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Eric Holder: Homeschool family political asylum (MERGED)


sunshine

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This is OT but I'd like to know if anyone cares to answer. There are people on the thread extremely knowledgeable about immigration. Do you have any opinion about the immigration provisions in the Violence against Women Act?

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" And my German dad would have a minor fit if he was forced to deal with even more technology."

I think I'm with your German dad on that......

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The majority of asylum claimants in the US come from China .

Maybe this is too much of a generality, but why do they seek asylum? Is it political repression and religious persecution or both or other things entirely? And also, why do they come to the United States? Why not Europe or Australia? If you have time to answer, I'd like to know.

the main reasons for the granting of status is political and religious persecution.

Also, forced abortion.

There are a number that seek asylum in Australia (no idea about Europe), but I'd imagine the US is attractive because it remains in the minds of many the Promised Land. (really).

You have to demonstrate $ to get a visa if you're Chinese though; so people have to be at least somewhat well off.

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This is OT but I'd like to know if anyone cares to answer. There are people on the thread extremely knowledgeable about immigration. Do you have any opinion about the immigration provisions in the Violence against Women Act?

-I think in theory it is a good idea, but it can sometimes be abused. I am sure it is rare, but I live in an area with a very large number of immigrants and have heard of at least 2 cases where the charges were fabricated in order to get the visa. But I work in a field where you are going to get very desperate people, I am sure it isn't common at all.

I think that the immigration reform that is currently being proposed is a much better solution.

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-I think in theory it is a good idea, but it can sometimes be abused. I am sure it is rare, but I live in an area with a very large number of immigrants and have heard of at least 2 cases where the charges were fabricated in order to get the visa. But I work in a field where you are going to get very desperate people, I am sure it isn't common at all.

I think that the immigration reform that is currently being proposed is a much better solution.

I don't know. One of my friends at ICE said that they get a surprising number of fraudulent claims under VAWA - including a few where spouses have claimed extreme abuse here in the US when it turns out that their spouses were deployed overseas at the time and had no idea they were being called abusers in ICE filings. From what I understand, the petitioning party only has to allege abuse or threats of abuse(threats to have petitioner or a family member deported count as abuse), and there doesn't have to be a police report. In addition, the petitioner can file without the knowledge or involvement of the alleged abuser so if there's another side to the story, ICE won't necessarily get it.

I think there are still plenty of valid abuse claims out there and those people need protection, but I do agree that there needs to be reform of this and other immigration laws. The current system is almost as complex and messed up as the tax code.

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The Romeikes aren't the first family who run into trouble in respect to German laws. The constitution guarantees freedom of religion, so you can believe whatever you like. But you're also entitled to an education and the state has a duty to provide you with one. The idea is that every child gets the same opportunities. As a parent, you can pick schools, but you can't deny your child a public education. So, the question is whose rights are more important in this respect. In Germany, a child's right to an education and the same opportunities everyone else gets, outweigh the parents' rights to homeschool.

Having been brought up in Germany as a pastor's kid in a pretty fundamentalist/evangelical environment (at least by German standards) I'm eternally grateful for the German "Schulpflicht" (ie the duty to visit an actual school). It's not only about getting a public / recognized education and having opportunities or something to fall back on should you decide against your parents' way of life. Which I did.

It's also about context, relating to the outside world. Getting in touch with different worldviews/ideas. Which was pretty confusing at the time, and in school I was pretty much the nice pastor's kid and an outsider, but it gave me a sense that there might be a big world outside of my little box, which is fascinating and scintillating and worth exploring and not evil at all. This exposure to a life outside of your small chicken patch is the really 'dangerous' part about getting an education in a state/public school which a lot of the fundamentalist homeschoolers want to avoid... Learning to think for myself, having teachers challenge me to think for myself, being challenged by my peers to think for myself... You cannot return to ignorance once you started on the path of critical thinking...

Getting an education in a state school enabled me to choose for myself how I want to live my life and not be predetermined by my parents' believes. If you ask me, every child should have the right to choose for him/herself. Homeschooling purely for religious reasons pretty much robs the child of this possibility.

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-I think in theory it is a good idea, but it can sometimes be abused. I am sure it is rare, but I live in an area with a very large number of immigrants and have heard of at least 2 cases where the charges were fabricated in order to get the visa. But I work in a field where you are going to get very desperate people, I am sure it isn't common at all.

I think that the immigration reform that is currently being proposed is a much better solution.

Interesting. I work in a field where I see a lot of abuses in this area. It seems like once a week I see it. But I've never heard anyone else lodge that particular complaint against the VAWA. Just wondering if anyone else has seen it. While I recognize that some of these women are desperate, some of them are just downright crafty. It creates many problems for the people they accuse.

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Interesting. I work in a field where I see a lot of abuses in this area. It seems like once a week I see it. But I've never heard anyone else lodge that particular complaint against the VAWA. Just wondering if anyone else has seen it. While I recognize that some of these women are desperate, some of them are just downright crafty. It creates many problems for the people they accuse.

Oh yes. In the example I mentioned above, some of these alleged abusers who weren't even in the USA when the alleged acts occurred found out about accusations because their security clearances suddenly got yanked. You can probably imagine what kind of problems that caused.

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I don't know; I think VAWA (from what I know of it, and that's not a huge amount) is designed to protect the most vulnerable. If you immigration depends on another person, you're prima face vulnerable. Add language issues to that; lack of knowledge etc... Awful, awful stuff. When you look at domestic abuse situations and think - how could she stay; well, add threat of deportation (stupid *%&^, I'll get you %&^ deported if you don't do X) and you could see why people might stay in an abusive relationship. Ditto undocumented aliens.

ANY immigration opportunity is played. Any and Every. ANYTIME you create a benefit for someone, anyone, people game. Underreport income to claim benefits; tax avoidance; fake marriages etc... Along with death and taxes, people gaming the system is inevitable. Of course there will be people who game VAWA provisions.

It's worth pointing out that the visa that victims get is a U class visa -

The U Class Visa was created through The Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act of 2000. The legislation was passed with the intention of enabling law enforcement professionals to investigate and then prosecute cases of human trafficking, sexual assault, domestic violence and other violent crimes occurring in the US. At the same time, it was also meant to provide protection to the victims of such crimes, so they could legally stay in the U. S. and be permitted to work for up to four years while their case is being prosecuted. These individuals can also eventually apply for permanent residency status in the U.S. after a certain amount of time has passed on their U visa.

The whole point is to prosecute offenders. That's why immigration protection is provided. This is why:

From what I understand, the petitioning party only has to allege abuse or threats of abuse(threats to have petitioner or a family member deported count as abuse), and there doesn't have to be a police report. In addition, the petitioner can file without the knowledge or involvement of the alleged abuser so if there's another side to the story, ICE won't necessarily get it.

is irrelevant - it's going to come out in the process of the investigation; where it should come out. The only reason that your friend knows there are a surprising number of false claims, is because they are investigated. Also - there are only 10,000 of these visas given out each year: no where near as many are as needed. Often enough people can be deported once the investigation is done.

I'd rather a few people got a year or two on a visa they weren't entitled to [and a non-guilty person was investigated and then exonerated] than traffickers, rapists and domestic abusers were able to prey on some of the most vulnerable people in the country.

Anyway - I don't know a huge amount about this particular visa class. I'd be curious *how* people think it should be reformed. Immigration is a huge damn mess: the whole system should go. But assuming that's not going to happen - what would be better?

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  • 1 month later...

appeal - asylum denied

http://www.calgaryherald.com/life/feder ... story.html

On Tuesday, a three-member panel of U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the Romeikes do not meet the criteria for asylum.

"The question is not whether Germany's policy violates the American Constitution, whether it violates the parameters of an international treaty or whether Germany's law is a good idea. It is whether the Romeikes have established the prerequisites of an asylum claim — a well-founded fear of persecution on account of a protected ground," the court wrote. In this case, that protected ground is religious freedom.

The court found that the German government treats all truants the same, regardless of their reasons for not attending school.

The Home School Legal Defence Association represented the Romeikes in court. Mike Donnelly, its director of international relations, said the Romeikes planned to appeal.

"The court ignored the evidence that Germany targets people for religious or philosophical reasons," Donnelly said, referring to a 2003 German Supreme Court decision that found the compulsory attendance law served a legitimate government interest of counteracting the development of parallel societies.

The 6th Circuit considered this argument but dismissed it, stating, "Any compulsory-attendance law could be said to have this effect."

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There are many countries they could have gone to. They could have come here to the UK quite easily and legally. But it seems the HSLD now are branching out internationally. I'm sure I read they encouraged them to come to the US.

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