Reddit's Alexis Ohanian blasts Trump’s ban as "deeply un-American"

PanARMENIAN.Net - Alexis Ohanian, the co-founder of Reddit and the great grandson of refugees who fled the Armenian Genocide, says President Donald Trump's immigration ban is both "deeply un-American" and "potentially unconstitutional," The Verge reports.

Ohanian expressed his views in an open letter to the Reddit community penned under his long-time handle "kn0thing" and posted to the official Reddit blog.

The tech industry figure describes himself as not only the son of an undocumented German immigrant, but also "the great grandson of refugees who fled the Armenian Genocide." Ohanian says welcoming both groups — immigrants and refugees — is America's "unfair advantage," quoting a startup term for besting the competition. "Without them, there’s no me, and there’s no Reddit. We are Americans," he writes. "Let’s not forget that we’ve thrived as a nation because we’ve been a beacon for the courageous — the tired, the poor, the tempest-tossed."

Ohanian is just the latest tech industry figure to take a more hardened and transparent stand against Trump's immigration ban, which has led to a chaotic scene at US airports, scores of protests across the country, and a mounting wave of legal battles for the new administration.

"A little over a century ago, a Turkish soldier decided my great grandfather was too young to kill after cutting down his parents in front of him; instead of turning the sword on the boy, the soldier sent him to an orphanage. Many Armenians, including my great grandmother, found sanctuary in Aleppo, Syria—before the two reconnected and found their way to Ellis Island. Thankfully they weren't retained, rather they found this message:

"Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

"My great grandfather didn’t speak much English, but he worked hard, and was able to get a job at Endicott-Johnson Shoe Company in Binghamton, NY. That was his family's golden door. And though he and my great grandmother had four children, all born in the U.S., immigration continued to reshape their family, generation after generation. The one son they had—my grandfather —volunteered to serve in the Second World War and married a French-Armenian immigrant. And my mother, a native of Hamburg, Germany, decided to leave her friends, family, and education behind after falling in love with my father, who was born in San Francisco.

"My forebears were brave refugees who found a home in this country. I’ve always been proud to live in a country that said yes to these shell-shocked immigrants from a strange land, that created a path for a woman who wanted only to work hard and start a family here.

"Without them, there’s no me, and there’s no Reddit. We are Americans. Let’s not forget that we’ve thrived as a nation because we’ve been a beacon for the courageous—the tired, the poor, the tempest-tossed."