Wednesday, May 15, 2013

U.S. Court Rejects Homeschooling Family's Plea for Asylum (What's Next?)

Fox News reporter Todd Starnes relates the bad news:

The U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the Obama Administration’s decision to deny asylum to a German homeschooling family.

The Romeike family fled their German homeland in 2008 seeking political asylum in the United States – where they hoped to home school their children. Instead, the Obama administration wants the evangelical Christian family deported.

An Immigration judge granted them asylum in 2010 after the family revealed they were facing criminal prosecution for homeschooling their children. That decision was later overturned by the Board of Immigration Appeals in 2012.

The court ruled today that the Romeikes had not made a sufficient case and that the United States has not opened its doors to every victim of unfair treatment...

Michael Farris, founder of the Home School Legal Defense Association, vowed to appeal the decision.

“Germany continues to persecute homeschoolers,” said Mike Donnelly, the HSLDA’s director of international affairs. “The court ignored mountains of evidence that homeschoolers are harshly fined and that custody of their children is gravely threatened—something most people would call persecution. This is what the Romeikes will suffer if they are sent back to Germany.” 


The Justice Dept. is arguing that German law banning home schooling does not violate the family’s human rights.

“They are trying to send a family back to Germany where they would certainly lose custody of their children,” Farris told Fox News. “Our government is siding with Germany.”

Farris said the Germans ban home schools because “they don’t want to have religious and philosophical minorities in their country.”

“That means they don’t want to have significant numbers of people who think differently than what the government thinks,” he said. “It’s an incredibly dangerous assertion that people can’t think in a way that the government doesn’t approve of.”…

Farris said he finds great irony that the Obama administration is releasing thousands of illegal aliens – yet wants to send a family seeking political asylum back to Germany.

“Eleven million people are going to be allowed to stay freely – but this one family is going to be shipped back to Germany to be persecuted,” he said. “It just doesn’t make any sense.”…

Farris said he finds great irony that the Obama administration is releasing thousands of illegal aliens – yet wants to send a family seeking political asylum back to Germany.

“Eleven million people are going to be allowed to stay freely – but this one family is going to be shipped back to Germany to be persecuted,” he said. “It just doesn’t make any sense.”


What can we do now?

1) Of course, pray for the appeal to be successful. And pray for a restoration of sanity in our nation's immigration policy, one that rewards immigrants who love America for its values as well as its opportunities, a policy that welcomes immigrants who are able and willing to add to the nation's economic strength rather than take from it.

And 2) you might even consider sending along a contribution to the HSLDA to help them in their effort to secure protection for the Romeike family.