Brunswick officials are emphasizing their limited role in a new housing development for asylum seekers while also insisting that they welcome its residents, following a backlash against the project that’s featured misinformation and racist attacks.
The 60-unit complex, which is funded by MaineHousing and privately run Developers Collaborative, has been the target of conservative attacks since Donald Trump Jr. made misleading comments about it while campaigning for his father. At the local level, the attacks have come in various forms, including phone calls and emails.
During a heated meeting of the Town Council on Feb. 20, five people made comments over a Zoom video feed that included racist slurs and antisemitic remarks, some of them directed at the project. Another five speakers appearing in person criticized the project, saying they didn’t want their tax dollars paying for it and in a few cases falsely implying that the asylum seekers are here illegally.
“You have all these houses being built. That’s discrimination, in my eyes,” George Bernier, a Brunswick resident, said at the meeting. “Am I too white? Is that what it is? Do I work too much? What’s the discrimination factor?”
Now, Brunswick officials are trying to walk a fine line of minimizing their role in the project while also welcoming the people it’s brought to town.
While councilors did not respond during the Feb. 20 meeting, the town released a memo beforehand that highlighted the legal status of the project’s residents and the fact that they will pay 30 percent of their rent once they begin working, with MaineHousing covering the rest.
The memo also emphasized that Brunswick taxpayers are not paying for the housing and that the town did not know about the arrangement until the asylum seekers were moving in.
In an interview, Town Council Chair Abby King said that the project was originally not designated for asylum seekers when it was approved by the Planning Board. That designation came only after the original developer sold the project to Developers Collaborative and MaineHousing.
The town has indirectly supported the project by hiring several people — an employee in its general assistance office, teachers and staff in its schools — who speak the same languages as the asylum seekers do, King said. But with Brunswick being a growing town, she noted that the town was already likely to hire those staffers.
Brunswick also hosts a Welcome Center for immigrants in its local recreation center, but that center predates the housing project and was opened to assist another round of new Mainers that arrived in 2019, with funding from MaineHousing and staffing by the Immigrant Resource Center of Maine.
While some residents have attacked the new housing complex, King — who said she has received several threatening emails and phone calls herself — thinks that most residents support it. In one case, citizens raised about $70,000 to help furnish its apartments.
“I certainly believe that in Brunswick, the anti-new Mainer group is small,” King said. “This community is welcoming of these immigrants.”
King noted most of the asylum seekers living in the new development have already been in the U.S. for a year now and are employed.
After the racist and antisemitic comments that came over Zoom, Brunswick is also considering changing how meetings are held to avoid similarly hateful disruptions.
The council had to cancel the rest of the Zoom section of public comment in that case, and it could enshrine that policy for the foreseeable future, King said. However, King said she’s against completely removing public comment over Zoom, as videoconferencing provides an accessible way for people to participate in meetings.
Several towns in Maine have restricted video participation in meetings following an increase in disruptive tirades known as “Zoom bombings.” Hallowell has a waiting room that allows councilors to vet participants before they speak, and Rockland councilors can mute speakers.
“It’s a balance of wanting to be accessible to people and wanting to make sure that everyone, the majority, who are wanting to participate appropriately, are able to do so,” King said.