ROCKLAND, Maine — Two women on the Rockland City Council have received death threats after they voted to support a local law to restrict municipal employees’ cooperation with federal immigration officials.
Penny York and Kaitlin Callahan detailed the threats, which have been numerous.
“I am receiving threats to city email, by phone, on social media posts and via direct message,” Councilor York said. “My friends who are on social media are also receiving threats.”
She said she has been doxed by having pretty much every personal detail of her life published on what she calls a white supremacist-friendly website. Those posts include pictures of the front of her house from recent tax records, information about her employer, her last 20 years of addresses and phone numbers, as well as personal information about her credit score, date of birth, and partial Social Security numbers, York said.
“People have said that they are going to come and take my son and ‘raise him right,’ as well as calling me the most disgusting slurs imaginable and telling me in great graphic detail the things they are going to do to me both alive and after they ‘end’ me,” York said.
She said the Maine X Community online site clipped a short portion of her statement to a teen who spoke at a Dec. 1 City Council meeting, but not the whole statement, painting her as a traitor to all peoples, including the ones that she said she was attempting to defend in the kindest, most reasonable way.
At that Dec. 1 meeting, York praised the youth for having the courage to stand up and voice an opinion that was in direct opposition to what many other people in the room believed. The councilor then quoted from the plaque at the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty, “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.”
“None of us have the right to claim this as our place and kick people out,” York said at the Dec. 1 meeting.
Councilor Kaitlin Callahan said she, too, has received threats.
The current escalation of threats began in the last few days, coincidentally coinciding with the circulation of a Maine Wire article featuring an interview with Councilor Nicole Kalloch, Callahan said. The City Council on Dec. 8 approved a local ordinance that bars municipal employees from assisting federal immigration agents unless there is a judicial order. The vote was 4-1 with Kalloch casting the opposing vote.
Callahan said her personal Facebook page is locked down, her public “Callahan for City Council” page was open and received numerous messages. She said the few she has read have called her the “c” word, the “n” word and warned her to watch her back.
She said a week or so back there was a comment under an online article that said something to the effect of, “I hope Tim Carroll smash her head in off the side of his cruiser first.”
“Within the Facebook group ‘Maine Community X,’ comments have encouraged the doxing and harassment of both Penny and me, including sharing our personal information. I have been getting an excessive number of calls from blocked numbers. I’m not answering and they aren’t leaving voicemails,” she said.
“The underlying problem is the intentional spreading of misinformation, which is feeding this extremist hatred and making the city of Rockland less safe as a whole,” Councilor Callahan said.
She said the Rockland Police Department can still perform its job, and remains fully able to work with federal partners on serious, violent crimes, including sex, human, drug, gun trafficking, etc.
The Police Department can still respond to public safety risks even if a situation occurred at the scene of a federal immigration enforcement, Callahan said.
“By giving interviews to alt right publications known for extremist rhetoric and misinformation, she (Kalloch) risks the safety of residents by deliberately inflaming the situation with inaccurate, fear-based statements. She knows the ordinance is legally sound, she knows it doesn’t hinder local law enforcement from doing their job, so feeding into this extremist narrative only makes the city of Rockland less safe for everyone, including her fellow councilors, but more importantly our children,” Callahan said.
Kalloch strongly disagreed with Callahan.
“I want to be very clear: I am not responsible for any threatening communications received by anyone. I do not condone threats or harassment in any form. Publicly suggesting that I am responsible because I participated in a media interview is both inappropriate and reckless. This is not the first time Kaitlin and Penny have made accusations of this nature without substantiation and repeating them only fuels misinformation. If there are legitimate threats, they should be handled by law enforcement, not speculated about in public or used to assign blame for political purposes. Continuing to make unsupported claims and encouraging press coverage around them only draws unnecessary and negative attention to Rockland and to those advancing the accusations. I will continue to speak openly and lawfully on issues affecting our community, and I expect the same standard of responsibility and evidence from others,” Kalloch said.
This story appears through a media partnership with Midcoast Villager.