Right before our eyes, a catastrophe is taking shape on our southern border. And like the orderly, well-argued, reasonably presented policies that permitted racial segregation, the internment of Japanese nationals, restricting Jewish immigration in the 1930s, and other ugly, shameful moments in our history, this one rises from our failure to recognize costs of political selfishness.
President Trump ran on the promise to stop illegal immigration. True to his word, he is attempting to do that, not by creating an immigration law that tries to address the complex realities of the situation, but with Draconian severity that doesn’t just mock American values, but insults our basic notions of human decency. Minors who attempt to cross the border without papers are being placed in detention centers on military bases, where they live in barbed wire compounds, and sleep on mattresses on the floor. These include not only unaccompanied children, but youngsters who are traveling with their parents or other adults.
Sheltering displaced people is a big challenge for any government under any circumstances. But this is a self-created problem, and the administration has not come anywhere near to rising to the challenge.
In fact, there is reason to believe the government is doing actual harm.
Last week the American Civil Liberties Union says it has obtained 30,000 pages of records documenting abuse and neglect of unaccompanied immigrant children by U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Children in custody have alleged that some were run over by vehicles, deprived of edible food and potable water, detained in freezing and unsanitary cells, threatened with rape, and other outrages. At the same time, the New York Times reported that the Department of Health and Human Services says it has lost track of nearly 1,500 immigrant children it placed with sponsors in the United States.
The CBP denies wrongdoing and says previous allegations were shown to be unfounded, but the administration’s more pointed response was offered by President Trump, These minors, the president said, are fueling drug trafficking and gang violence. “They exploited the loopholes in our laws to enter the country as unaccompanied alien minors,’’ said the president. “They look so innocent. They’re not innocent.”
In fact, innocence until proven guilty is one of the cornerstones of our justice system. Allowing that minors lack the moral judgment of adults is another. As he has done so frequently, the president is condemning large groups of vulnerable, nearly powerless people to create fear, and thus justify his heavy-handed racist policies.
In his brash statements, the president completely overlooks the violent realities of life in Central and South America. Decades of war in many of the countries took hundreds of thousands of lives and destabilized institutions, and the narcotics cartels took care of the rest. Now the countries are infused with violence perpetrated by drug gangs. Of the world’s 50 most violent cities, 42 of those cities are in Latin America. In 2017, Los Cabos, the holiday destination at the southern tip of the Baja peninsula that is beloved by many Americans, saw 365 people murdered, making it, the deadliest city in the world.
Much of the undocumented immigration we see is due to the tremendous destabilization that defines life on our border. And yet we seem to prefer to ignore it—and the role that the appetites of drug-consuming Americans play in the chaos that prevails. Attorney General Sessions recently said the United States “cannot take everyone on this planet who is in a difficult situation.”
Poor us. If only the Attorney General acted as helplessly as he pretends to be. Instead, the administration zealously blames the victims. “If you cross the border unlawfully … then we will prosecute you,” he said in speeches last week. “If you smuggle an illegal alien across the border, then we’ll prosecute you. … If you’re smuggling a child, then we’re going to prosecute you, and that child will be separated from you, probably, as required by law. If you don’t want your child separated, then don’t bring them across the border illegally. It’s not our fault that somebody does that.”
Immigration is a tough problem. It needs more than simplistic solutions. The answer to suffering people trying to escape a frying pan is not to trap them in a bigger fire. There is a world of suffering at our southern border in which we have played a part; we need to offer more than indifference and hostility, or we will deserve the shame that will be our reward.