The Refugees Registry in the United States

by Jerry Waszczuk

I don’t know what a “Muslim Registry” is about. Would it be a database for the entire Muslim population in the USA, including the Nation of Islam, or would it only apply to the Middle Easterners, Pakistanis, Afghanis, etc.? I think that this registry might have always existed without anybody knowing about it and that all of the documented residents are registered, but some groups of residents are more closely watched than others by Homeland Security.

The exceptions are the undocumented residents who have no driver licenses or kids born in the USA and are not on government assistance programs. Gathering information about newcomers from different parts of the world is nothing new and is necessary for keeping the country and its citizens safe. After I was processed as a future U.S. resident when I landed in Texas in 1982, two FBI agents from Houston arrived at my apartment and questioned me, and the questions were quite strange to me.

I got very suspicious about who the FBI agents were and asked one agent to give me the phone number to his office in Houston. I called his office to confirm his identity and make sure that he worked for the FBI, not the KGB. He was from the FBI. The special agent was assigned to watch me and my family from 1982 to 1991. He got mad when I moved from Texas to Washington State and did not inform him about it.

The FBI was taking care of my family’s safety because the communists sent a lot of agents via refugee camps to the US and other western countries to spy and infiltrate churches, with the new diaspora’s organizations made of refugees from Eastern Europe (Soviet Bloc countries). In 1997, during a political rally on the American-Canadian border, I was holding a poster that said “Down with Soviet Imperialism.” The next day, the Polish communist secret police (SB) arrested my brother in Poland and demanded that he convince me not to participate in the United States in any activities against the Polish Communist government and the Soviet Union.

After communism fell, I was informed that my Polish friend who was a professor with a doctorate degree at one of the colleges in Tacoma, WA sent a message to Poland about my poster and my display on the American Canadian border. My buddy was the son-in-law of one of the highest-ranking Polish communist diplomats, the Polish Ambassador to the U.S. Romuald Spasowski, who defected in December of 1981 after the communists implemented martial law to crack down on the anti-communist labor movement “Solidarity,” of which I was one of the organizers and leaders.

After communism fell and the Polish communist Secret Police (SB) archives were opened, it was disclosed that Spasowski’s son-in-law was sent to the USA by the Polish Interior Ministry as a trained Polish communist secret police agent to spy on his father-in-law. Spasowski wrote a book entitled “Liberation of One.” I have this book with his dedication and signature. Spasowski’s father was such a fanatical communist (professor) that he committed suicide because the Soviet Union rejected his application for Soviet citizenship. Also, the special FBI agent who was taking care of me and my family, Jan Zawitkowski, made news in California in 1991 (see http://articles.latimes.com/1991-04-30/local/me-1026_1_camp-pendleton).

I feel sorry for the Syrian refugees and for any refugees who lost everything and are being displaced because of war or government terror. It is a legitimate fear of the American government that jihadists and terrorists are looking for revenge because American bombs destroyed their homes or killed their family members. Most of them are good and decent people, but some do not love us and will not love us once they are on American soil after being admitted as permanent residents. They could get into this country via the refugee camps in the same way as the communist agents were sent to the west in 1980-1990.