By Pam Hersh
I never thought I would find the best possible Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, and New Year’s gift in Ohio.
The gift has nothing to do with Ohio’s politics or sports teams. Instead the gift comprises joyful characteristics wrapped up in someone called Dave, a political refugee from Afghanistan.
Dave — and his wife and two young children — are being welcomed by the state of Ohio, after an extremely dangerous four-year effort to immigrate. And many Princetonians had a hand in delivering Dave and his family to their new home.
I got to know Dave through his benefactor, Princeton resident and Princeton University Woodrow Wilson School MPA candidate Michael Kelvington, who was featured in a Loose Ends column one year ago. My initial reason for interviewing the 34-year-old United States Army Major, who was the 2015 Princeton Veterans Day Ceremony speaker, was to focus on his extraordinary military career, which included winning a prestigious scholarship from the Combating Terrorism Center to the Woodrow Wilson School graduate program.
Michael never was comfortable talking about his Purple Heart or the dozens of other honors he had accumulated during his tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan. All he wanted to do was talk about Dave, the Afghani translator who “was a profoundly valuable asset to me during my 2012 deployment. I believe his counsel helped me keep my men alive,” Michael said.
For almost 6 years, Dave served the United States Army as a linguist and cultural adviser in southern Afghanistan. He was shot at and hand grenades and IEDs blow up near him. In exchange for his service, the U.S. Government promised to bring him and his family to America through the Special Immigration Visa (SIV) system. When the Americans pulled out of Afghanistan, Dave lost his job, and the commitment to bring him to the United States got mired down in the SIV process.
For the four years since he left Afghanistan, Mr. Kelvington has waged an intense campaign to get the U.S. Government to live up to its commitment. He has spent hundreds of hours talking, calling, writing, emailing, lecturing about Dave, as well as connecting with 53 congressional offices and dozens of other military and governmental offices.
As one of Michael’s email list of “Save Dave” proponents, I received regular updates on the Dave situation, with the most recent email being the gift — the one to print out and frame to remind me that happy endings are possible and some good deeds bring rewards not punishments.
“Thanks to all your efforts and contributions, Hamayon (Dave) and his family arrived safely in Akron, Ohio, around 10:30 pm on November 30… My deepest appreciation for all your help in making this family’s dream a reality. Take care and God bless you all!”
Only a few months earlier, the “Save Dave” email recipients received a message reporting how Dave’s life was in grave danger — the situation being in “dire straits.” Even though Dave had been living in hiding and separated from his family for two years, his real identity, Hamayon Yaqobi, and his role with the American soldiers was posted on Facebook with 70,000 followers with accompanying responses that he must be killed.
In typical self-effacing fashion, Michael asked me to make sure that when I did my update on Dave that I publicize how so many of his friends in Princeton and colleagues at Princeton University embraced the “Save Dave” campaign.
“Everyone here was awesome,” Michael said. “They opened their hearts and their wallets to someone they never met. I would have loved to have settled Dave in Princeton, but I do not know where I will land — geographically — after I get my MPA degree in June and resume my responsibilities as a major in the U.S. Army. So we opted for Ohio (Akron is Michael’s home town), where I have a network of friends and family to help with Dave’s resettlement.”
Also offering “profound thanks” to the support of his wife, a former U.S. Army Black Hawk pilot, and his three small children, he refused to take credit for unjamming the logjam that characterized Dave’s extreme vetting process.
Michael called himself “just the squeaky wheel,” but a wheel that in fact created such sweet music to the ears of a certain brand-new Ohio resident.
