Keating Out of Step on SAFE Act

Big shout out to Ashley and Grace for having their Op-Ed on Rep. Keating's vote on the SAFE Act published in the Cape Cod Times today!

Keating Out of Step on SAFE Act

By Grace Fernandes and Ashley Benson

At this time of Thanksgiving, a holiday celebrating some of America’s first refugees of religious oppression, we are extremely disappointed by U.S. Rep. William Keating’s Nov. 19 vote to pass H.R. 4038.

We believe this bill, the American Security Against Foreign Enemies Act (also known as the SAFE Act), will make it harder for refugees to find a haven in our country by requiring the director of the FBI, in unanimous concurrence with the secretary of Homeland Security and the director of National Security, to verify that each refugee poses no threat to our country’s security, in addition to other barriers. Keating’s vote, among the minority of Democrats in the House, does not align itself with his past efforts to aid the victims of conflicts and mass atrocities around the world.

Since 2011, more than 12 million Syrians have been forced to flee their homes as a result of a violent civil war. Half are children. Unfortunately, children displaced or orphaned by this conflict are at high risk of malnourishment, abuse and exploitation. They are often forced to quit school because of constant relocation. In this country, we have the opportunity to take in some of those refugee children and provide them with the life and education they would not have otherwise experienced in their wartorn homeland. We are morally obligated to extend our aid to these young victims of conflict and their families, whose only offense was being born into a violent and unstable country. Turning our backs on these people is inhumane and does not represent who we are as a nation. The United States has and should continue to be a beacon for the world’s oppressed.

George Santayana once said, “Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” In 1939 we as a country turned our backs on the St. Louis, aboard which were 937 passengers, almost all Jewish refugees. The xenophobia of the American people led our government to deny these refugees admittance into our country.

As Americans, we cannot afford to make this same mistake again, or allow fear to control our decisions. After the recent attacks in Paris, France has maintained its commitment to admit refugees from Syria; this is in stark contrast to the further barriers that our representatives wish to raise against refugees. The support shown recently for Paris needs also to be shown for the Syrian refugees experiencing the same unwarranted violence from ISIS and other threats. We must remember that these people are not terrorists, but the ones fleeing terror.

H.R. 4038 caters to the propaganda produced by ISIS in its attempts to recruit potential soldiers, giving extremists incentive to join the movement. We risk sending a message to the millions of displaced Syrians that they are unwelcome; this has the potential to incite anger and resentment toward us as a nation and may encourage lone-wolf extremists to ally themselves with ISIS and increase their strength as an organization.

This bill is counterproductive. To date there are no cases of refugees committing terrorist attacks in this country. We understand the widespread concern for safety, especially in the wake of the recent attacks in Paris. As President George W. Bush stated nine days after the attack of 9/11, “Our enemy is not our many Muslim friends; it is not our many Arab friends.” Syrian refugees, who are fleeing from the very people we stand against, cannot be used as scapegoats following these horrific events.

The recurring argument in defense of this bill is that it will prevent potential terrorists from exploiting the United States Refugee Admissions Program as a means of entrance into the country. This argument fails to take into consideration one very important detail: The current refugee vetting process in the United States is on average an 18- to 24-month process, in addition to the lengthy U.N. process that precedes it. It’s unlikely that potential terrorists will wait two years, subjecting themselves to the most extensive screening process of any foreign travelers to the United States, just to have a chance to gain asylum in this country. H.R. 4038 is fixing a problem that does not exist, and in doing so alienates innocent people who are looking to us for a place of refuge.

Massachusetts has long been a leader in helping those most in need. Gov. Baker’s statement that he is “not interested in accepting refugees from Syria” is inconsistent with who we are as a state.

We hope Sens. Warren and Markey will stand up to this wave of xenophobia and help prevent this bill from advancing, and we hope Rep. Keating will reconsider his support and pledge to uphold the president’s potential veto. We are better than this.

— Grace Fernandes and Ashley Benson are seniors at Monomoy Regional High School in Harwich.

See story at Cape Cod Times here

DC Trip Day 3 - Lobby Day

With an early wake up we were all walking out of the hotel fully loaded at 815. We walked down First St past Union Station to the Dirksen Senate office building where STAND's hq for the day was set up in the basement cafeteria. After dropping our bags, we walked across Capitol Hill to Rep. Keating's office in Cannon. 

Following last year's model, we developed a presentation where all 16 students have a part. We made our first pitch of the day to Gabrielle Gould, Keating's new foreign policy staffer. It went great, and we felt like we were really able to help her understand our issues, especially the Atrocities Prevention Board. 

After the meeting, Keating interns Rachel and Casey took us over to the Capitol for our tour. 

We had a nice tour with Sean though it was more crowded than usual. 

We took our annual photo with Sam Houston. 

After the tour, we walked over to the Hart Building for our meeting with Sen. Warren's senior staffer, Feras Sleiman - this is the third time we have met with him! The kids did a great job again, and Feras is very supportive 

of the cause, even knowing that August 4 was the fourth anniversary of the proposal to create the APB. 

Next we grabbed lunch in the Senate cafeteria which was excellent and reasonable. 

With some extra time we went to a lecture in the Supreme Court chamber (kudos to Grace for finding this online) 

and then over to the Library of Congress for a visit. 

We then went to our 4pm meeting in Sen. Markey's office where we met with senior foreign policy analyst Phil McGovern, who has a fascinating background of active military service in Afghanistam and Iraq and last year countering ISIS, and also service in the State Dept. He was also really impressed by the presentation, and he really knows what he's talking about - he worked on the presidential study directive that created the APB! 

This was a home run and a great way to complete our lobby day. We just had time to grab our bags and head to Union Station to catch a 520 train to BWI,

which gave us plenty of time to grab dinner before our 815 flight. This was one of our best trips ever! The kids did a phenomenal job - learning deeply about the issues, advocating forcefully for human rights, and representing Monomoy with class and style. Awesome job!

DC Trip Day 2: #STANDSummit

We rolled out of the hotel at 830 and took the Metro 

to Tenleytown where we grabbed breakfast then walked down to American University for #STANDSummit. 

The day was a mix of inspirational speakers and policy education. Early highlight was Jack Healey, former director of Amnesty International, telling stories from five decades of peace activism. "To make a difference you just need a big heart and a steely determination." "There is a river of consciousness that is deep and wide waiting for peace and harmony to occur." "You want for them what your parents want for you -" food, health, education, a job..., decency, kindness, justice. "Take care of your heart and never back up." You have to understand both sides of a conflict. "Don't be afraid to trust your instincts against the experts." "Ask for what you want." "Have security in small numbers. I'm dangerous in small numbers."

We learned a lot about activism and leadership from the folks at AMPglobalyouth.org, then over lunch were treated to stories from diaspora from Sudan and the CAR, including Gabino Guerengomba. 

Gabino talked about the need to get away from the aid model for Africa to a sustainable support for development and entrepreneurship. From Aid to Empowerment maybe. 

We then had a very wonky (meaning great) panel on the Atrocities Prevention Board which is our main ask for tomorrow's lobbying. The ATB is an interagency working group that meets regularly to look upstream to see what crises may be building and to develop the tools to try to prevent them from exploding. It has operated for three years and has helped our government address situations in Burundi and CAR. It was created by executive action and may not be sustained past the current administration unless Congress formally authorizes it. 

Next was our keynote speech by our friend and hero Carl Wilkens. I will add some of his inspirational messages later. 

We then talked about and prepared our presentations for tomorrow when we will be lobbying our members of congress. 

At 7, we got picked up by Roland of Adventure Tours for our night monument tour. 

Day 1 in DC

Another DC trip, another 3:30am wake up text. But this year, everyone was already up. They were told to be in Terminal A at Logan by 5:30 but when I get there at 5:15, they are all there early. By 5:30 they are all through security and at the gate. Plenty of time to grab breakfast before our 6:35 Southwest flight to BWI. 

We walked off the plane in Baltimore and got in our SuperShuttles to DC, dropped our bags at the Hilton Garden Inn, and then got a ride to the US Holocaust Memorial Museum just before it opened at 10. We took two hours to go through the permanent exhibit. As always, it was a powerful experience for our students. 

(This is the rail car you walk through)

From there we walked in a warm rain 

to the Museum of the American Indian where we had an excellent lunch - 

though the cafeteria was crowded - and an hour to enjoy the museum. Highlight: retrospective of Kay Walking Stick's art - the evolution of her diptych style. 

From there, we took our longest walk of the day, thankfully without rain, over Capitol Hill and out Maryland Ave, a beautiful neighborhood of townhouses, past Revolutionary War hero Nathanael Greene's statue, 

to the Atlas Theater. Here we were treated to the first matinee of a new play put on by a new theater company - the Mosaic Theater. The play, Unexplored Interior (This is Rwanda: The Beginning and the End of the Earth), was brilliant and challenging and, in the words of our students, mind blowing. Along with the USHMM visit, this has prepared us for the antigenocide work we will do tomorrow at the conference. 

From there we walked to Busboys and Poets, the best restaurant we have found in DC, where we had a great meal and were joined by our friends and heroes Carl Wilkens and HHS grad Mackenzie Hamilton, and the whole STAND leadership crew. 

Finally we walked back to the hotel and checked into our rooms. I think everyone pretty quickly collapsed after the long day. This was a near perfect day with a precision and focus that the students might describe as military. To the conference tomorrow!