How much is your kid worth? What’s the value you put on your family?
What if the U.S. government kidnapped your child? What if you and your child both suffered years of trauma because of the separation, and your family never recovered? What if you contemplated suicide, or even attempted it?
Would you pipe down and go away for a cash settlement of, say, $450,000? Too low? Name your price.
Maybe you find the whole question offensive. A lot of Americans seem deeply offended by media reports that the Biden Justice Department is in the midst of negotiating legal settlements with hundreds of migrant families who are suing the U.S. government because their children—including toddlers and babies—were snatched by Uncle Sam at the U.S.-Mexico border during the Trump administration.
When asked about those reports last week, President Biden first declared they were “garbage,” and “not true.” Less than 24 hours after that, Biden was on board, insisting that the families were due some restitution—though perhaps not the $450,000 figure that’s been widely bandied about.
“If in fact, because of the outrageous behavior of the last administration, you were coming across the border, whether it was legal or illegal, and you lost your child,” he said, “you deserve some kind of compensation, no matter what the circumstance.”
The families are being represented by lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union, who have been meticulous in documenting the litany of disgusting abuses these poor people were subjected to for the unpardonable sin of wanting to be part of the American melting pot.
For instance, there was never any attempt by the Trump administration to communicate to either parent or child the whereabouts of either party. In some cases, it was many months or up to a year before parent and child were reunited. And even when they were, the child often didn’t recognize the parent and recoiled from their touch. Other parents never saw their children again, as their offspring wound up in foster care.
Even with lawyers, jury consultants, law professors and former federal procedures saying that the nearly half-million-dollar payments could be a bargain compared to letting jurors decide what a family is worth, there are still obstinate Americans saying “No way, Jose!” They’re offended by the idea of even a nickel going to any illegal immigrant, no matter how egregiously they were wronged.
What offends me—and what should damn well offend us all—is the idea that it’s the dollars and cents, rather than the cruelty and incompetence, that’s sent many of our countrymen into a rage.
Thousands of migrant families—including some from Central America seeking refugee status—were apprehended at the U.S.-Mexico border, and their kids taken from them and put in cages. No lawyers, no hearing, no immigration judge. Just a snatch and grab.
When critics reflexively insist that all these people came here “illegally,” they don’t know what the hell they’re talking about.
The process of applying for asylum is 100 percent legal. Whether the Trump administration gave those claims a hearing or not is irrelevant. We don’t know if these people were legal or illegal, undocumented or refugees. We’ll never know.
It reminds me of what the George W. Bush administration did to U.S. citizens who were terror suspects after the Sept 11 attacks. It declared them “enemy combatants” so they could be tortured without the protection of either the Geneva Conventions or the U.S. Constitution.
That’s cheating. The U.S. government can’t rig the game, in order to escape accountability for mistreating human beings.
Family separation of migrants was the express policy of both the Obama and Trump administrations. Both were guilty of breaking apart families at the border—Obama in 2014, and Trump in 2018. But Trump and his ghoulish attorney general, Jeff Sessions, were more honest and open about it, saying publicly that the kid-snatching was intended to “deter” future migrants from making the trek north.
Worse, Trump and co. never had a plan to reunite the families. They couldn’t put Humpty Dumpty back together again. But whether they realized it or not, they took responsibility for all these children when they ripped them from their parents’ bosoms.
In many cases—as many as 5,500 instances, according to the ACLU—the parent was deported and the child stayed in the U.S., either in detention facilities or placed in foster care to be raised by strangers. There have also been ghastly reports of children sexually assaulted while in custody, including by guards working for the U.S. taxpayer. Even today, under the Biden administration, thousands of children remain in detention facilities run by the Department of Health and Human Services.
This horror show is happening on our dime. Sleep with that, America.
Even after hearing all of the above, many Americans just shrug. Unbothered. Uncaring. Unmoved.
But mention money, the possibility that these families might get a big settlement because debts have to be paid—and sins too—and what happens? Those same Americans go ballistic.
Snap out of it, folks. This isn’t about gaming out possible jury awards, or “rewarding” behavior that may or may have been unlawful. This isn’t even about money, even if that is all that some people see.
It certainly isn’t about what some Republicans claim it is: incentivizing future illegal immigration. That’s just stupid. What parent in their right mind would see any of this rampant abuse as an incentive to do anything but jump off a bridge?
This is about morality. Americans are faced with a moral crisis.
What happened to the “woke” liberals who talk a good game about having compassion and pursuing social justice? Where did they go?
What about law-and-order conservatives who preach about accountability and taking responsibility for our mistakes? Anyone seen them?
Our government committed an unspeakable wrong. Shame on us if we don’t at least try to make it right. Money isn’t enough. But it’s all we have to offer these poor people, along with the regret and remorse of what ought to be an embarrassed nation.