Please consider this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVQ4Ys6UWJs
Dear Mr. President
Instead of blaming the Democrats, why don’t you just issue an executive order? Executive orders don’t seem to be foreign to you.
Dear Mr. President, you and I both know the answer.
As part of your “art of the deal” tactics, you really do not care how many kids’ lives you destroy.
Dear Mr. President, your actions are so despicable that at least 15 Republican Senators are willing to call you on it.
Senators Object
The Hill reports 13 GOP senators ask administration to pause separation of immigrant families.
GOP senators, led by Sen. Orrin Hatch (Utah), sent a letter to Attorney General Jeff Sessions asking for a moratorium of the president’s controversial “zero tolerance” policy, which is resulting in the separation of families detained at the border.
“We support the administration’s efforts to enforce our immigration laws, but we cannot support implementation of a policy that results in the categorical forced separation of minor children from their parents,” the Republican senators wrote.
In addition to Hatch, GOP Sens. John McCain (Ariz.), Pat Roberts (Kan.), Susan Collins (Maine), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Bob Corker (Tenn.), Lamar Alexander (Tenn.), John Boozman (Ark.), Dean Heller (Nev.), Cory Gardner (Colo.), James Lankford (Okla.), Bill Cassidy (La.) and Rob Portman (Ohio) signed on to the letter to Sessions.
The senators added in their letter Tuesday that they’ve “read with increasing alarm” media reports of immigrant children being separated from their parents.
Ted Cruz
The Texas Tribune reports Ted Cruz introduces legislation to keep immigrant families together after they cross the border.
That’s 14.
Rand Paul
KFVS News reports Both parties move to stop Trump Administration from separating migrant families.
Republican Sen. Rand Paul released a statement that read, “I strongly support enforcing our immigration laws, securing our border, and protecting our country. At the same time, I oppose the government separating families.”
That’s 15.
There may be more that I do not know about. The rest are fools or cowards afraid to speak out.
Cowardly Response
This was the cowardly response from Homeland Security: Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said Monday it was up to Congress to pass legislature to end the policy of separating children from their parents as part of the country’s overall immigration procedure.
Excuse me for asking again.
Dear Mr. President
Instead of blaming the Democrats, why don’t you just issue an executive order? Executive orders don’t seem to be foreign to you.
By the way, 13 Republican Senators believe you can do this by yourself. Not only do they believe this can be fixed by executive order, they are explicitly asking you to do just that!
Let the Taunts Begin
In response to my last post on this subject, I received the expected jackass responses. One person asked me to take in refugees.
Clearly that person cannot read because I never said, “Let them in.” Rather, I said, “Don’t separate families.”
Another commented on abortion and my crocodile tears. I replied the subjects are not the same and I do not accept his definition of personhood.
A third person commented on the “rule of law,” and I politely pointed out that slavery was once the rule of law.
So keep the inane comments coming. I will reply to them as time fits.
But before making inane comments I advise re-reading Trump’s Immoral Immigration Tactics: What’s the Libertarian View?
Oh Well
I expect this:
https://twitter.com/hussmanjp/status/1009207410014158849
That’s always the risk. And it has happened to me numerous times.
Like Hussman, I prefer to state my views and let the consequences be damned.
I do not play politics. I state my views.
Addendum
As expected, this did not take long:
Mike “Mish” Shedlock
“Think of the children?????”
“Yes, I would like for them to still have a somewhat functional country where they are in the clear majority by the time they’re adults.”
“NO! Not YOUR children! OTHER people’s children!”
Mish why are you falling for or promoting this fake news and distortion of the issue??
The US have been invaded by these people’s for 40 years and everyone in the media and elites have been complicit. Anyone crossing the border should be punished. PERIOD. Everything else is obfuscation.
Just look at what the Mexcian Presidential candidate said this week.
Immigration is about sharing in the exploitation of the country, not sharing in the building or maintaining it.
Access to White people is not a human right
Fox threatened to legalize drugs and the Bush people got hysterical. the cartels sell drugs to rich Americans, it would be like gangsters in the 30s when no one in Chicago could afford (or wanted) bootleg whisky and it all went to Canada. you get stuck with the violence and lawlessness and corruption. its really hypocritical to make those statements about coming here ‘legally’, when the system is stacked against the immigrants path to naturalization. The same thing happened prior to W2 with Japanese immigrants who had been here 20-30 years because the law was an obstacle to citizenship, so when w2 broke out they shipped them all to camps and stole their land.
So, what’s the way forward? Excuse Trump because someone else did it?
If being horrible because someone else was horrible is the argument, this does nothing to raise standards.
And the whole promise of Trump was, somehow, elect a walking lawsuit and multiple bankrupt who ruined countless businesses — because this would raise standards.
Before anyone takes my anti-Trumpism as equating to pro-Hillary: wrong, Wrong, WRONG. They were both terrible candidates.
We need to get rid of this binary, tribal thinking – “the sins of my leader are fine, just so long as it’s not your leader in charge.” Because a large proportion of the electorate was unhappy with either candidate and voted with a pinched nose, fingers crossed and a winced expression.
If we hurt children, we are nothing.
According to the Guardian (if it can be believed – I chose a left-wing source on purpose) Obama’s enforcement of immigration law was akin to his persecution of whistleblowers: absolutely merciless.
The problem I see with this is not the criticism of the practice of separating children from their parents – let us grant that this should not be done unless it is obvious that the children concerned are in danger for some reason.
But it is definitely not “Trump’s policy” – it has been firmly established US policy for many years. In other words, it is a concerted media campaign over a topic the US mainstream media curiously never cared to mention under Obama – but it was reported elsewhere. Here are several articles from the left-wing UK Guardian in 2015, complaining about the Obama administration’s “record deportations”, “sending asylum seekers to their deaths” and of course “separating families”.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jan/08/parents-us-citizens-deported-despite-immigration-reform
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/oct/12/obama-immigration-deportations-central-america
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/aug/22/immigrant-children-detention-california-judge
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/oct/14/altar-mexico-how-the-migrant-oasis-for-would-be-border-crossers-became-a-trap
https://www.theguardian.com/global/2015/may/17/deported-to-mexico-immigration-america
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jan/26/migrant-children-border-patrol-ice-boxes
I would note Trump has now ended the practice via executive order – Obama never did anything comparable.
Thanks Realist – I deeply appreciate that! I speak my mind. One is free to disagree, but I am honest.
That’s what I like about Trump as president though. Everyone hates him so much they highlight every wrong doing – as they should with any president /administration / government. Unfortunately, when they like the president they are quite happy to cover up the same thing. As we know, this has been happening for a long time but no one really cared when it was not Trump. It’s not like they didn’t have evidence and even photos of this from during the Obama administration. That’s my observation as someone not from or in the US. I like that now everyone sees things for what they are and has been for a long time. The stupidity though is once Trump is out, it’ll probably be back to not mattering.
JavaMe – The difference is Obama chose to not enforce the law. Trump could have done the same. Or he could have issued an executive order as 15 Republican senators demanded. He did neither.
Dear Mish McCain,
How is this situation different from what was going on under Obama administration during the liberal media blackout? DHS is overwhelmed trying to find a place for all these illegals. Even worse now since immigration has become so political, Soros and others are funding their trip to the border. All designed to embarrass the Trump administration going into the midterms. Seems the strategy is working…
These ppl show up in the USA because their own govts are corrupt. The most impactful thing America could do is legalize drugs and take away the drug money that corrupts.
And NAFTA destroyed the rural Mexican’s ability to live off of farming by flooding their market with American Ag products.
The Swamp is where both parties LUV them some cheap labor!!!! And make no mistake about it, illegal immigration is ALL about the cheap labor.
Come here legally and you can enter peacefully. Break our laws, and you are treated as the criminal that you are.
“No asylum requests are accepted or even looked at.” I don’t believe US has shut down legal asylum. Btw, there is an annual ceiling for the number of legal admissions. The FY2018 ceiling is 45k.
Best and most accurate comment In the set: Jon Sellers
“Congress can change the law. Trump could apply different enforcement procedures for parents with children, as did prior administrations.
But you’re not going to change any minds here. There has always been a dark underbelly to the American population.”
Precisely – Trump purposely manufactured this crisis
I really wish you would read and think. They effectively shut the damn bridge. People standing on the bridge for days in 103 degree heat. No asylum requests are accepted or even looked at.
“want a change – vote for Trump” – by Mish.
Manufactured? Yes, by Trump. Obama chose to not separate families. Trump chose the opposite.
Because they are human beings, and we don’t treat them as property.
“It is important to understand the real issue. Children are being tortured to push forward resolution of a political issue.”
I saw a photo of children at one of the centers. A classroom setting. None of the children looked as if they were either traumatized or tortured.
I know the children can not be charged with a crime(stupid law!). But since they were used in the commission of a crime why not use civil asset forfeiture to seize them?
we all know “The Law is an Ass”, and in this case, so is the Executive branch
Interesting, 43 had an immigration agreement with Congressional Democrats but House Republicans shot it down. I understand why they hate hispanics, they come here illegally and vote illegally for left leaning, Marxist candidates (their thoughts not mine) I know how it works, I live in ca49. The real situation is more nuanced but this simple approach defies gravity. Immigration was already slowing due to better economic conditions in Mexico (say goodbye Nafta and hello to more immigrants) and 45s billion dollar wall is nothing compared to 43s TRILLION dollar wall. (They always choose San Diego to kick this off) Now the real immigration problem is not Mexico but violence in Central America, which is deeply rooted in US foreign policy, and spawned MS13. When these people show up at our border it means foreign policy is not working, which applies exponentially to Europe where a disparate union manages a much larger and more potentially violent problem with a lot more humanity and understanding. Greenspan once said we have to liberalize immigration to find workers for the new American manufacturing jobs, and he meant legal immigration.A lot of otherwise legal Americans still carry green cards, the system is a travesty. The real immigration problem is the opposite of what you think, millions of Americans would like to move to Mexico, with about 1/3 the US population and fewer regulations and taxes you can live a free life down there, (free from the IRS, free from Trump, free at last) however Mexico has its owns obstacles to immigration, and so we need an agreement which takes both sides into account.
Thank you for taking the principled stand Mish. Our federal laws do not allow children to be placed with parents when parents have been detained for legal reasons. This law is of course intended for American citizens who have broken federal laws where you have other parents or relatives to place the child. Using it in the manner the current administration is using it is deplorable. The law has been on the books forever (you don’t want kids hanging out in prisons) and Mr. Trump has decided to enforce it in an especially egregious manner. Congress can change the law. Trump could apply different enforcement procedures for parents with children, as did prior administrations.
But you’re not going to change any minds here. There has always been a dark under-belly to the American population. Maybe all societies have one. I don’t know. And as a Libertarian writer, you’re going to attract a conservative crowd that isn’t really libertarian, but isn’t sure of the difference. So you are going to get a lot of ugly, poorly informed responses.
As a communitarian conservative (anti-big gov and anti-big business) I’ll save my ugly, poorly informed responses for your libertarian economic posts! Have a great day and keep up the good work.
So Mish, if the kids are not separated, where do they go? Are you advocating letting the entire family into the U.S. to roam free just like before?
Let’s see – 15 nominally Republican Senators took time out from addressing the unsustainable deficit they have created to lambast President Trump for enforcing laws that they themselves passed. Is there any surprise that President Trump has about ten times higher support from US Citizens than Congress?
This whole media storm was so obviously created by the Deep State/Lame Stream Media to distract from the revelations in the OIG report. The surprise is that Mish was fooled by this transparent attempt to change the subject. Not one of Mish’s finest hours.
It’s hard to believe that some group isn’t suing to stop this policy. The courts would probably put an end to it.
Exactly- the foster care system does not do a very good job as it is currently. It is the only thing we have now though for dealing with neglect and abuse cases. Why would we voluntarily add to that system yet another population of children kidnapped from their parents. I would expect equivalent poor results from processing these children through the foster care system. In the case of toddlers and infants especially I would expect many to lose their family and childhood permanently – This is the wrong thing to do.
So where oh where is the moral outrage at 100,000 CITIZEN CHILDREN being held from their parents for nothing more than an ALLEGATION of wrong doing?
This immigrant story is manufactured outrage just to get Trump….
Ok I didn’t want to post this entire snip from The Atlantic reference above but I think it is necessary:
“Professor Paul Chill of the University of Connecticut School of Law explained the stakes in a 2004 scholarly article:
On an average day, police officers and child-welfare caseworkers throughout the UnitedStates remove more than seven hundred children from the custody of their parents to protect them from alleged abuse or neglect. These children are typically seized without warning from their homes or schools, subjected to intrusive interrogations, medical examinations and/or strip searches, and forced to live in foster homes or group residences while the legal system sorts out their future…
Removals can be terrifying experiences for children and families. Often they occur at night. Parents have little or no time to prepare children for separation. The officials conducting the removal, as well as the adults supervising the placement, are usually complete strangers to the child. Children are thrust into alien environs, separated from parents, siblings and all else familiar, with little if any idea of why they have been taken there. Such experiences may not only cause “grief, terror and feelings of abandonment” but may “compromise” a child’s very “capacity to form secure attachments” and lead to other serious problems. The trauma may be magnified when the child is actually suffering abuse or neglect in the home, and in any event it is increased when reunification with loved ones does not occur quickly.
He goes on to explain that while taking kids from parents in this fashion is only permitted in emergencies as a matter of law, the way things play out in practice is very different. “According to statistics published by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, more than 100,000 children who were
removed in 2001–more than one in three–were later found not to have been maltreated at all,” “
In case the child entering the soil of USA is not the child of the person he/she enters with I see problems…
It is important to understand the real issue. Children are being tortured to push forward resolution of a political issue. It may be effective but it is still the wrong thing to do. Like so many things is shows how far our values have deteriorated. I can think of many alternative policies to forward resolution of this issue that don’t involve child torture.
“Mish, this time you’ve really triggered the Trumplings by disparaging their object of worship.”
Obviously, you have been triggered, calling Trump supporters names.
Mish, this time you’ve really triggered the Trumplings by disparaging their object of worship. Aside from the usual trumple tantrums, I wonder how many outright threats you’re gonna get?
What is despicable is that the democrats refuse to legislate a fix to the illegal immigration problem. Democrats proved that they don’t really care about the children.
Leave it to the government to come up with the least productive and most expensive policy to resolve an issue. Put the families on a nice bus with a package of residency application papers to fill out and send them home to wait for a call from nearest US embassy inviting them to come to USA. No change to law necessary just a budget for bus tickets. Has to be cheaper than kidnapping their children and placing them in foster care while locking up the parents. Of course the larger issue is why so many people think government kidnapping of children is acceptable policy.
This is not new policy and nobody seemed to care when Obama did it now it’s a problem. If he whips out his pen and cell phone for every problem we have a new emperor in town. Also he is doing nothing to break up families they are doing it to themselves by coming here. Try going to Europe or Mexico and getting a job and welfare. They will have you on a plane with a one way ticket so fast your head will spin.
I agree that they should not be separated. Any family that gets caught here illegally should be expelled post haste. No daycare freebies.
Immigrant parents taking advantage of laws passed decades ago that were never properly enforced by previous administrations. I’m sick and tired of hearing the phrase ‘undocumented’ immigrants instead of the correct term ‘ illegal’. Send all families back across the border and let them apply and wait for legal admission into the United States. This whole thing is a sob story to get the liberal agenda of amnesty voted into law. A total crock of sh-t. We didn’t hear much squawking when this situation was going on during the Obama administration. Trump has decided to get tough when other administrations were too politically correct to offend any potential voter base. It’s about time.
They should change the law to immediate deportation of the entire family. The refugee provision is misused with lawyers coaching illegal aliens how to answer the questions correctly.
The real issue is how Trump handled the situation. Instead of blaming the democrats, he should have stated the policy is the same as it was under the previous administration and he would work on changing the policy.
I believe we need to reinstate the policies of the Obama administration on this one.
Yeah, it’s so terrible when irresponsible parents break the law, are arrested and prosecuted and thus separated from their children, like the millions of American citizens that are in prison and thus separated from their (millions of) children. Of course, the children in question, those of people who recently crossed the border illegally, are only separated from their parents for a few hours or at most a couple of days, but it is still quite irresponsible of those parents. There are 2,000 such children. There are another 10,000 children, in the care of HHS, whose parents abandoned them and sent them on a death march across Mexico to the USA; what great parents.
Wake up, Mish; you are smarter than this.
First, make sure only criminals are “criminals.” If Moses’ Boss didn’t consider it a crime, who the heck is some self promoting, tax feeding slimeball to do so? Then, make sure the parent is properly, by a full criminal process including jury of peers, found guilty.
Then, if one parent has to go to jail, the kid stays with the other. If both go to jail, ask mom and/or dad who (s)he wants kids to stay with for the duration. Then ask whether the designate accepts. Rinse and repeat until a match is found. Mom and dad both dead? Nearest relative who accepts the responsibility. Search VERY broadly. It ain’t that hard in the age of genetic fingerprinting.
Parents have been dying in much greater numbers all throughout history and geography. Kids are taken care of. No tax feeders needed. Just as they aren’t needed for anything else, either.
Karl lays it out correctly as usual here… http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=233653
In fact I am also against Presidential pardons and the like (In India we pardon bandits and rapists and make them legislators too…). Then why have judicial process and convict the guy. You break the law you pay the price. Period. There is nothing else to it. Playing on emotions cannot change the cold fact that you broke the law.
IMO, as it is the bad guys make law-abiding guys’ life tough. To top it, you create drama and make out the guys who follow the law as the bad guys is really hard to stomach.
hhhmmm, I didn’t notice a destroyed kid’s life. Apparently Moms are OK with this. Maybe their lives were getting destroyed before they came? Are we just puppets of a hell bent media? Please, try to be sure.
Not that I really know what is happening in all this immigration business but the following sentence needs clearing up: “you really do not care how many kids lives you destroy”. Destroy for good? Killing them? Placing them in some sort of a childcare? When talking about kids it is easy to get emotional. Parents are putting them in danger crossing the Mediterranean to Europe in shaky unseaworthy vehicles. Many drown. Main aim is to get to the social benefits and free life. In USA this immigration problem seems to drag on for decades if not longer and everybody suffer. What is not said often is that these immigrants do the dirty and dangerous jobs with very little pay and no security. The employers don’t want to pay decent salaries since they can be exploited. That is the real issue here. This sad sidetrack is just a part of a bigger problem. Not that I am for Trump policies here but hard action might end the whole illegal entry to the USA. When people willing to enter realise what might happen the end for this illegal activity might come sooner than expected.
This crisis strikes me as manufactured. Our whole Asylum process is a mess. I doubt most voters are even paying attention.