OKC Screen Printing Shop Sends Welcoming Message To Syrian Refugees

Gov. Mary Fallin wants President Barack Obama to stop Syrian refugees from entering the United States, but an Oklahoma City man is using this T-shirt to send the opposite message.

Despite the push back from state leaders, an Oklahoma City man wants refugees to know some Oklahomans are laying down their welcome mats.

It's started with a simple Facebook post Sunday morning.

“It's a complicated situation and this is a very simple statement,” said Taylor McKenzie of McKenzie & Co. 

One that reads in black and white: "refugees are welcome here." McKenzie & Co. in downtown Oklahoma City is providing the ink and design free to anyone who wants to join them in opening their arms to refugees.

“I think we are all pretty radical about how we feel nations, states, and borders; open them all up is the way I feel personally,” said McKenzie.

Many Americans now question if there is a lesson to be learned from the Paris attacks after one of the terrorists posed as a Syrian refugee.

Only three Syrian refugees now live in Oklahoma. More than half of Americans polled by Bloomberg Politics said the United States shouldn't take any Syrian refugees fleeing the war in their country.

But Taylor Thompson and others who lined up at the T-shirt screening shop on Film Row disagree.

“I'm more concerned with helping people who are fleeing when their homes have been destroyed and their families are being killed,” Thompson said.

Thompson brought several shirts in to have this message printed on them.

“I love that people are standing up and saying that we actually do care and making a statement about it,” she said.

“This is a point we're reaching right now where you're either going to fall on the side of humanity or or inhumanity and to me it's very black and white,” McKenzie said.

McKenzie & Co. will screen print any shirt brought in to the shop from 1 to 5 p.m. Tuesday at 630 W. Sheridan Ave.