"Zero Tolerance", Family separations & other immigration iss

[Frelga]

My family lost entire branches to Holocaust. I have no hesitation in saying that Hitler took longer to get to this level of institutionalized cruelty, and the German people resisted harder.

But that's a European perspective.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

My family also lost entire branches to the holocaust, and I can't remotely agree with that, much as I find what is going on currently disturbing.

[Frelga]

I'd like to hear your reasoning, V.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

This policy is cruel and inhuman, but it is targeting a small group of people because they are breaking the law, not a whole class of mostly-law-abiding citizens simply because of their religious or racial identity. The persecution of Jews began almost from the moment that the NSDAP took power in Germany, forcing them out of business and professions, seizing their property and forcing them out of the civil service. The Nuremburg laws, which became the legal basis for the complete expulsion of Jews from public life in Germany, were passed about approximately the same point in Hitler's regime as we are in Trump's administration, and so far as I understand there was very little resistance from most of the German people.

I hate what is going on right now in our country, but I still think that comparing it to the situation in Nazi Germany is completely hyperbolic and unhelpful.

Just my opinion, of course. I make no claim to be an expert.

[RoseMorninStar]

I'm posting something I read on Facebook. How true it is or how much it applies to the thousands who find themselves in this situation I cannot claim to know, especially as to the claim of law breaking/legality (or not).

Post by Wyeth Ruthven

So, I did immigration casework for Senator Fritz Hollings, studied immigration law at law school under a former INS general counsel, and worked for a border Congressman in the district that included the Rio Grande Valley. So hear me out:
1. These people in detention have not committed a crime.
2. I don't mean that in a moral or a figurative sense. I mean literally. It is NOT a crime to ask for asylum.
3. These people didn't jump a fence, they didn't sneak into the back yard. They are knocking on the front door and saying "People are trying to kill me in my home country, will you let me in?"
4. Now, I didn't fall off the turnip truck. Some of these people are lying. That's why you have a hearing. And because they might wander off, these people are held in detention until the hearing.
5. This hearing is NOT in a criminal court. It's in an immigration court. Because these people have not committed a crime.
6. Immigration court is not like criminal court. You don't have a right to an attorney.
7. So these people are waiting around, separated from their children, with no attorney, until they get a hearing.
8. In 2015, the median wait for an immigration hearing was 404 days.
9. Here's where it gets even more twisted.
10. If people plead guilty to asylum fraud, they get their kids back and get deported.
11. So these people knock on the front door, which is perfectly legal, and we take their kids, and tell them the quickest way to get them back is to confess.
12. If someone committed a crime - shoplifting, armed robbery, murder - and you took their kids away to make them confess, that confession would be thrown out.
13. But these confessions are lawful, because this isn't criminal court.
14. Because these people haven't committed a crime.
15. Now some people think that if we make it so unpleasant for these people, they will stop trying to cross the border.
16. But the message this sends isn't "Go Home." The message it sends is "Sneak in."
17. If they go home, they think they will be murdered. If they request asylum, they are separated from their children.
18. If they sneak in successfully, they're safe. If they sneak in and get caught, they are no worse off than if they sought asylum legally.
19. And remember, these people haven't committed a crime.

[Frelga]

V, I wanted to acknowledge your post before I post elsewhere. I will respond when I am home from work and explain why, with great sadness, I am forced to disagree.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Cohen also slammed President Trump's "zero tolerance" policy that separates families at the U.S.-Mexico border.

"As the son of a Polish holocaust survivor, the images and sounds of this family separation policy is heart wrenching,” Cohen wrote. “While I strongly support measures that will secure our porous borders, children should never be used as bargaining chips."

Yes, THAT Cohen.

[Inanna]

Trump signed an executive order banning the separation of families. Oh, thank goodness.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

As discussed in the other Trump thread, that order does not really fix the problem. Or rather it fixes by creating other problems potentially just as bad.

[RoseMorninStar]

Again, re-posting from someone elsewhere. Is this how things are now V?

The Executive Order today is to stop separating families when they initially cross the border. While this is movement in the right direction, DO NOT BE FOOLED by what this Order does. Here are the facts thus far:

1. Families will not be immediately separated, but they will be held in detention together.
2. Crossing the border “illegally” will no longer be deemed a civil violation, it will be deemed a criminal violation.
3. Because it is a criminal violation the parents will be charged criminally. At that point, their children will be forcibly taken.
4. The Executive Order will provide a provision that families will be expedited through the criminal process. This means that the removal of their children will be expedited.

There is still a need for the Tent Cities. There will still be Tender Age Facilities. This serves as optics for Trump to claim he is not ripping families apart. He is. The GOP are. They are just hiding in in the fine print.

[Inanna]

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Rose, yes that is accurate so far as I understand. Basically, it is creating the illusion that the problem has been addressed (and most news reports that I have heard/seen say things like "Trump reverses course and ends separation of families) but in truth the problem is not fixed. Moreover, there is not facilities or other resources needed to detain families on the scale contemplated (as the so-called zero tolerance policy is sill completely in effect and is not modified by this executive order, other than in the ways that Rose describes). Even with "expedited the families through the criminal process" I don't see how this is even going to work.

As I said in the other thread, the only word that I can think for what is going on is "insane".

[Voronwë the Faithful]

As the dust settles, the media is beginning to realize that Trump's reversal isn't all that.

Trump's immigration reversal creates its own chaos

[Dave_LF]

So basically:
1) Trump does something that is appallingly evil by almost any standard
2) He claims he's a hero for reversing his own heinous policies after a massive public outcry
3) He doesn't actually do it

[Dave_LF]

This policy is cruel and inhuman, but it is targeting a small group of people because they are breaking the law, not a whole class of mostly-law-abiding citizens simply because of their religious or racial identity.

I agree with your larger point, but I feel compelled to point out that, based on what I've read, the split families are largely asylum seekers fleeing violence in places like Honduras and not (to borrow the term) illegal immigrants.

[Frelga]

That's what I understand, too. The law allows asylum seekers to enter the US through the approved ports of entry. Recently, the reports emerged that these points have been limiting or prohibiting entry, so that in some places people have been waiting for weeks. Some become desperate enough to go around, which until recently was a civil offense but now is a crime and leads to separating families.

And many of these people are literally fleeing for their lives and have already been through hell.

Eta: as for it not being a race-driven policy and simply a law enforcement action... I agree with this from 538.

What Is Really Behind Trump’s Controversial Immigration Policies?

It's worth reading the entire article. It's long but thoughtful, and now is not the time to skim headlines.

If you think of stopping the growth in the foreign-born population as the unifying goal — rather than strengthening national security or promoting law enforcement — then Trump’s immigration agenda hangs together more clearly. The steps taken or proposed by the administration, such as ending DACA and sharply curtailing refugee admissions, are likely to result in: some foreign-born people currently in the U.S. being forced to return to their home countries, including highly skilled tech workers; those who remain here having a harder time helping relatives come to the country; fewer refugees ever entering in the first place; and some immigrants who got citizenship having it revoked.

[Dave_LF]

Do you know if he's only splitting the families who "go around," or is the same thing happening to ones who wait their turn?

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I also agree with that thoughtful piece by Perry Bacon (Nate Silver has really gathered a good team at 538). But I still think it is qualitatively different than the Nazi persecution (and subsequent attempts to exterminate) the Jews. But I've already said my piece and I don't have to repeat myself.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

If this is true (which is a big if) it should help.

Border Patrol will stop referring migrant parents who cross into the U.S. illegally with children for prosecution, official says

[Frelga]

There seem to be conflicting signals from CBP and Justice Department, so yeah, a big if.

Meanwhile. NPR

The man who organized last year's white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia has been granted a permit to hold a "White Civil Rights Rally" in Washington, D.C. this summer. https://t.co/lkdnHUr3eO

Charlottesville was the rally where Heather Heyer was murdered.