Garden City, Kansas.
Posted By Robin Menken
Bob Hurst’s Garden City, Kansas Is a crime documentary about a foiled terrorist attack and a warning against the violence of Trumpist America.
We meet Angie Haflich, the content editor of High Plains Public Radio which broadcasts to Kansas and four other states.
Interviews with Haflich and other local citizens portray a conservative Middle American small town (mostly Republican) which, because of it reliance on farming and meat packing, developed an unusually practical progressive approach to Immigration.
Once a real life Mayberry, as can be glimpsed in archival footage from a 1950s booster film “This is Our Town Garden City, Kansas USA”, Garden City specialized in farming, wheat milling and grain storage.
Like all of Kansas they raised sunflowers, corn, sorghum soybeans, hogs, cattle and bison. (Seen happily grazing in the film). Its well-painted homes and perfectly manicured lawns look a little different now, as the hard-working immigrants don’t have time or resources to perfectly maintain their ‘castles’.
Animated sequences portray the court testimony of Dan Day, a self proclaimed Patriot and member of the KSF (Kansa Security Force) Militia, who eventually reported the planned attack to the FBI.
Recruited in 2015 at a cookout by Patrick Stein, Dan was indoctrinated in the KSF’s belief structure. “We got a Muslim In the White House. Sharia Law is coming. Hilary will get elected. They will arrest patriots and put them in Walmarts (converted to concentration camps). The UN were coming for us.”
Patrick asked him to join a special unit: Gavin “Sparky” Wright, Curtis “CO” Allen, and Patrick Stein, nicknamed “Orkin Man” because he was sworn to kill “cockroaches.” They needed to “rise up against cockroaches infesting our country. They to be eradicated.”
They began running recon missions following the immigrants from home to school to work.
Dan Day was dubbed “Dangerous Dan”, “D-Day” and “Minute Man”. Later Dan met someone from the FBI who asked him to attend meetings and report on the Militia.
We meet Muslim community activists and community leaders, part of the earlier waves of African immigrants. Amy Longa community activist, came from Uganda with a law degree. Abdulkadir Mohamed, a community leader in the Somalian community, came to Garden City because of threats on his life . Originally from Kenya, he got a job at the UN and worked in Kuwait, Somalia and Ruanda before receiving death threats.
The large Somalian and Burmese immigrant community in Garden City followed the 1980s’ wave of Vietnamese Laotians, Mexican and Central American. They work in the meat processing plant Tyson Foods (formerly IBP) reputedly one the largest plants in the world, slaughtering 6,000 head of cattle daily.
They also work for local farmers raising their crops. Almost all businesses in the region are agricultural or cattle related.
Farmer Chris Heiman (farmer) points out one of his valued workers for fifteen years, a Mexican-German Mennonite. “He’s a good worker, he does 80-85 hours a week in busy months, You can’t find people who can do this work unless they are immigrants who grew up on a farm. Americans can’t or won’t do this work. I welcome them. Labor needs the competition. We need immigrants.”
When the IBP came to Garden City in the 70’s to offer to put up a plant, city officials reasoned, if we want to continue to grow, unlike other small towns who lost 40 % of their population, we should take this offer, but is it a blessing or a curse? They determined to work with the immigrants. To offer Civics classes, preparing them for their road to citizenship (taught by former Municipal Judge Peter Ramirez.
The local police learned about their new residents and developed a protective attitude. Sgt. Lana Urteaga came from a small town in Nebraska. It was shock when she arrived but soon she welcomed the Immigrants as good family people.
“When you come here you get. a sense of the world…you adapt and you learn and you grow and you learn to love it, to be apart of their lives. You need to understand their way of life to effectively serve that section of the population.” She mentions Burmese, Vietnamese Haitians. Somalian, Mexican. There are 30 languages spoken in the schools.
Sister Janice Thome of Ministry of Presence, a daughter of dairy farmers, explains. “There are immigrants from 25 different countries in this area: People from Ethiopia, Sudan, Eritrea- which I didn’t even know was a country.”
Health care workers Jerome and Kristi Greene moved from Great Bend. Kristy explained “When I moved here I was afraid of the culture, the diversity. I had pre- conceived ideas.” She was won over, she grew to love the community.
Jerome Greene, was brought up thinking, “If you want to live in America speak English”. His new elderly patients couldn’t speak English, their children translated for them. Their children learned the language. It changed his consciousness.
Former mayor Molly Harness remembers. “When the Muslims wanted a separate cemetery, to be able to follow their burial customs, she got warning letters. “Don’t over- accommodate them, they’ll take over.”
Things changed when Trump made it OK to be outwardly racist.
Harness opines, ”We’ve given a whole segment of the population permission to say whatever. It’s a sin the way we’re treating people. We let them do our hard work, mock them, chase them, imprison them, take their kids away.”
Hector Martinez lll explains, “I have Mexican friends wearing shirt “Lets Make America Great Again” because its a trend. They don’t understand the impact.” They don’t follow politics.
Citizenship is a lengthy and expensive process, even with help from Civics classes and Immigration lawyers. It could take a working family twelve years to raise enough money and evidence to complete citizenship. Hector Martinez worked cleaning jobs at night. Seeking to complete his eduction he volunteered at Garden City College. He studied and filed a H-1B visa because he couldn’t afford an attorney CHECK
Most of the community talking heads wished for streamlined access to citizenship. “Lets get them documented.” Then long came Trump and his reworking of Immigration. The process swiftly became harsh, punitive and almost impossible.
For years Immigration lawyer Mike Feltman was successful filing cases for people seeking asylum from Domestic and Gang Violence Victim. Not since Trump.
In 2016, Dan recounts, The unit began surveillance. In the Dollar General, Patrick exclaimed, “there’s a couple of those cockroach bitches, I’ll knock ‘em off kill ‘em” and pointed a gun at them. Dan made him put it away before someone called the police, but not before he saw the fear in their eyes.
While observing the Mary Street Complex, a largely Somali residential area with a small mosque, they saw a Somali mother and baby girl. Remembering how his grown daughter played dress-up when she was the toddler’s age, Dan thought. “how cute -dressed like mom.”
Patrick fumed , “Look at the baby cockroach mother-fucker, we should take her out too.” Dan realized his life was in danger and began praying about it.
Patrick threatened to shoot Dan if word got out.
In June Patrick came up with targets in three towns: Dodge, Liberal and Garden City, including “railroad heaven” (where Patrick believed the UN would incarcerate Patriots.) He talked about killing the maximum number of Muslims as well as landlords and their families and pastors who helped them, raping their children. “ If they were helping Muslims they needed to die.” He hoped to publish a manifesto, force Media to publish it and launch the Crusades 2.0.
They discussed an “old-fashioned” drive-by shooting of a schoolbus: a 1000 pounder bomb, multiple car bombs. They learned to make bombs and detonator online and tested the detonator. They decided to bomb the Mary Street Complex when the muslims were in prayer. The plan was for the day after election when “HiIlary would be in power and UN would begin moving on us.”
Dan finally realized, “ These guys are serious.. a target. a date. This is real. That’s what I told the FBI. It came to a stop. Allen was arrested for battery of his girlfriend and told Police about the plans, triggering the FBI involvement arrests and warrants. On Oct 12, 2016 the shocking story hit the papers.
The story hit on Angie Haflich’s last day at work at High Plains Public Radio. She made her most significant local story on her last day at work. Law enforcement showed Angie the potential damage to the whole area. She was horrified. No one believed that locals with racist beliefs would turn violent. “It was scary for them and scary for us, it heightened our awareness.”
The New York Times interviewed Sister Janice Thome. A state representative described the arrest on television, “8 months of FBU investigation revealed a hidden culture of hatred and Violence many Kansas find it as scary as I have”.
Good news: The next morning local politicians stood outside the Mary Street Complex with signs “We love our muslims” showing their solidarity with the Somalis. The police met with the community, monitoring threats to show solidarity and willingness to protect them. Garden city stood up to say “THIS is not us”.
The perpetrators received lengthy jail terms, reassuring the immigrants, putting people’s minds at rest. Convicted of a conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction, they were sentenced: Curtis Allen (25 years), Patrick Stein (30 years), Gavin Wright (26 years).
Christian Dan Daly believes “God helped me bring it down.”
