Comment on Judge says Deering High student, an asylum seeker, may compete in national poetry recital contest

A Maine high school student from Zambia who is seeking asylum in the United States has won the legal right to compete in a national poetry recital contest next week. U.S. District Judge John A. Woodcock on Friday granted a temporary restraining order against the National Endowment for the Arts, allowing Allan Monga to attend the NEA’s Poetry Out Loud competition beginning Monday in Washington, D.C. The NEA had excluded Monga, a junior at Deering High School, from the national competition because its rules require that competitors be either citizens or permanent residents.