Udvalget for Udlændinge- og Integrationspolitik 2014-15 (1. samling)
UUI Alm.del Bilag 11
Offentligt
30 October 2014
TO: The Immigration and Integration Affairs Committee
Greetings.
I am an American whose family is here on the Green Card Scheme. I wrote to members of the
Immigration and Integration Affairs Committee individually, but it has been recommended to me to
write a letter just to the committee, also for publication on the website. I want to relate to every person
serving on this committee the significant personal and financial cost that the retroactive application of
the extension rules will impose upon current Green Card holders. The new extension rules (particularly
the extension rule requiring the Green Card holder to earn at least 315,000 DKK annually in order to
obtain a second extension), absolutely should not be applied to people who came here based on the
prior representations that the Danish government made. To do so is fundamentally unjust, financially
harmful, discriminatory and will discourage anyone, no matter how talented or needed, from coming to
Denmark. Government should make life predictable, not arbitrary. Government should not foster the
financial destruction of a family. Just like people should abide by their promises, so should
government. We don't trust people who violate business deals; we should not trust governments who
violate business deals.
In my family, my husband Eric Olmanson (PhD in Geography from the University of Wisconsin) is the
actual Green Card holder, while I (Juris Doctor from the University of Wisconsin, with sixteen years as
a licensed attorney) am technically the accompanying spouse, although I qualify for a Green Card in
my own right (we did it this way because it was cheaper for me to apply as an accompanying spouse).
We arrived in Denmark with our two daughters, age 6 and 10, in April this year.
Not everyone who applies for the Green Card scheme does so just for the job. I had an excellent
position as an attorney back home and was rather high up in state government. In fact, I was Assistant
Legal Counsel to the Wisconsin Department of Corrections. I made $84,000 per year, plus excellent
fringe benefits (pension, vacation, health and dental insurance, life insurance), which brought my
effective salary up to over $110,000 per year. My husband picked up lectureships at the University of
Wisconsin, and also wrote institutional histories, on commission. We had our home paid off (and we
owned another home outright as well) and were financially settled. However, for philosophical reasons
we sought to come to Denmark.
We walked away from the financial security we had in America to come to Denmark, based on
representations made by Danish Immigration Service and the Danish Agency for Labour Market and
Recruitment that extension would be based on #1 Eric working an average of 10 hours per week, #2
none of us committing any crimes, and #3 we would not request or accept any money under the Active
Social Welfare Act. There was no requirement that people would need to earn at least 315,000 DKK
annually in order to obtain a second extension.
Coming to Denmark cost our family close to $40,000, not counting the tens of thousands of dollars in
income we have lost as a result of me resigning from my position in state government to come here.
We cashed in my deferred income of over $20,000. We cashed in the savings plans we had put together
for our daughters' future university education. We used both my savings and my husbands's savings.
Additionally, we sold our collection of many thousands of books (I'm not exaggerating; we owned
enough books to furnish a small town's library) for a small fraction of what we paid for them and for a
small fraction of what it would cost for us to replace them, if we were to return to the US.
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Now that we are here and have walked away from our financial secureity, and now that we have
infused tens of thousands of dollars into the Danish economy, the Danish government is changing the
rules and is pulling the rug out from underneath us. Suddenly we are told that in order to get our
second extension, my husband will need to make at least 315,000 DKK annually. This was not in any
way, shape, or form part of the deal at the time we spent money applying, nor was it at the time we
spent money coming here. This income requirement simply should be inapplicable
at any point in
time
to people who made their decision to spend money applying and then coming here prior to the
reforms being enacted.
Both Eric and I were fully aware that it would take us 4-5 years to establish ourselves in Denmark. We
both were fully aware that he would not be getting a teaching position until he learned Danish. We
know that I will need to learn Danish, plus take additional law classes on EU contract law and
international taxation, before I can even be hired as in-house counsel. It was our plan to take whatever
jobs were available while we learned Danish, which we estimate will take us 2-4 years to learn.
Based on the representations made on the newtodenmark.dk website (which is maintained collectively
by the Danish Immigration Service and the Danish Agency for Labour Market and Recruitment), we
knew that we qualified for the Green Card Scheme. Based on the representations made on
thenewtodenmark.dk wesite, we knew that (at least under the rules in effect now and the rules in effect
when we applied in 2013) we would qualify for both of the extensions. However, there is no way that
people like us will earn enough money (315,000 DKK annually) to qualify for the second extension
under the new rules. We are not engineers. We are not IT professionals. We are not doctors or
dentists. People like us need several years to learn the language before anyone will hire us for a
professional position in our fields.
Had we known that the Danish Parliament intended to enact new extension rules and apply the new
extension rules to people like us, we never, ever, ever would have even applied for the Green Card at
all, because we know that neither of us will be making enough money yet by the time we are required
to apply for our extension.
Had we known that the Danish Parliament intended to enact new extension rules and apply the new
extension rules to people in our situation, I never would have resigned from my attorney position in
Wisconsin. I never would have cashed in my deferred income. We never would have cashed in our
daughters' educational funds. Although we don't like the US rates of gun violence, we would have
taken our chances with that in the US and kept my good attorney position there, which I can never get
back.
Had we been able to foresee that the Danish Parliament would apply the new extension rules to people
who had come here based on different representations, we never would have interrupted our daughters'
education in the United States. They were in a good school and were progressing well. But based on
the representations that the Danish Immigration Service and the Danish Agency for Labour Market and
Recruitment made, we decided that it would be in their long-term interests for us to come to Denmark
and for them to learn Danish.
Had we been able to foresee the new income requirement of at least 315,000 DKK annually, we never
would have infused tens of thousands of our American dollars into the Danish economy; we would
have just stayed home. It doesn't escape me that the proposed expulsion of Green Card holders not
earning least 315,000 DKK annually do not include any financial reparations for those Green Card
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holders who infused foreign money into the Danish economy (application fees, travel fares, housing
costs far in excess of the costs back home and so forth) based on the Danish Government's prior
representations. If I had wanted to spend a small fortune in Denmark and then return to my home
country, I would have come as a tourist.
Like many Americans, I am, myself, a genetic melting pot. My ancestors were mostly from Ireland,
Britain, Germany, Spain, France, the Netherlands, Austria and Poland, with a few from South Asia,
and, as I was surprised to learn within the past few years, Africa. My ancestors were mostly Christian,
but a few were Jewish (and, of course, my slave ancestors would have come to the New World with
some other set of beliefs).
While there is no shortage of atrocities that various of my ancestors faced over the years, what the
Danish government is planning to do to Green Card holders who don't earn enough money brings to
mind the repeated expulsions that my Jewish ancestors faced from almost everywhere they lived in
Europe. For Denmark to keep the tens of thousands of dollars we have infused into its economy, but
then expell us us for not meeting new terms that were not part of the original bargain is the same sort of
maltreatment-by-tyrant that my Jewish ancestors faced throughout the centuries.
When I look at the demographics of the current Green Card holders who will likely be expelled since
they won't be earning at least 315,000 DKK annually by the time their second renewal comes up, the
plan seems to be tantamount to ethnic cleansing, with the victims this time around by-and-large being
moderate Muslims (after all, it isn't Europeans who were induced by the Danish government to come to
Denmark on the Green Card scheme; rather, the Green Card holders are highly educated and hard
working people most of whom have darker skin than the average Dane). Does Denmark really want to
model itself after the behavior of Charles VI of the Habsburg Empire, with simply a different social
group being the victims this time around?
In sum, it is utterly unjust, financially destructive, and a violation of basic human rights, to apply the
315,000 DKK requirement for a second extension to existing Green Card holders who made their
decision to apply, and then to come to Denmark, based on the old extension criteria. Please eliminate
this provision in the law and continue to apply the old extension criteria to Green Card holders who
came here under the rules currently in effect. At no time should there be any minimum annual income
requirement (let alone one of 315,000 DKK annually) imposed on people who came here based on a
different promise made by the Danish government.
Sincerely,
Andrea Olmanson
Cirkelhusene 2, 4, 2
4600 Køge
(+45) 71 54 19 75