Unreachables
Five hundred forty-five children, separated from their parents at the border, cannot be reunited with their parents. It wasn’t in the middle of some natural disaster, and the parents didn’t commit some murderous act. No, by intentional policy of the Government of the United States, children were taken from parents. They committed the misdemeanor offense of crossing a “line in the sand”, and the Government failed to maintain adequate records to put them back together. Some were babies.
They are now called the “unreachables”. The children went into the “system”, from Customs and Border Control in the Department of Homeland Security, to the Office of Refugee Resettlement in the Department of Health and Human Services. They were scattered throughout the nation. Meanwhile the adults were deported to their home countries. There was no tracking process to maintain a connection between the two, and those kids were simply lost to their parents.
Policy Debate
There was a debate in the Trump Administration about the policy, the plan to “deter” migrants by taking their kids when they arrived in the US. The “hard-ass” Trump appointees thought it would scare migrants into not trying to get here. But the pros in the “deep state” that dealt with illegal immigration for year had a real understanding of the problem. Conditions were so bad in Central America that whatever the “deterrence” offered by US Border Control couldn’t hold a candle to the gang violence and economic ruin there.
And the “pros” also warned that their system would be overwhelmed with the children. Before it even happened, they said we would “lose” kids. But the Administration went ahead with their plan, and for five hundred and forty-five kids, destroyed their lives.
If any other country did this, Americans would rise up in “righteous anger” over the crimes against these children. But this is not some “war crime” committed in a far away desert or jungle. It happened in American towns like McAllen, Texas and Nogales, Arizona. It’s happened under the “Stars and Stripes” in the “land of the free and the home of the brave”. And we aren’t completely sure it’s not happening now. We don’t seem very brave.
Outrage
There are so many outrages committed by the Trump Administration that it’s hard to keep track of them all. He started his campaign for the Presidency by blaming “Mexicans” as rapists and drug dealers. His first days in office he tried to ban a religion from entering the United States, the “Muslim Ban”. And for the last four years the President has appealed to our worst fears, blaming “brown people” for a whole variety of “wrongs”. Trump incites and encourages the evil strain in America: from “fine people on both sides” at Charlottesville, to telling the “Proud Boys” to “stand back and stand by”, to pretending his doesn’t know what QAnon is.
But for these five hundred and forty-five children and thousands more, the Trump Administration has in the name of the United States, ripped them from their parents. It doesn’t get any uglier than that.
Character
When they say that this election is about “character”, it’s not just about whether the President lies (over 20,000 times according to the Washington Post) or hides his taxes. It’s not just about a President who constantly denigrates anyone who criticizes him, but seems to take particular pleasure in attacking women, from Nancy Pelosi to Leslie Stahl. It’s not even about a man who says wearing facemasks will help control the pandemic then ridicules those who actually wear them.
No this is the true “character” issue. Donald Trump leads a Presidency that has no moral compass. They are willing to do literally anything to pursue their policy goals. They ignored COVID. His White House has “cozied” up to the worst dictators in the world, from Putin to Erdogan to Duterte to Kim. And they sat around a table and chose to drag innocent children out of the arms of their parents. It was a vote, only Homeland Security Secretary Kirstin Neilsen, who was well aware of the consequences, voted no. But the rest pressured her to change her decision.
There have been so many mistakes, and there is so little time to correct them.
Exceptionalism
Americans are taught from an early age that our founding story, from heroic immigration to the Revolution, is exceptional. We were raised on Ronald Reagan’s “shining city on a hill” speech: the United States as the example of democracy to the world. We acknowledged the failures in our past, from slavery to internment camps, but vowed to be better in our present and future.
But there is nothing “exceptional” about tearing children from their parents’ arms. It is cruel, barbaric, and desperate. It represents the worst of us, not our better angels. And that is decision we need to make in the next two weeks. Americans need to decide what kind of “character” we want in the leader of our nation. More importantly we need to decide what kind of character we have ourselves.
