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Syrian discussion draws large crowd at Daemen

Mike Desmond/wbfo news

The bombings in Paris brought out a crowd to Daemen College last night for a talk on the refugee crisis and the Russian intervention in Syria.

The crowd packed the room to hear from professors with a special expertise in the topic. Troy University political scientist Michael Slobodchikoff says Americans are realizing the bombers could work here, as they did on 9/11.

"It's very common to worry about the Trojan Horse. And, so, it is not surprising that we would be very worried about accepting Syrian refugees," Slobodchikoff said. 

"Now, you have the governors of Michigan and Alabama saying that they will refuse to accept Syrian refugees which will create humanitarian problems in and of themselves despite the fact that generally the refugees will be able to move anyway."

Immigration is a federal task. Daemen Visiting Historian Tomasz Pudlocki says there are so many refugees, they threaten the unity of the European Union and its commitment to open national borders. He says that allows workers from his native Poland to work in Western Europe, where there are jobs without special immigration rules.

Mike Desmond is one of Western New York’s most experienced reporters, having spent nearly a half-century covering the region for newspapers, television stations and public radio. He has been with WBFO and its predecessor, WNED-AM, since 1988. As a reporter for WBFO, he has covered literally thousands of stories involving education, science, business, the environment and many other issues. Mike has been a long-time theater reviewer for a variety of publications and was formerly a part-time reporter for The New York Times.