“Lower skilled Alaskans work in tourism and fishing,” read one line from Judy Eledge’s recent immigration commentary.
What an utterly tone-deaf and insulting statement. The author demonstrated an antiquated view dating back more than 150 years concerning immigration — Irish, Chinese, German, Swedish, Dutch, Somali, to name a few — and insulted very highly skilled/educated Alaskans that hold degrees in hospitality and fisheries management; some I’d wager she taught during her tenure as an educator.
Our family ran a fishing operation in Bristol Bay for 37 years. We had college students, teachers, lawyers, commercial airline pilots and other highly intelligent, educated and skilled crew during that 37-year span.
We are two retired air traffic controllers, a retired Anchorage Police Department dispatcher, retired Alaska Railroad worker and retired Anchorage School District employees. Two of us drive tourist buses in the summer, own and operate two small businesses and do volunteer work with the Clothesline Project.
The author’s opinion seems to be using national Republican Party rhetoric, tossing out insinuations that the 60,000 foreign-born Alaska residents are all illegally in the state. As for the “caravans of new immigrants rushing toward our borders,” those caravans seemed to stop right after the 2016 election cycle.”
Jumping the line?” Nothing in the immigration proposal states anything about jumping a line. It allows them to get in the line. It puts them in the system; it allows them to get a job and pay taxes, to contribute and be a part of that melting pot the author referenced as a pride of Alaskans.Perhaps this is why the Republican Party is losing ground and party affiliations both locally and nationally?
Alaska does not have a border problem. Some Alaskans have a problem with change.
— Jerome McArthur
Anchorage
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