This fall, Open Doors for Refugees, alongside the Leagues of Women Voters, the CatholicMulticultural Center, and the Literacy Network, hosted two dynamic immigrant town halls, each one a powerful reminder that immigrant voices are essential to the future of Madison and Dane County. The first town hall took place on the morning of October 10… Read More
Four men who came to our country requesting aid are among those who were renditioned to the CECOT prison in El Salvador despite the government previously having allowed them to stay in the United States due to fear they would be persecuted abroad. To learn more about the backgrounds of these men is to understand the additional risk that the Trump administration’s actions are imposing on those who flee to the United States.
On September 17th, 2024, for the first time since 2019, Open Doors for Refugees hosted a citizenship ceremony in Madison, joined by five staff from the Milwaukee Office of United States Citizenship & Immigration Services (USCIS). The colorful event gained gravitas from its location in the main courtroom of the Robert W. Kastenmeier U.S. Courthouse. Twenty-six individuals from… Read More
Kassim Rajab is a Road to Livelihood case manager at Forward Service Corporation in the Refugee Cash Assistance Department and the founder and Executive Director of the Madison Refugee Union. How long have you been in your current roles and what drew you to these positions? I am the Executive Director of the Madison Refugee Union,… Read More
In his eloquent appearance on Channel 3000 to promote the 2023 Freeze for Food, Farhan A. shared the eight-year-long road to his dream job as a microbiologist at the University of Wisconsin. Farhan and his family fled Iraq and arrived in Madison in 2014, under auspices of the United Nations International Organization for Migration (IOM) and Madison’s Lutheran Social… Read More
Murishi was born in Tanzania in 1996. His path as a refugee led him to the Congo, Burundi, and then in 2011, to Uganda. As a child, he could not afford a musical instrument, but he has a lovely singing voice and by age 14, he was already writing music. His lyrics are about life,… Read More
Attendees at Congolese weddings, parties, or dowry celebrations are likely to see men and women attired in brightly colored African fabrics. Whether original or traditional in design, chances are good that Sifa has had her hand and machine in the garments’ construction. Sifa is a refugee from the Democratic Republic of Congo; as a child… Read More
Nuristan, Wisconsin, California, Next? Uprooted from their homes, fleeing to temporary locations, surviving loss, waiting for visas, assigned to a new country, refugees endure movement and change. “Settlement” remains a future dream. Aziz and his family waited two years in Afghanistan before Aziz’s SIV visa was confirmed. By way of San Diego in 2014, they… Read More
Some Madisonians who are dedicated to helping refugees may be surprised to learn how hard refugees work to help one another and to assist refugees abroad. Albert and his wife Muhiya are two such people. Albert was born in Katanga, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), and Muhiya came from Lubumbashi, in northern DRC. Before the… Read More
When Open Doors for Refugees sent out a call recently to the refugee community for someone who’d be willing to share their experience in Madison as part of a Zoom-based Open Doors Introductory Meeting, Rasha was quick to volunteer. Unafraid to speak English, even on Zoom to a group of strangers, Rasha described how well… Read More
