The Romeike family
The U. S. Supreme Court decided yesterday to deny a review of the appeal of German homeschoolers Uwe and Hannelore Romeike who have been fighting for years for asylum in the American court system.
The Romeikes fled to the United States in 2008 to avoid losing custody of their children to the German government. According to Germany’s highest court, the German ban on homeschooling is designed to insure that religious homeschoolers do not become a “parallel society.”
Michael Farris, Chairman of the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) and lead counsel for the Romeikes in the appellate courts, said, “While this is the end of the line for normal legal appeals, we are not giving up.”
The initial immigration judge hearing the case granted the Romeikes’ request for asylum in 2010 on religious freedom grounds.
The Obama Administration appealed that decision and prevailed on two levels of appeals.
Describing HSLDA’s plans for the Romeikes, Farris said, “We will pursue changes to the asylum law in this country to insure that religious freedom is once again vigorously protected in our policy. I am just glad that the Pilgrims did not face this anti-religious policy when they landed at Plymouth Rock.
“After all, the Pilgrims left England to find religious freedom, but they left Holland to find a place that was both safe for their children and which provided religious freedom,” Farris noted. “These are the very values which our nation today has decided to abandon.”
Farris did not mince words with Fox News’ Todd Starnes when he admitted that he believes the Romeike case is part of the Obama administration’s overall campaign to crush religious freedom in this country.
“The Obama administration’s attitude toward religious freedom, particularly religious freedom for Christians is shocking,” he said in an exclusive telephone interview with Starnes. “I have little doubt that if this family had been of some other faith that the decision would have never been appealed in the first place. They would have let this family stay.”
Home School Legal Defense Association is a nonprofit advocacy organization established to defend and advance the constitutional right of parents to direct the education of their children and to protect family freedoms.
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