Erdoğan has been under intense scrutiny from world leaders for his highly authoritarian and reactionary response to a failed July 2016 military coup. Erdoğan’s strong-armed measures have resulted in over 130,000 public sector firings and arrests, the imprisonment of the political opposition and the suppression of the press. While voices from around the European Union were calling for careful consideration of what could be the sunset of the Turkish democracy established under Kemal Attaturk nearly 100 years earlier, the Executive branch was on the phone with President Edroğan, congratulating him on his victory.

The referendum is a sweeping restructure of about 20 items in the Turkish constitution. Many of them, upon first reading seem innocuous;

• Military courts are broadly abolished
• Military seats on the high court are abolished, leaving the same number of seats appointed by the parliament, while two seats are filled by executive appointment (four fifths of the court still executive appointed)
• Compulsory military service is abolished
• Political candidates may now be younger, and
• The president may now appoint vice presidents

This last item might leave one with questions. Why has the president not had that power in the past? Why does he need it now? Why would one need multiple vice presidents? The answer, in all cases, is rooted in the new, massive consolidation of executive power in the president. For example, further amendments will

• Terminate the parliamentary system, eliminating the seat of prime minister, moving his function as head of government to the president.
  • Here we should note that as it stood until Sunday, the president was a non-partisan head of state. Party affiliation was not allowed, and the president was effectively, on election, an a-political actor.
• The president will now retain party affiliation.
• The president may dissolve the entire parliament on command and call for new elections
• The president, following special parliamentary procedure, may serve a third term
• Vetoes by the president, instead of requiring only a simple quorum majority, will require a simple absolute majority
• The parliament is now restricted to written auditing of ministers and vice presidents, instead of both written and verbal inquiry, and the president may not be questioned by any parliamentary auditors.
• The president may abolish and establish ministries, and appoint ministers and other senior officials, without review from the judiciary or legislative branches.

Officials in Erdoğan’s government hoped, and indeed expected, to garner at least 60 percent of the vote. Instead, it slipped by at a slim range of 51.3 to 48.7 majority. In addition to a strong public division which has, following this election, been quantified, there have also been serious accusations of various forms of voting manipulation on the part of the sitting government. There have been thousands of reports of fraud to the nation’s election commission, and there are many who argue that the approval of the referendum would not have come had the president not been using his intense authoritarian behavior to influence not only general political dissidents, but voters at large.

It is worth noting that, because of rebel activity in areas of the country populated largely by Kurdish people, large numbers of displaced Kurds, who were broadly expected to vote down the referendum, were unable to vote, because they no longer have official addresses.

This is the victory which our president has lauded. He is, as of yet, the first and only western leader to do so.

In fairness, our nation has legitimate military interest in maintaining Turkey as an ally against ISIS, but we cannot lose sight of the irrationality of fighting repressive regimes in one region by supporting and praising them in another. If the bulk of Western Europe can call a spade a spade, so can the president of the United States. True, many of us would have difficulty fathoming the speech craft necessary to smoothly avoid mentioning this kind of political event when in conversation with its beneficiary. It is, however, commonplace for the common man to be unable to fathom basic capacities which are, nonetheless, absolutely crucial to being the most powerful human on the planet.

We may be wont to overzealously decry the imminence of the next western dictatorships in Germany, France or the US – the United States are in a difficult pass, but this is not pre-war Europe.  And yet, it is still vital that we as citizens – as democrats in the ancient sense – remember that the best place to slit the throat of a democracy is in the ballot booth. And so we are not wrong in questioning why our president is the first leader in the western world to praise this kind of power grab.

We will, for at least the next several years, continue to watch Donald Trump, to scruple and debate, to scrutinize his actions as president. We will continue, then, to hear him insist that his interest is the nation’s interest, the interest of the security and prosperity of the people. Less likely, however, is it that we will hear him ground his actions in the defense of a diverse, just and balanced democracy.

This is a time to be on edge. This is a time to keep eyes open. This is a time to steel oneself, and not allow one’s leaders to charm with their speech, the way they are all too willing to charm the likes of Recep Tyyip Erdoğan.

The name of the game is vigilance.

Photo courtesy of CNN.

The Ban

The first ban was released on Jan. 27, in the form of an executive order. The ban was needed, according to its text,

In order to protect Americans, the United States must ensure that those admitted to this country do not bear hostile attitudes toward it and its founding principles. 

Stating further

The United States cannot, and should not, admit those who do not support the Constitution, or those who would place violent ideologies over American law.

The countries targeted by the order were Iraq, Iran, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Lebanon. In those countries, the ability to travel to the US was revoked from those traveling for business, leisure, as students or the family of a student, temporary workers, fiancés of US citizens, new immigrants and refugees. Immediately following the announcement and signing of the ban, protests broke out in major airports across the country, condemning the order as un-American in its spirit, inhumane in its condemnation of asylum seekers and destructive as pertains to American foreign relations. The president responded with an insistence that he acted in the interest of national security, as has been his repeatedly expressed intent form the inception of his political persona during the campaign.

These initial declamations, however, were followed by much more focused scrutiny. One major point of concern for some was what seemed to be a religious lilt to the function of the order. Reminders began to resurface of comments the president made on the campaign trail about the need for a “total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States, until our Country’s representatives can figure out what the hell is going on.”

The idea that a religious sect with a long history of practice should be singled out as a target of executive control, at least to the circuit court in Washington, which halted the implementation of the ban in that state, was highly unsettling. In appealing to this allegation, the administration pointed out that only seven of over forty Muslim-majority nations around the world are targeted in the ban, then reiterated that the ban was made in the interest of national security. The problem continued, though, regarding the declared intent to exempt Christians persecuted in those countries. The president stated that Christian victims had been ignored in favor of Muslim asylum seekers and were being more severely persecuted. The numbers out of Syria, for instance, show that approximately 98 percent of refugees being taken on from that country are Muslim while Christians number in the area of 1%. Notably, these numbers are approximately reflective of the general population

These allegations aside, the administration was also questioned for the specific selection of countries targeted in the ban. Of the seven, not a single country has produced a perpetrator of lethal terrorism in the United States for over a decade. On the other hand, several nations in the region, frequently linked with radical Islamic terrorism do not appear on the ban.

Saudi Arabia is one of several nations that have been identified. The country was home to 15 of the 19 terrorist who carried out the 9-11 attacks. During her most recent presidential campaign, Hillary Clinton alleged that Saudi nationals, or the national government, were providing direct financial support to IS. Clinton’s and other such claims have been refuted by Saudi officials. It is, in any case, well know that Wahhabism, a highly conservative Islamic theology which condemns all religious sects – Muslim or otherwise – outside of its system as heretical, rose to prominence in Saudi Arabia. The founder of the sect is considered in large part responsible for the rise of the Saud family and the creation of the monarchy which has ruled the vast majority of the Arabian Peninsula for nearly 200 years, by combining his Salafism with an apolitical attitude favorable to absolutist rule. From this Wahhabist tradition has stemmed a brand of jihadi Salafism with close ties to current groups like ISIS and Al Qaeda. This observation is often rebuffed with reminders of the strong official ties of the Saudi government to our own.

But Saudi Arabia is not on the list of noted omissions. Egypt has also been raised as a potential security threat. In the past seven years, Egypt has seen three entirely different governmental structures in power. It was in 2011 that Hosni Mubarak was ousted in one of the defining popular coups of the “Arab Sprint”. Then, after only a year, his democratically elected successor, Mohammed Morsi was ousted in a secularist-militarist coup led by current leader and commander Abd al-Fattah as-Sisi, who is facing heavy dissent from the Egyptian people for strong authoritarianism, which he claims is necessary to hold strong radical actors at bay throughout the country. In addition, two of the remaining four of the 911 perpetrators, large portions of rank and file ISIS fighters and a number of Al-Qaeda leaders have come from Egypt.

Beyond that, Lebanon and the United Arab Emirates – the countries home to the two remaining 911 hijackers- have been left out of the ban; the latter of the two also falling under another category critique surrounding the ban. The UAE represent one of several middle eastern nations not touched by the ban, among them the UAE, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Indonesia, in which the Trump family has major financial investments.

Responses again center around insistence that the ban was made in the interest of national security and that the countries just mentioned are, for the most part, major US allies.

In the midst of the debate, arose the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, halting the ban after an appeal to the Washington decision. The decision centered around proclamations that

[We] hold that the Government has not shown a likelihood of success on the merits of its appeal, nor has it shown that failure to enter a stay would cause irreparable injury, and we therefore deny its emergency motion for a stay.

And that

The Government has pointed to no evidence that any alien from any of the countries named in the Order has perpetrated a terrorist attack in the United States.

It is in response to this judicial condemnation that the president has announced the creation of a new order, which is to be released in the near future.

The People

Amidst this ongoing debate, it may serve Americans to direct some attention to the refugees in their own community, as well as the process required to be accepted into the country under refugee status.

The process consists of thirteen steps, as outlined by the US Committee for Refugees and Immigrants.

1. An individual is qualified by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) as a refugee (A refugee is someone who has fled from his or her home country and cannot return because he or she has a well-founded fear of persecution based on religion, race, nationality, political opinion or membership in a particular social group.)
2. The individual is referred to the US the UNHCR, a qualified NGO, or a US Embassy
3. Background information for a security check is then compiled by a resettlement support center.
4. Multi-layer, inter-agency security checks are conducted.
5. Some applicants will then be checked again through a more thorough vetting process.
6. Of age applicants are registered and fingerprinted
7. The individual will be interviewed by Department of Homeland Security officials, who travel to the country of asylum.
8. The individual will be conditionally approved, subject to the results of the security checks
9. Medical examinations are administered
10. A Sponsor Agency is found
11. Cultural orientation is undergone
12. By this time, it is usually necessary to do another security check to ensure that, during the extensive process, the individual has remained qualified under the security clearances
13. The individual is admitted into the united states

To better understand this process, and conditions of refugees in the Kansas City Area, “The Monitor” sat down with Mr. Steve Weitkamp, Director of Refugee Resettlement Services at Jewish Vocational Services – one of several humanitarian organizations working with refugees in KC.

To lead off we discussed the development of refugee relations in the US. Weitkamp made a point of noting that many Americans are, as far as he can tell, are under the impression that for better or for worse, “US immigration policy is chiseled onto the base of the Statue of Liberty”, which, he says, it is certainly not. For most of US history, official attitudes towards immigrants were either ambivalent or “arguably shameful” Weitkamp referred then to the Chinese, who were involved in railroad work during the mid 19th century, and were largely denied citizenship, or reentry following departure from US Soil.

The real shift seemed to come around a century later, in response to the M.S. Saint Louis debacle. The St. Louis was a German passenger vessel which sailed from Hamburg in 1939 holding around 1000 passengers, almost entirely German Jews. The west largely ignored their plight, and after making the voyage to Cuba and being denied entrance into the harbor in Havana, they were rejected at US ports. Ultimately, the ship was forced to return to Europe, where several continental nations, along with Great Britain, admitted the passengers. As a result, it is estimated that around a third of the passengers, among those who disembarked on the continent, were later captured and killed in Nazi death camps.

Following the war, the tone which the US took toward refugees responded largely to the horror of the holocaust and the pre-war hesitance which the world had shown the Jews, largely characterized in the Saint Louis affair.

Even then, however, the system was usually ad hoc. When conflicts arose and refugees were the byproduct, the government would appropriate the necessary structures and resources and take on whatever it saw fit to undertake, where after the system would dissolve. Then, following the Vietnam War, the tone changed. The government realized that it might bear some moral obligation to the protection of citizens endangered by its military engagements – or possibly that it stood to gain from a display of virtue in the fight against soviet communism. This went on through the Cold War – now from southeast Asia, now from the Eastern Bloc, now from the middle east.

To facilitate this ongoing engagement, the Voluntary Agency (VolAg) system was conceived as a public-private partnership that would be installed as an ongoing arm of US international relations. Effectively, the system is a private humanitarian network overseen by the State Department to organize refugee management services. It is “private at both ends”, with some agencies dealing with the identification and appeals process, who then report work with federal officials on the first 12 of the thirteen steps, then, after officials have vetted and approved a case, the refugees are turned over to one of nine or ten (depending on the year) humanitarian organizations stateside. These include organizations like Church World Services, Hebrew International Aid Society, US Conference of Catholic Bishops, among other (secular) agencies.  These VolAgs then assign cases to one of the subsidiary organizations in their network according to their location.

This brings us finally to Kansas City. In the area we have three major subsidiaries : Jewish Vocational Services, Catholic Charities and Della Lamb Community Services. Each works with resettling refugees.

Weitkamp also helped to clarify the political and cultural climate, as well as the economic dynamic experienced by refugees when entering the country. As far as initial integration, there are certainly not the same barriers here that refugees might face elsewhere in the world – especially in Europe, where racial diversity on most of the continent is relatively low. It is highly different here from a place like Germany, where one can very often identify a refugee by his physical appearance. In the US most people couldn’t separate a native from a foreign national unless they spoke, at which point it is still unclear until it is made explicit whether they are a traveler, immigrant, temporary worker or refugee.

The greatest cultural challenge in the long term, says Weitkamp, is, interestingly enough, seldom food, clothing, religion, politics, gender, race – but capitalism. There is an acute need for refugees to make quick and lasting adjustments to American capitalist culture in order to survive. That goes for everyone. For some it is strange to experience so much economic freedom, for others so much existential fragility.”

The culture of this country is largely capitalistic… one component of our particular society is basically official – most times –  official indifference…  we will let people succeed to the point, you know, where they own a company that shoots things into space, but we will also let them fail to the point where they are on the corner with a cardboard sign.”

Accordingly, there are some basic rules to follow, which were apparently largely picked up on by, for instance, the Vietnamese community who came after the war. It is extremely important to have a support group, usually a family. That family then has to be employed as soon as possible with their incomes, not individually counted, but as a household. The target should be a house in an area with good schools, and then you work for your children, who are the focal point of the refugee integration. It can be shocking to those coming to the US as professionals – lawyers, doctors, engineers of all kinds – because their certifications are effectively meaningless; and unless they are fluent in English, they are candidates for, at best, entry level jobs. So the focus must be on the children.

Throughout this process, services like JVS are there to help. These services, largely the same in terms of receiving refugees, are organized to connect immigrants with employers, to find housing that will be feasible in the long term, to help in managing finances, including support payments that will come for a few months following arrival. The objective for these organizations is to prepare these refugees for a sustainable and stable life in America.

It was discussed whether or not, in doing this, there is much exchange with local government. As far as relations with the government go within the city, local government is apparently rhetorically supportive, but actively ambivalent, which Weitkamp says is ideal. On the national level, however, things have indeed become tricky. JVS, Catholic Charities, Della Lamb – their work, and their impact – tend to remain, to their pleasure, “under the horizon”. Their intentions are humanitarian, and generally apolitical. They rarely – if ever – enter the arena. However, they are not immune to their environment. In reference to threats from the current body politic, Weitkamp identified an obscure consequence that could have a lasting impact on the refugee situation in the United States. What will kill these agencies is not bad press, but numbers. When working with refugees, many of the aforementioned demoted professionals are picked up and given work within the organization. Over time, this raises them to their previous employability status. It can sometimes increase it. Once the learning of English is facilitated, and stateside work experience is collected in a business that demands adaptability and a range of skills, like that of humanitarian non-profit work, these multilingual refugees are excellent job candidates. Many of the Americans working with the agencies pick up the same skills.

Now it is not uncommon that slow periods come, and bring with them furlough and temporary leave. These periods are manageable – but when the president moves the ceiling of refugee admissions from 100,000 yearly to 50,000 yearly, JVS, CC, Della Lamb – they will have nothing. No cases to work, and none of the commensurate funding from DHS. Those highly desirable humanitarians who have made their operations possible will not be able to stand a furlough for as long as would be necessary. They will not be able to wait until this drought passes. They will go elsewhere, and their current employers face disappearance. If this is a national phenomenon, which is not unimaginable, then the refugee lobby in D.C., which Weitkamp said has done a great deal to keep the system running smoothly for the past four decades, will weaken. This thriving humanitarian effort, which has worked for since we left Vietnam, will spiral out of effectuality, and into memory.

The nation’s eyes will be on Washington D.C. in coming days. They will be looking for pattern and reason in the president’s management of their security. They will be looking for dissent, for loopholes and oversteps and the eyes of those who work in the system which manages this process, will be looking for the augers of their fate.

If there are readers who would like to know more about their local organizations, or national numbers and processes, the following links are provided.

• Jewish Vocational Services
• Catholic Charities of Northeast Kansas
• Della Lamb Community Service
• New Roots for refugees
• International Organization for Migration
• Missouri Department of Social Cervices

Photo courtesy of ABC Denver7 News.

In October, a new policy from the Department of Education declared that submission channels for the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) would open in the fall, as opposed to the beginning of the new year. The move was made in an attempt to align the application process with the schedule of most colleges and universities throughout the country, as well as allow families to apply using a verified income level, the previous year’s tax returns. This is a change from the previous policy, which required a forward-looking estimate of eventual income, which then needed to be amended after the filing of returns for the next year. While this new deadline simplifies the process, it comes much sooner. For those students unaware of the change, or those who have not filed their application, it is urgent that they submit their applications as soon as possible. Funds in many circumstances are limited, and awarded on a first come, first serve basis. A student could very well face a reduction or loss of expected financial aid due to failure to file in a timely manner here.

In mid-January, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) filed a suit against Navient, the largest loan servicer in the nation, claiming that the company had profited to the tune of four billion dollars as a result of various forms of fraud and willful negligence. The suit alleges breaches of proper conduct, such as willful misallocation of payments across diverse outstanding loans. There are also allegations that the company misreported forgiven or deferred loans as defaulted, causing the credit scores of debt holders to plummet; moreover, Navient’s bureaucratic misdirection is supposed to have lead purposely to over-payment.

In light of this fraud, students should monitor their debt. Understanding the terms under which student debt was accepted is critical to prevent malpractice by loan providers. For ongoing management, those in debt can familiarize themselves with the National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS) and the payment estimator.

For students who will soon be graduating, there are opportunities to submit income information as a criterion for loan standing. This means that the size and total amount of students’ loan payments can, under certain circumstances, be based upon income.

The new administration and the new legislature’s intentions remain somewhat shrouded. President Trump has discussed capping student loan payments at 12.5 percent of income and forgiving remaining debt after 15 years of good stewardship of student debt, a possible boon to students. Trump has also discussed a major reduction of interest rates.

The possible privatization of the student loan market appears to be less advantageous to students, but this depends largely on the structure of the replacement system. It should be noted that on the campaign trail, Trump fielded the idea that the Dept. of Education could be “largely eliminated.” What this means for the nearly 30 billion dollars in grant money budgeted to the department for students is unknown.

Students should also be aware of the penalties incurred because of the use of drugs when receiving student loans and aid. Generally, arrest for possession of modest amounts of lower class drugs while enrolled in courses will result in strikes, which, if accumulated, will disbar students from student loans and aid. Sale and trafficking charges usually result in immediate revocations of eligibility. There are ways in which the privilege might be redeemed, but the process will significantly set back educational plans.

There are a number of shifts taking place or about to take place in student loan life which is already notoriously tricky to navigate. With filing dates shifting, the commensurate changes to required information, the very real possibility of predatory loan practices from national level lending groups, and the diverse palette of policy prescriptions coming down from the federal level, students of Jewell, as well as students across the country, can hardly afford to let anything slide by them.