By Melanie Nathan, Oct 25, 2024.
I advocate for LGBTQI+ people from African countries who have been forcibly displaced dues to extreme persecution and violence. We seek durable solutions to include resettlement to third countries for refugees. This is a tough task especially when most refugees have no choice but to seek protection in hostile host second countries, hoping for resettlement which is not guaranteed to all. The very criminalizing laws that license violence from which they have fled, are the same in these host countries. The only difference is that once a refugee in the second country, one is supposed to enjoy a layer of international protection presided over by UNHCR. The organization I direct also provides humanitarian and various other services. It has been the dream of all those hoping for resettlement to come to the United States of America.
Just this past month, I am happy to report forward movement for LGBTQI+ refugees in three countries where we work. A high number of LGBTQI+ people who I have spent several years working with, including some who are ambassadors for AHRC, were submitted to embassies for resettlement and approved in the past few months.
A few called me terribly upset because they are not being resettled to the USA.
This is how one of the conversations went with someone who I will call Thyne, who when we chatted on Zoom had tears in his eyes and a look of foreboding on his face:
Thyne: Commissioner, I have good news and bad news.
Me: Tell me the bad news first …
Thyne: Well, I dont know how to break it to you. The bad news is I have been resettled to Germany
Me (big smile) : OMG that is amazing news. Are you kidding me? It could not be better news. I am so happy for you.
Thyne: But I wanted to come near to you, to America.
Me: Well the new reality is that you may be saving me one day by being in Germany, in Europe. Now Let me tell you why this is really great news.
America is not kind to immigrants and awful to refugees. When comparing benefits and what you get in country like Germany to the USA, you are way better off there. You will receive much more services and funds to get your new life started.
But THAT is not the ONLY reason I am so happy for you. America is facing an election and DJT could land up President of this country, again. Last time he was President he shut the borders to refugees and even people who were about to enter after receiving the good news that they had been resettled to the USA. Even though they had gone through 4-10 years of extreme vetting and process to get here, they could not board those planes and were turned around. It was a nightmare. We had to fight for them in the courts and we did win. However the problem is that since then trump has put his own bad judges in the highest courts and so we may never be able to win those cases if it happens again.
Now whoever is coming here is risking that happening again. Which means it could cost you another 4-8 years. Because you could travel at any time there is a 50% chance you will be stopped.
If you go to Germany, you have all of Europe as your place. You can travel easily and even shift to another country at some point if you want to. No one will be sending you back or stopping you entering.
You have a black skin. America is way more racist than you can imagine. We have at least 80 million people voting to put a Nazi and racist in office who hates immigrants. That means THAT MANY people think exactly the way he does. He called your country a shit-hole country. Shows what he and his millions of voters think about you. Why would anyone from Africa want to come here to risk being around those kind of people.
While the American dream is still here and maybe we can regain our soul if Kamala Harris is elected, I feel it will take a very long time to fix the harm the monster trump has already done to this country, in terms of how he has twisted people’s thinking through lies, scapegoating and fear mongering. That does not go away over night. Not even with a good President.
Just about everyone I know, including descendants of Holocaust survivors from European countries, such as Germany are applying for the passports and citizenships that were taken away from them during the Pogroms and Holocaust.
Thyne: Oh I had no idea, you are giving me a joy again.
Me: You have no idea how lucky you are to be going to a place where you will get much better services and resources than you will in the USA, where after mere months you are on your own struggling to get a job that is not dishwashing or wiping the tuchus of some old person. Not that those are bad jobs for some, but I know you and I know you want to study further. American won’t give you a paid education. Germans will!
So Thyne, you have no bad news for me … only great news.
COUNTRY CONDITIONS EXPERT WITNESS
Melanie Nathan, Executive Director of African Human Rights Coalition is a qualified country of origin expert witness in the United States and global immigration courts, providing expert written country conditions reports and testimony for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, non-binary, LGBTQI + asylum seekers from African Countries, to include activists, allies and human rights defenders.
MELANIE NATHAN,
Commissionermnathan@gmail.com
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