Discussion of immigration during the first 2020 Democratic presidential debate began with the gutting image of a father and child who drowned during a desperate attempt to cross the Rio Grande into the U.S. “Watching that image of Oscar and his daughter Valeria was heartbreaking,” said former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro. “It should also piss us all off.”
The former San Antonio mayor was unequivocal that Trump administration policy forcing asylum-seekers to wait on the Mexican side of the border for weeks, even months, resulted in these horrific deaths. “This metering policy is what basically prompted Oscar and Valeria to make that risky swim across the river,” he said. “Oscar and Valeria went to a port of entry, and then they were denied an ability to make an asylum claim. So they got frustrated, and they tried to cross the river, and they died because of that.”
Castro pledged to end the metering policy, along with the inhumane “zero tolerance” and “Remain in Mexico” policies, on the first day of his presidency. The first in the field to put forward a detailed immigration plan, his expertise was clear on this issue, and he led: “Castro demonstrated that sure-footed knowledge of the labyrinthine immigration system may be a potential winner with a Democratic audience,” The Daily Beast reported.
Only two other candidates on the stage Wednesday night, former Rep. Beto O’Rourke and Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, have also released immigration plans. Inslee, condemning the administration’s vile treatment of migrant children, said that “they should be released” to their families. Inslee touted his work protecting immigrant communities in his state, saying he was “proud” of passing a law “that prevents local law enforcement from being turned into mini-ICE agents.”
O’Rourke, meanwhile, tried to challenge Castro on his proposal to do away with a law that has been weaponized by the Trump administration to separate families at the border, but Castro remained undeterred. “The reason that they’re separating these little children from their families is that they’re using Section 1325 of that act, which criminalizes coming across the border, to incarcerate the parents, and then separate them,” he said. “Some of us on this stage have called to end that section, to terminate it.”
”Decriminalizing migration isn’t exactly the same as opening the borders,” Vox reported. “People coming to the US without papers could still be deported if they were caught and brought before an immigration judge. But it would make unauthorized immigration purely a civil offense, instead of a criminal one. The distinction matters a lot.” Nine other Democratic candidates—including two onstage that night, Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Sen. Cory Booker—currently support decriminalization. “Even moderate Tim Ryan implied he’d be open to repeal during Wednesday’s debate,” Vox reported.
O’Rourke said that he opposed repeal because he was afraid it could affect asylum-seekers and encourage traffickers. Castro, however, noted “that O’Rourke’s human trafficking concerns were already covered by other sections of the [Immigration and Nationality Act],” The Daily Beast noted. “I think you should do your homework on this issue,” Castro said. “If you did your homework on this issue, you would know that we should repeal this section.”
Booker connected the issue of family separation at the border to family separation within the U.S. “Folks should understand that the separation of children from families doesn’t just go on at our border,” he said to audible cheers from audience members. “It happens in our communities as ICE are ripping away parents from their American children, spouses from the like, and are creating fear in cities all across this country, where parents are afraid to even drop their kids off at school or go to work. We must end those policies as well.”
Just this week, a federal judge halted the imminent deportation of an immigrant who faced being separated from her two U.S.-born citizen children at at any moment. ICE targeted Alma Santiago for deportation even though she’s pregnant, leaving her advocates to fear she would miscarry after becoming sick in custody. While she’s still detained, the judge’s order gives her more time to continue fighting her case as advocates also fight to free her.
It must be again noted that of the candidates onstage that night, only three—Castro, Inslee, and O’Rourke—have offered full and detailed immigration proposals, and Warren has put forward a detailed plan to end private detention. When it comes to Thursday night’s debate, only former Vice President Joe Biden and Sen. Kamala Harris have put forward policy proposals with details (if I have missed someone, please correct me!). Candidates last night humanized this issue, but when immigrant families are in need of protection and innocent children are languishing, the field must keep going—and Castro is showing the way.