles north of Springfield, the folks in Northampton likely have no clue about all the problems Springfield has had (unless they have been reading RRW for years!).
Endnote: My apologies to the good citizens of Northampton! I have been spelling the name of your town wrong for months! Sheesh, just found that I had spelled it wrong above!