PORTLAND, Maine — Hundreds of protesters reflecting a range of races and backgrounds took to Congress Street Thursday evening, waving signs that read “We are Maine” and shouting “immigrants are people too,” and “it’s not OK to cut GA.”
The rally aimed to show solidarity with Maine’s latest wave of immigrants and urge lawmakers to reject Gov. Paul LePage’s proposed cuts to emergency aid programs such as General Assistance and Temporary Assistance to Needy Families.
Organized by the Maine Immigrant Rights Coalition, a group of 33 advocacy and faith organizations, the rally featured speakers who hammered on the theme that proposed changes to public assistance programs — most of which originate from the LePage administration and some of which are included in the governor’s $6.5 billion two-year budget proposal — would harm vulnerable Mainers instead of position them to better help themselves escape poverty.
“There’s tons of people here today with incredible stories of fleeing a country to find safety in America, being on General Assistance for a short period of time, getting off and working 60 hours a week to give back to our state,” Ben Chin, a member of the Maine People’s Alliance and Lewiston mayoral candidate, said. “This is not a partisan issue. If [proponents of proposed cuts] actually get to know somebody that has these horror stories to share, they’d come around to our point of view. It’s time to reject the bill and LePage’s budget in general.”
The LePage-initiated bill in question is LD 369, which if passed, would make undocumented immigrants ineligible for General Assistance, a form of aid organizers say many families depend on for survival.
Cities and towns administer General Assistance, but the state provides a share of the program’s funding. Portland and Westbrook have joined the Maine Municipal Association in a lawsuit challenging the LePage administration’s efforts to cut off General Assistance funding to municipalities that allow undocumented immigrants to receive aid.
Many of the people opposed to this bill are asylum seekers who settle in Maine after fleeing oppression or violence in war-torn countries such as Somalia, the Congo and Angola. Friends Herve Malenbe and Pitshou Banguninga said their home country of the Congo is a very scary place right now.
“We didn’t come here like visitors; we came here because we had no choice,” Banguninga said. “When we came here, we had nothing. We don’t want to be put on the street.”
Banguninga and Malenbe hold jobs, but they said it’s more like volunteering. They’ve been in the U.S. for only four months and said it’s still tough to make ends meet, but, despite that, they feel welcome here.
“Socially, Lewiston and Portland are very welcoming cities,” Malenbe said.
Patricio Nrinamau from Angola is unemployed and uses General Assistance to care for his two small children, both of whom were born in Maine as U.S. citizens. He said he would work, but he has to wait for the lengthy process of acquiring federal immigration and work permit papers.
“I need to be here today,” Nrinamau said. “I want to work, but I have to wait.”
“It just makes me sick to see people who come here from other countries out of desperation and they just get abandoned and screwed over by the government,” said Caroline Tkach, who described herself as a Portland native angered by the government’s treatment of immigrants.
Protesters started marching from Lincoln Park around 5:30 p.m. and were escorted down the street by several Portland police cruisers.
After arriving in Monument Square, the crowd — and several curious onlookers — gathered around the Portland soldiers and sailors statue to listen to the opening speaker, the Rev. Allen Ewing-Merrill of HopeGateWay.
“Cutting off assistance for vulnerable neighbors, simply because of where they were born, will not make their need for food, shelter or life-saving medications evaporate,” Ewing-Merrill said. “It will simply leave hundreds and hundreds of our neighbors destitute.”
Marpheen Chann, a student at University of Maine School of Law, spoke to the crowd about his family’s experience escaping the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia and settling in Maine.
“Maine people did their best to help us — with food stamps to feed us, with housing assistance to shelter us and caring people to help watch over us,” Chann said. “I’ve been blessed that I grew up in a time when Maine believed in good government. It is my hope for tomorrow and every single day from here on out that Maine will continue to invest in people — all Maine people, regardless of where we have been.”
Strategically positioned on the side of the square so she could wave her sign that read “We are Maine. LePage’s priorities are not!” was Portlander Venita Hodgkin, who said almost her entire family would be affected by the proposed welfare policy changes.
“When I have a child, I’m going to need temporary assistance, and I need to know if Maine has my back,” Hodgkin said.
Brenden Barrington had just finished his shift at work when he walked into a packed Monument Square. Barrington, who recently became homeless, said everyone who needs General Assistance should be able to get it.
“The reason I’m still homeless is because I had a full-time job and I was going through step programming that would help me get an apartment,” Barrington said.
Other people who described themselves as homeless attended the rally but weren’t as supportive of the message. Kevin, who asked the BDN not use his last name, plunked himself down in the middle of the road while the protestors marched around him in what he described as the “most passive sign of resistance he could show without inciting violence.”
“This is the end of my second winter homeless,” Kevin said. “The majority of the people I see here are from social services organizations. At least they have jobs.”
Asking for change and passively watching the rally with disgruntled looks on their faces were Jay Higgins and Peter Wing, who said they feel cheated out of General Assistance money by “people of color.”
“We’re white and we grew up here and we have nothing,” Higgins, who added he had not slept indoors for four months, said. “We can’t even get in the door to General Assistance. They’ll be two of us and 55 of them.”
Criticism of the rally on social media drew comments, such as, “we can’t have undocumented people running around collecting government checks” and “I might have attended this rally, but I was working 40 hours a week.”
Despite the opinion of dissenters, coordinators of the Maine Immigrants Rights Coalition, including Alain Nahimana, said LePage’s policies do not reflect the true welcoming values of the overall Maine population.
“We don’t see true Mainers being reflected in Augusta,” Nahimana said. “Too many people are being pitted against each other, instead of working together to make a better Maine.”