And, you know stereotyping is very wrong and doing so makes you a very very bad person.
RRW geography lesson! Just found this very useful map that updates every day the countries where Ebola has been reported (in case you plan to go to Africa).
I just re-read this article and wondered why it was news.
We know here at RRW that Maine is in overload with its mostly African immigrants and the recent rush of asylum seekers, but this article is nothing more than a lecture to those dummies (I’m not calling anyone a dummy!) who live in Maine and don’t know about geography and other such things more worldly people might know about.
Read it yourselves. The bottom line is that no one can seem to find any Africans in Maine yet stereotyped as possible Ebola carriers, but just in case you Mainers have a hankering to start stereotyping, don’t do it says the Portland Press Herald.
…representatives of several Maine immigrant communities in Portland and Lewiston-Auburn said they have not experienced any negative interactions because of the Ebola outbreak.
But rest assured, the powers-that-be are getting a jump on the non-problem by distributing information on how you should be thinking.
By the way, it isn’t just happening in Maine, I saw other articles before I went away where “communities” were heading stereotyping off-at-the- pass.
One more effort to drill in the immigrants-are-victims meme (but, hey, aren’t they now stereotyping?).
About the map which can be found by clicking here—Tourism Update says it is updated every day. Cool huh?
See our Health Issuescategory for more on refugee and immigrant health in America.
We have reported on the problem in Maine for months (years!). The gist of it is that Maine has had a wonderland of welfare for immigrants (that is whatbrought the first Somalis to Lewiston years ago) and now the LePage Administration is trying to cut back social services to asylum seekers. (The federal government does not give welfare to asylum seekers until they have become legitimate legal refugees.)
Apparently the word got out throughout Africa and elsewhere—get to Maine and you can get social services while you wait for your asylum application to be processed. So they came.
For new readers, asylum seekers get into the US on their own (visa overstays etc.) and then apply for asylum (claiming to be persecuted at home). If granted asylum they become “refugees” in the full sense of the word and get federal taxpayer goodies and help from a federal resettlement contractor. But, thanks to the border crashers an already over full asylum court can’t get to cases for years.
Here is a bit of the story at CentralMaine.com, but you should read the whole thing (of course it starts out with a sympathetic ‘star’ of the story, Journalism 101?). They are all “vulnerable” you know! (but aren’t there Americans who are vulnerable as well?).
Once vulnerable in their homelands, Maine’s asylum seekers, in growing numbers, are left waiting – for permission to work, for their status to change and, now, to see if looming welfare reforms will make them vulnerable all over again.
[….]
Thousands of people from war-torn or politically troubled nations in sub-Saharan Africa have arrived in Maine in recent years on their own with visas that allow them to visit, work or study on a temporary basis, only to seek asylum so they can stay permanently. Asylum applicants wait in a fuzzy legal status in which they are considered to be undocumented but protected from deportation. And at the same time they are prohibited by federal law from working for at least six months – and sometimes much longer.
Meanwhile, the wait for asylum can take years, with a nationwide backlog of applications that is expected to grow because of the surge of unaccompanied minors crossing the southern U.S. border in recent months.
BOWDOINHAM Maine (Reuters) – A Rwandan man accused of war crimes was arrested by the U.S. Border Patrol in northern Maine after a local citizen reported a “suspicious person” walking near the Canadian border, law enforcement officials said on Thursday.
Jean Leonard Teganya, 42, a Rwandan who authorities said had violated international law and the Canadian Crimes Against Humanity and War Crimes Act, walked across the border into the United States illegally on Sunday when he was spotted, according to a statement issued by the Department of Homeland Security.
He was later detained and processed for removal from the United States, a spokeswoman said.
This is not our first Rwandan war criminal by any means. We posted extensively on a multi-million dollar federal trial in New Hampshire which ended last summer with a prison sentence for a Rwandan woman who lied to get into the US as a refugeebut was then found to be a war criminal (and is alleged to have killed a nun). See that post here and follow links back.
Here (below) a reader from Maine expresses his concern about the program and asks that it be strictly limited.
Be sure to read yesterday’s postin which we directed readers and those who submitted statements to the US State Department to write to Rep. Trey Gowdy who chairs the all important subcommittee responsible for refugee resettlement and ask that he obtain the statements from contractorsthat the State Department is withholding from the public. What are they afraid of?
Ask Rep. Trey Gowdy to demand the release of all testimony from May 29th public comment period and ask him to hold Congressional oversight hearings on the refugee program.
From Michael in Maine:
Dear Ms. Spruell:
I am concerned with the large numbers of refugees (~70,000 a year) that are being resettled in the U.S. I am particularly concerned regarding the large number of people claiming refugee status who are from countries containing significant populations that are not friendly with the U.S. Unfriendly populations often include people who are not aligned with the countries’ governments, so just because these people are refugees does not mean that they are pro-American.
I do not wish for anyone to be forced to live under oppression, but in many, and perhaps most, cases it seems to me that it would be better to try to resettle refugees in less oppressive countries more similar to or nearer to their home country rather than to the U.S. Moreover, there is great concern that the number of refugees we are letting in currently is so great that it is overwhelming our ability to properly screen applicants for fraudulent claims.
I think that we could probably get by with a refugee program that relocated about 1/5 of the people to the U.S. that we do now; moreover, our program ought to prioritize refugees based on how easily they can be assimilated to the U.S. For those who cannot easily be assimilated to our culture we should find alternate countries and help them to immigrate to them instead.
I am also very concerned about the influence of various Refugee advocacy groups, such as the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, who gain financially from government contracts when the number of refugees increases.
Given that (for reasons that remain unclear to me) there will be no public hearing this year, I would like for a complete record of all comments to be published.
I am sending written copies of this mail to Anne C. Richard, Asst. Secretary of State for Population, Refugees and Migration, and to the proper House and Senate Judiciary Committee Subcommittees. I am also sending electronic copies to my Senators and my Congresswoman, using their on-line contact forms.
Michael
cc: Senator Susan Collins, Senator Angus King, Representative Chellie Pingree,
House of Representatives Judiciary Committee, Subcommittee on Immigration and Border Security, US Senate Judiciary Committee, Subcommittee on Immigration, Refugees and Border Security.
See all of our posts relating to this year’s State Department hearing by clicking here. And, see our extensive archive on Maine, here.
And, by the way, if anyone gets any interesting response from an elected representative, send it our way.
One last thing—next week the Lutherans send 50 refugees to Capitol Hill to lobby Congress (for more money and more refugees), so it’s especially important that you get your statements in at this time as well.
Maine has a reputation in the country (and probably in Africa too!) as the go-to state for welfare benefits before one is even a legal resident. In fact, it is the welfare magnet that brought the first of what is now tens of thousands of Somalis to Maine. (Click herefor one of our most-read posts about Maine the welfare magnet).
Maine Somali community organizers: We want our welfare! Photo: Bangor Daily News
On Friday, Maine Attorney General Janet Mills ruled that it would be unconstitutional for Maine to disallow social services to those seeking asylum or generally illegally in the state.
Keep in mind that federal laws do not give benefits to asylum seekers UNTIL they have been granted legal asylum status. Just because one says one is seeking asylum that does not give them the rights of legitimate ‘refugees.’ Maine has been giving benefits to one and all, thus the flood of migrants to Maine.
AUGUSTA, Maine — Maine Attorney General Janet Mills has ruled that a proposal by Gov. Paul LePage to bar immigrants and asylum seekers from receiving General Assistance is illegal and unconstitutional.
Health and Human Services Commissioner Mary Mayhew reacted with dismay and said she will continue to pursue implementation of the rule.
The proposed new rule, which was unveiled late last year by the Maine Department of Health and Human Services, was meant to align qualification for the state’s General Assistance program with other public assistance programs such as Temporary Assistance for Needy Families and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. In essence, the proposal would block anyone from receiving General Assistance until they receive full U.S. citizenship.
Mayhew said Friday in a written statement that she has revised the rule so that only illegal immigrants — and not legal noncitizens — would be barred from the General Assistance program.
Lewiston, the Somali capital of New England, is one of three migrant-overloaded cities in Maine.
The rule would allow towns and cities to continue to provide the benefit, which is intended as an emergency measure to help individuals and families through financial crises, but without any financial support from the state. In most municipalities, the state pays 50 percent of the benefits, though there are three cities — Bangor, Portland and Lewiston — where state support ramps up to 90 percent after local spending reaches a certain threshold.
General Assistance cost the state and local municipalities a total of $12 million in 2013 and provided an average benefit of $966 to approximately 12,000 people. About 64 percent of that cost was in the immigrant-heavy cities of Bangor, Lewiston and Portland.
Go herefor our extensive Lewiston archive and herefor everything we have on Maine.
