January 24, 2018
Page 5
Activist Derides Remark
Takes to social
media when
guard asked
about bomb
When a security guard at
City Hall searched a bag from
a Portland activist and commu-
nity leader and joked about
searching for a bomb, the res-
ident, an immigrant from So-
mali and an official candidate
for political office in Oregon,
wondered if he was being ra-
cially targeted.
Kayse Jama, director of the
nonprofit organization Unite
Oregon and a candidate for
the state senate from Portland,
told the story this weekend in a
Facebook post.
“Are there any bazookas
or bombs?” the security guard
asked as the bag was checked
through security, Jama said.
“He clearly saw I am an im-
migrant and I have an accent.
To me this is not a joke. I am
wondering if I was being iden-
tified by him as someone from
Somalia or if this has happened
to others.”
A wave of Facebook com-
ments criticized the guard’s re-
mark as racist, while others said
it was just a poorly thought-out
joke. Many offered their sym-
pathy and support to Jama.
Most who commented said
they’d never heard a remark
like that and derided it as inap-
propriate, unacceptable racial
Kayse Jama
profiling. Others, some identi-
fying themselves as white resi-
dents, said they’d been subject-
ed to similar low-brow humor
from security personnel.
Jama updated his post after
the comment thread, saying,
“It is evident that this is not
just something that happens to
people of color or immigrants
or refugees. I posted to learn.
To be clear, I have no interest
in punishing this guard or “get-
ting him fired.””
But Jama said he still found
the remark discomforting and
chalked it up to a system fail-
ure. He called for better train-
ing for security guards on how
to communicate to the public,
in particular to “those who are
impacted by the current envi-
ronment around race and im-
migration“
At Unite Oregon, Jama helps
immigrants and refugees navi-
gate inequality issues.
Recruiting Candidates
C ontinueD from p age 3
“I’m just a single working
mother, and people can look
at me and see a regular person
who happens to be in office,”
she said.
On average, it takes a poten-
tial candidate of color being
asked to run for office eight to
10 times before they agree, ac-
cording to Jesse Beason, board
chair at Color PAC. He noted
however, that since the presi-
dential election in 2016, peo-
ple have been more willing to
get involved and take action.
Color PAC is run by a board
of volunteers which helps build
a network of recruiters to find
and encourage people of color
to engage in local politics, and
provide them with tools to help
them succeed. These include
individual trainings on how to
run a campaign, fundraise, and
engage volunteers.
“We need people in office
who represent who Oregon is
and is becoming,” said Beason.
Another main priority for
the board is to provide ongo-
ing support for candidates after
they have been elected.
Champions of color have
historically lacked political in-
frastructure in Oregon, and find
that most current systems are
not designed for their leader-
ship and ideas, and thus rarely
serve more than one term.
“We want to help candi-
dates not only run and win, but
govern effectively when they
get there,” said Beason on the
importance of retention. “Ineq-
uity stems from public policy,
so we need more people of col-
or to be decision makers, with
their personal influences that
stem from their lived experi-
ence of race,” he added.