In less than six weeks, the order that has allowed her and more than 800 other immigrants from the former American colony in West Africa to live in the United States for decades will end, the result of Trump’s decision last year to terminate a program that every other president since George H.W. Bush supported. Come March 31, Menyongar will face a choice: Return to Liberia and leave behind her 17-year-old daughter, an American citizen, or stay in the United States, losing her work authorization and becoming an undocumented immigrant.
While this whole situation is sad, I’m super disappointed in the Washington Post’s lazy reporting. Liberia was not an American colony.
I see no reason why the merico-Liberians weren’t given asylum in the first place; it wasn’t a civil war it was a genocide.
In the last several years the US has given work visas to Liberians who aren’t merico-Liberians and I have been in the same workplaces with them. The older Liberians still want to “complete the war” and seek out medico-Liberians in the US to do so. It gave me nightmares after listening to them boast about their involvement in the war/genocide.
I had been close friends with a woman who lost 200 of her family and extended family members within a few weeks. Then the people who murdered her family built their homes and residential rental buildings on top of their graves, even claimed they fled. They didn’t have a chance to flee.
I consider the last several White House administrations complicit in genocide for blocking asylum for these people who came here 20 years ago. And I hope Canada does right and allows them to immigrate and gain full residency.
The older Liberians still want to “complete the war” and seek out medico-Liberians in the US to do so. It gave me nightmares after listening to them boast about their involvement in the war/genocide.
Scary to think some people are still thinking of war after the country has achieved a reasonably stable peace.