Posted on 04/12/2017 5:24:35 AM PDT by wbill
PORTLAND, Maine — Abdi Ali doesn’t have memories of the country to which the United States government intends to deport him.
Ali and his family fled war in Somalia in 1996, when he was 7 years old. They came to the U.S. legally as refugees, and Ali became a permanent resident a year later, according to interviews and Immigration and Customs Enforcement documents.
In his first interview since ICE agents arrested the 28-year-old inside a Portland courthouse last week, Ali said he is terrified of being sent back to Somalia and does not understand why, after decades in the U.S., he is being deported on a 4-year-old drug possession conviction for which he has already served jail time.
“I’ve been here my whole life, and they [are] kicking me out for this one charge,” Ali said, wiping tears on his orange jumpsuit at the Cumberland County Jail on Monday. “If I go back to my country, they’re going to pretty much kill me. I don’t know [anything] about my country. I’m American. I consider myself American.”
Ali’s arrest appears to be the first time ICE has entered a Maine court to arrest someone. It has struck deep anxiety into the state’s immigrant community and comes as a sign that the Trump administration’s more aggressive immigration enforcement will target people here, including those with legal status in the U.S.
“The new thing that is really, really disturbing here is them seeking him out in the court,” Susan Roche, executive director of the Immigrant Legal Advocacy Project, said. “This shines a light on the injustice in our immigration laws.”
Roche said immigration officials trying to deport people based on old convictions is not new, but seeking immigrants out in court to do so is. The new, more aggressive enforcement approach evident in Ali’s case is also affecting his fiancee and her three children, whom he lives with in Westbrook, she said.
“It’s at a different level now than it was before, but we’ve seen so many cases where a family is torn apart by something someone did in the past,” Roche said.
Last Thursday, three ICE agents arrested Ali while he was at the Cumberland County Courthouse to plead not guilty to a drunken driving charge. They walked him out of the court in handcuffs, and a spokesman for the agency later pointed to Ali’s history of misdemeanor convictions, including two for assault in 2010.
But the documents ICE agents gave Ali when he was arrested, explaining why the agency is seeking to deport him, cite only a 2013 cocaine conviction. Ali pleaded guilty to the misdemeanor and served five months in jail. At the time, Ali said, there was no talk of deporting him for the crime, and he doesn’t understand why the federal government is coming after him years later.
“Why me? I’m not even a felon,” Ali cried. “They’re treating me like I’m a big criminal or something”
When asked why ICE is seeking to deport the Ali for a 4-year-old misdemeanor, spokesman Khaalid Walls said that under Trump’s executive order on “ Enhancing Public Safety in the Interior of the United States,” the agency “will no longer exempt classes or categories of removable aliens from potential enforcement.”
“All of those in violation of immigration laws may be subject to immigration arrest, detention, and if found removable by final order, removal from the United States,” Walls said.
Ali is only one of many Somalis who will be sent back to Africa this year, according to Stephen Schwartz, the U.S. ambassador to Somalia.
“We’ve actually repatriated 168 Somalis this year, and we’re going to repatriate hundreds more,” Schwartz said during a visit to Portland last Monday. “I would like migration to be done through legal means.”
In recent weeks, the Islamist militant group al-Shabaab has waged an increasingly deadly bombing campaign across Somalia, and famine and drought put more than a quarter of the country’s population at risk of starvation, according to the United Nations.
To Ali and his fiancee Melissa Hair, it seems deeply unfair that after coming to the U.S. legally and serving time for his crimes, the government is seeking to deport him.
“It’s like he’s being punished twice,” Hair said.
The couple, who have been together for nine years, were open about Ali’s troubled past.
Like many other Somalis who immigrated to Maine, Ali grew up in Portland’s Riverton neighborhood. He attended Lincoln Middle School and graduated from Deering High School in 2008, where Hair said he was a talented basketball player.
But after fleeing war in Somalia, Ali’s family had a difficult home life and he ran away around the age of 17, he said. Ali isn’t sure where his mother and siblings are today.
“I was on my own for a little bit,” Ali said.
After running away, Ali fell into crime and drug use. Between 2009 and 2014, he was convicted on a slew of misdemeanors, many of them petty crimes. According to a criminal background check, he was twice charged with felonies — for robbery and drug trafficking — but the charges were dismissed when he pleaded guilty to lesser crimes.
Ali eventually found a new family in Hair and her three children. In the past few years, he has straightened out his life, they said. He’s been working at a seafood processing plant and bringing home an income to help support the family. Ali and her children are close, Hair said, and she hasn’t figured out how to tell them he might be forced to leave the country.
An employee at the temp agency that helped Ali get the job described him as punctual and hardworking. Ali said he was getting ready to file his taxes before being arrested last week.
“Why are they doing this right now to me when they didn’t do it back then?” he said.
ICE going into the court to arrest Ali has other immigrants on edge, according to Mahmoud Hassan, president of the Somali Community Center of Maine. Courthouse arrests have drawn heavy criticism in states where they are more common. On Monday 179 Maine lawyers and Maine’s attorney general signed letters opposing the practice.
“People go to the court to address wrongs and seek justice,” Hassan said. “For ICE authorities to be staking out the court erodes their trust and the sanctity of that building.”
Ali said he is working with the Immigrant Legal Advocacy Project to find a lawyer to represent him during the removal proceedings in immigration court. He and Hair hope there will be a way to fight the government but are worried their family and hopes for the future may be broken apart.
Before Ali was arrested, the couple had been hatching a plan to open a business. It would be called “Fresh Gear,” and they would sell affordable boys clothing to poor teens around Maine. The idea was partially inspired by Ali’s childhood, Hair said.
“I don’t know about that now,” Ali said. “I don’t know where they’re sending me now.”
How little can we possibly care about how long he has resided in the US?
All that time and he didn’t assimilate and didn’t become a citizen.
Good riddance.
If he has cleaned up his life why is he hanging around the courthouse?
Nails it.
Deporting this Somali Common criminal——a junkie and alkie-—fits right into Trump’s deportation rationale.
The Somali’s own activities underline he is not beneficial to our country.
I do not get the rancor over arresting at a court house. Is there a more appropriate location for an arrest?
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It’s certainly safer for everyone concerned .... the officers, the public & the person being handed over to ICE. A handover in a controlled environment between law officers is preferable by far to going into a community that is likely hostile and knocking on doors or making traffic stops - even going to a workplace. If the media truly cared about public safety, they’d report it that way, but no ..... the “outrage” is to give the ‘Rat b@stard media something ginned up & negative to report about immigration laws finally being enforced.
Given this POS’s record, he’ll fit in and likely do quite well in Somalia.
He may even get a gig on one of the pirate boats.
“I’m moved by your story, sir. Here’s your ticket.”
“Next!”
They are deporting non-citizens who have committed crimes. Why would you say this doesn’t fit the new ICE policy ? It doesn’t matter if someone is here legally or not — if convicted of a crime, immediate deportation following serving time for the crime.
That has always been the law, it just wasn’t being enforced.
“I’m moved by your story, sir. Here’s your ticket.”
“Next!”
They need to find better poster children for their cause. The problem is that when they find them, they are not suffering the same fate. And there is a reason for that. :)
“Why are they doing this right now to me when they didn’t do it back then?” he said.
Exactly. Why haven't the laws been enforced for the past 20-odd years? But I don't think that's what he meant.
What are the chances he ignored several ICE notices to appear at their office and nabbing him at the county courthouse was Plan B?
Also notice how they left out the part that the couple was unmarried after 7 years together - so as not to spoil the EITC she was getting for her brood. The “reporter” left out the ages of the youngins - how much you wanna bet at least one of them is his? (refer to EITC comment above)
Folks, the bangor daily news is FAKE NEWS.
It like the Portland Press Herald and the Lewiston Sun Journal are carbon copies of the new york slimes, boston globe, and the washington poo.
They are experts on twisting one word, putting in or taking out one line to push their anti-Republic, Christ hating, democrat propaganda.
And this article fails to mention the fact that he was detained after being released after arraignment for oui.
But he didn't, and now he's paying the price.
I gotta tell ya, this article is trying to hit all of the notes. "Turning his life around". "Starting a new business". "Girlfriend with three kids hardest hit". All that's missing is a quote from Grandma saying that he was "Such a good boy." Writer has a future with the NY Times.
We'll conveniently ignore the fact that the guy is a lifetime petty criminal, constantly in and out of trouble with the law. And here illegally, to boot. That bit was completely glossed over.
That’s the part I could not get - The newspaper said he was here ‘legally’
ICE does not deport people here legally... oops, unless they commit crimes.
Who is supporting his children? If we are, then deport him - he’s no good here anyway and just taking a job from someone else.
IIRC, she died.
HE didn't want it ... so leave.
Tragedy! Tragedy! I wiped my tears on my pjs. This guy is a patriot and a taxpayer: a future entrepreneur. This situation has “struck deep anxiety into the state’s immigrant community.” My advice: avoid the court house. That would involve not getting arrested for drunken driving. Ali is a devoted family man. He probably did not marry after nine years because of welfare benefits. Still his “family” is being torn apart. A nine year relationship. Are the children his? What is the welfare cost? Everyone makes mistakes. Two convictions for assault, a cocaine conviction, drunken driving, robbery and drug trafficking. Sounds like a valuable member of society.
I agree. A courthouse is where the law is supposed to be paramount. Enforcing the law at a courthouse is pure justice
I’ve never had a misdemeanor conviction. No one in my family has had a misdemeanor conviction. I don’t know of any of my acquaintances having had a misdemeanor conviction. It is not common in normal society to have had a misdemeanor conviction. I think it is a reasonable litmus test for immigration.
Some other good litmus tests for immigration are low IQ, illness, and poverty. It’s not our responsibility to save everyone in the World, and it is not in our capacity to save everyone in the world.
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