Mayor Kelly To Trump: Send Refugees To Great Falls

Thanks to one of our discerning readers, who sent us this yesterday: about six months ago, and without authorization from the City Commission, Great Falls Mayor Bob Kelly signed a letter addressed to Donald Trump, asking the President to send refugees to the City of Great Falls.

According to the website Welcome Refugees 2020, Kelly has teamed up with local officials from 46 states urging Trump to send up to 95,000 refugees to the communities of its signatories:

“As leaders in our community elected at all levels of state and local government, we write today to express our strong support for resettling refugees in our states and communities and to urge your Administration to resettle at least 95,000 refugees in Fiscal Year 2020.” 

And according to the letter that Kelly signed on our behalf, we, the voting public, want these refugees to move here:

“The American people – our constituents – express their support for resettling refugees in our communities every single day.” 

Is that so? Do you want Great Falls to absorb a bunch of refugees?

I would also like to know where Kelly thinks these folks would live. We are warned ad nauseam by municipal figureheads like Kelly about the dearth of affordable housing in Great Falls. Now the mayor wants to import refugees here? OK, where to?

Regardless of one’s position on immigration, it would be one thing for Bob Kelly to encourage this sort of liberal advocacy as a private citizen. It is quite another, however, for Kelly to invoke his title as the Mayor of Great Falls, and to put words into his constituents’ mouths without first checking to see if they are actually true.

Instead of pushing his progressivism on our behalf and without our knowledge or consent, Kelly should have put a resolution onto the City Commission agenda and held a public hearing on the matter.

Maybe next time?

READ MORE: Will Great Falls Voters Re-elect Gavin Newsom?

Philip M. Faccenda
Philip M. Faccendahttp://www.straymoose.com
Philip M. Faccenda is an AIA award-winning architect and planner. He is the Editor-in-Chief of E-City Beat.

39 COMMENTS

  1. Are you kidding me!???
    He must be the dumbest mayor in the USA!!!!

    He needs to so some research to find that its a horrible idea! Think meth, heroin, trafficking is bad now? Just wait till this imbecile ruins our city more than it already has been!!!

    God what an idiot! 1 term for him folks, with damaging comment/thinking like this!!!

  2. Are you kidding the crime is bad enough and Greatfalls we don’t need refugees to deal with now also! Why don’t you let us people that live here speak for ourselves and quit putting words in our mouths

  3. This is ridiculous. We don’t even have places for our own community to sleep at night. The drug problem is in a steady rise, the crime rate has already gone up. Not saying refugees will increase those numbers, what I’m saying is, if you over populate a town that is sliding into a crisis of sorts, you’re damning those refugees to the insufferable conditions this city has to offer. Rethink. Please.

  4. Absolutely not! Mayor Kelly shows how once again elected officials forget they work for us. A decision like this should be presented to the voters. Vote Kelly Out!

    • These articles on here seem fake, there just to ridiculous. O and fuck that slaughter house, that will be the worst decision they’ve ever made. Evaporating blood pools that are just holes in the ground to literally evaporate excess animal blood. The smell not to mention, and the amount of rancid smelling pig hauling semis. You ever drove behind one that was full? You’ll pull off tenth to get away from it.plus where are we gonna house 90,000 people? Who are broke not to mention, who pays? We do 90,000 welfare recipients. Same with the slaughter house, it will not be locals staffing it. It’ll be God knows who with there families who also need housing and govt. Asst. Where’s the new school that has to be built to accommodate come from? Plus it’s Canadian owned, so all revenue we see none, and pay for they’re employees to live here. The whole thing really stinks and seems really shady and corrupt from Officials evem considering.

    • REALLY??? WE do not want theslaughter house either. That is being sneakilly pushed on us by the County Commissioners and it seems the City Commissioners are not standing up for our community…what a surprise…..All they see is tax dollars coming in and don’t see the overwhelming cost of the damage thatr will be done by the slaughter house and now refugees. What next???…Perhaps Mayor Kelly will write a letter to Putin and tell him to send his communist citizens from overpopulated areas of Russia. Kelly needs to go.

  5. Mayor Kelly , how bout u go live with the refugees …. we have enough crime here bringing them in will only make the crime worse ….. it’s not your place to invite them without the complete support of the community!!! Retract the invitation sir !!! They are not welcome here and neither are you if u want them here!!

    • Everyone deserves the ‘opportunity’ to have what we have by working for it as most of us have done. BTW what is your home address, Kevin Langkiet? how many refugees can you house and support at your home? How many can Kelly house and support. When you open your mouth you should be willing and able to open your doors.

  6. Well now is this fact or fiction ? Maybe find out first ! If fact the mayor certainly knows better than to sign such before having , at least, conversation with the commission. If the mayor did have conversation with the commission why hasn’t the community been made aware of such ? Also the general public, including the county and city should have made aware of his intentions! Mayor Kelly certainly is not the dumbest mayor in the country, he is very intelligent,well spoken and has a different skill set approach. How good a mayor is he? Only time will tell.On a final note, I would never signed such a letter that could possibly have such impact upon our community.

  7. Recall Kelly! He has no such authority! And, I certainly do not approve of this! Just look at all the troubles in Europe with refugees and Kelly wants to bring this down on our heads? Is he nuts? Fageddaboutit!

  8. Mayor Kelly you have overstepped your authority as mayor by not consulting the city commission and getting their approval before signing for the “refugee letter” and that should concern all residents of Great Falls and Cascade County. Next thing you know you’ll want to build a Mosque with taxpayer dollars in the middle of GTF to entice middle eastern refugees to move here. No way Bob, hit the road…….and if you don’t a recall petition needs to be drafted to remove you from the city commission….

  9. I keep asking my self how we keep re electing these people to the city commission. What do we need to do to get local term limits on the city , county and school district officals.

  10. Did he send another letter to Washington taking Montana OFF the list of states offering to take refugees??? I seriously doubt it, but makes no difference, his signature is still on the letter!!! No matter how many apologies he makes to us his signature remains!!

  11. All of you are against him doing is my hope is one day you have to leave your country for your safety and persecution. Put yourselves in their place and see what you would feel like. Native American were kicked of their land and put on reservations. Our children were jerked from our arms. which generations of trauma. And all of you sit back and put yourselves above these people. Just remember if your not Native American your family also came here as immigrants. Shame one every single one of you.

  12. Nooooooo! Absolutely not. This city cannot take care of the problems it has now. In know way is this city nor the county or state it is situated in able, in any way, to support this.
    Mr Kelly, you need to immediately with draw this request and humbly resign. You are in no way a responsible Mayor.
    I am not against refugees. If they are legitimate refugees and they are employable and willing to work and pay their own way I have no problems what so ever so do NOT get your dander up. Missoula has done this very thing and now they are having major problems that they themselves can’t even hide anymore.

  13. We already have way too many refugees in Montana. We didn’t want any to begin with. The people puting them here are making big bucks doing it. It’s all about lining their own pockets. We, the tax payers, then have to support these welfare recipients forever

  14. And yet not a word about the county commissioners. Build it and they will come. The gang of three doesn’t need to send a letter anywhere. At the behest of Freisen, they have already started the largest immigrant resettlement program this state has ever seen. Who the heck do you think is going to work in the slaughter plant? Build this monstrosity and Great Falls as we know it is done. No more Taco Bell. Now, go to Somali Tamale!

  15. It sounds as though he may have received something under the table to do such a thing Just what you need up there is 1 district becoming Muslim so they can vote another one into a political arena !

  16. You know we had a crime problem before it’s about to get nasty in great falls,I didnt grow up here i grew up in a bigger city down south and ill tell u this refegees only bring one thing with them abd thats TROUBLE!! I mean I’m not malicious person and could never harm anyone but it seems that riots and violence is what they want so they may not listen until they get it!!

  17. YA N MAYOR KELLY IS A LIER N LIED TO MY MOM N THEN THE CITY TORE R HOUSE DOWN WHITCH SME ONE SET IT ON FIRE THEN THE WORKER STOLED ALOT OF THINGS FRM US N THE CITY ALLOWED THIS TO HAPPEN TO N EVEN WENT TO JAIL JUST FOR ASKING A QUESTION N WE WAS WORKING ON R HOUSE TO THEY THINK THAT THEY R ABOVE THE LAW N OWN EVERYTHING N EVERY BODY N THEY CAN DO WHAT THEY WANT TO DO WE OWNED R HOUSE N LIVED IN THAT HOUSE FOR 35 YRS THEY STOLED EVERYTHING OUT OF MY SHEDD THAT WAS LOCKED SO MANY TOOLS THAT WAS HANDED DOWN TO ME FRM MY GRANDPA TO MY DAD THAT HVE PAST AWAY THEY R CORRUPT N THEIFS N THINK IT OK TO DO WHITCH IT ISNT AT ALL THEY STOLED A MAN TOOLS TO GO N MAKE A MANS HONIST LIVEING WITH TO PUTT FOOD ON THE TABLE N TAKE CARE OF HIS FAMILY WITH INSTEAD OF HELPING THEY TOOK N STOLED FRM US THEY R VERY CORRUPTED N THINK THEY R BETTER THEN EVERYONE N THAT THEY R ABOVE THE. LAW

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