The response of outrage is the desired response. Corey Lewandowski mocking the trauma of a 10-year-old with down syndrome is part of the plan. Kirstjen Neilsen being forced out of a Mexico Restaurant in DC [Really, Mexican? I know, right] is just another optic that the Trumptarians can use to play themselves — not these 2,600 terrorized children — as the “real” victims. Just as irony-immune Portland police argued for anti-ICE protestors to allow their “employees to go home to their families” -— uh, well, why don’t you guys do it first!
But no, they won’t.
This is all the reaction that they want. Deep inside the bowels of the White House, they’re rubbing their hands together literally with glee as the shouts and the screams of terrorized and traumatized kids get louder and louder and louder.
So deep and burning is their hatred of immigrants that they feel its a good thing for everyone else to react as they have because it allows them to say “See, they’re with MS-13!”
“See, they Hate America so much they would support criminals, they want those [toddler] criminals in YOUR neighborhood — they want them INFESTING your kid's school with their crime… and their gang-ness...”
They want us to freak out, they want our anger, they want us tearing our hair out. They're giggling as we do it.
That’s the ultimate point that Rachel Maddow made last night — when she wasn’t breaking down in tears at the news of the “Tender Age” centers — that they have set up.
Maddow points out (at 13:39) that WH advisor Steven Miller was practically giddy about how upset people have become about this policy.
“The U.S. government has a sacred, solemn, inviolable obligation to enforce the laws of the United States to stop illegal immigration and to secure and protect the borders,” Mr. Miller said in a recent interview. Asked if the images of children being taken from their parents would eventually make the president back down, Mr. Miller was adamant.
“There is no straying from that mission,” he said.
…
Mr. Miller is similarly immune to critiques from establishment Republicans, who often view his immigration positions as far out of the mainstream and politically dangerous. In the recent interview, Mr. Miller dismissed as ignorant the hand-wringing of Republicans about the family separation controversy.
“You have one party that’s in favor of open borders, and you have one party that wants to secure the border,” Mr. Miller said. “And all day long the American people are going to side with the party that wants to secure the border. And not by a little bit. Not 55-45. 60-40. 70-30. 80-20. I’m talking 90-10 on that.”
This is a false choice. Either you’re for ripping toddlers away from their parents as they enter the U.S. to seek refuge and asylum from growing gang violence and corruption in Central America — or you’re for open borders and inviting MS-13 into our living rooms.
There is no middle ground.
There is supposedly no way to make rational and humane decisions to separate the wheat from the chaff, to team up with [what’s left of] the governments of Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador and do background checks on people entering to ensure that they have no criminal record in their home nations, that they really aren’t “gangster wolves in family sheep clothing” [exactly what Gangster would bring their kids with them?] trying to slip in under the wire into the U.S.
It simply can’t be done, so they’re not even going to bother trying anymore.
Everybody gets arrested, everybody gets charged, everybody — even the kids — go to “jail.” Every family gets separated, even though first-time unlawful entry into the U.S. is a misdemeanor.
I will be saying this for probably the fourth time, but this so-called “zero tolerance” policy is like arresting everyone who runs a red light. It’s like arresting everyone who makes an unlawful lane change. [ala Sandra Bland], it’s like arresting everyone who has a broken tail light. [Walter Scott, Philando Castile] or everyone who parks in the wrong spot in front of a Walgreens [Sterling Brown] and hangs around outside of a Liquor Store [Alton Sterling], or for supposed taking $5 worth of cigarillos [Michael Brown], for walking home alone in the rain [Trayvon Martin], or for daring to wave around a toy gun [Tamir Rice, Jonathon Crawford III] for knocking on the wrong door after being in a traffic accident [Jonathan Ferrell, Renishia McBride] or showing up after being invited to a pool party [Dejarria Becton]. or tackled while trying to use an ATM [James Blake], or being thrown to the ground by Officer Slam for not getting out of your seat quickly enough.
That’s what “ZERO TOLERANCE” looks like. That’s what Arrest First, think later — means. If we were really seriously implementing Zero Tolerance for all crimes, every potential criminal would be arrested on every possible arrest, all the time, everywhere. There would be no compassion, no discretion, no option other than “send them all to jail, NOW!”
But they aren’t are they?
We don’t do that with everyone. We apparently only decide that’s necessary with some people, in some places, who are accused of some misdemeanors — but not others.
And isn’t it amazing though, that none of this happens to anyone “illegally” entering from our Northern Border?
Congress may come up with a temporary ad-hoc fix to this situation on our border, as I type this Paul Ryan just announced something something or the other which the GOP House will vote on. Whether that gets through the Senate or Trump will sign it remains to be seen, although I frankly doubt it quite seriously because Trump wants all this.
He’s not going to give it up nearly so easily.
Ultimately, as Rachel points out, this will probably be solved by the courts issuing an emergency injunction against this policy as being a violation of multiple U.S. Laws — as Fox Judge Napolitano has pointed out children can’t be taken from their parents without probable cause that they are in danger — and that will be the slamming hammer that Trump can’t wriggle his way out from under.
“I think the administration is motivated by Trump’s skills of negotiating. I think he is thinking he is trying to use children to turn up the heat on the negotiators,” Napolitano said. “In my opinion, it is child abuse to separate children from their parents, unless it is necessary to save a human’s life, and that is not the case here. There is a federal statute that says you can’t separate children for more than 72 hours, and they know all of this. They are picking and choosing which rules to follow ridgedly, and which ones they wish weren’t there.”
Also based on the 1995 Flores case, children can't be held apart from their parents for more than 20 days which is also being grossly violated.
Picking and choosing which rules to follow is selective enforcement, it’s potential prosecutorial bias, a violation of due process and probable cause. Congress doesn’t really need to change this, it’s already ridiculously illegal.
But that’s going to take time while thousands of children endure a life-altering trauma, and in the meanwhile — Stephen Miller giggles.
Wednesday, Jun 20, 2018 · 2:48:03 PM +00:00 · Frank Vyan Walton
If you think that the sound of crying kids is going to melt the icy heart of the average Trumptarian — think again.
Trump supporters in Arizona insisted the president was simply enforcing the law — although no such law exits — by separating immigrant families as part of the administration’s zero-tolerance policy on illegal border crossings, reported CNN.
“He should enforce the laws like he’s doing, and our Congress needs to abide by the laws and follow the laws and enforce the laws — not go against our president,” said Ron Carroll, a 69-year-old from Mesa. “I blame it on the parents for letting it happen because they bring them up and know they can’t get across there legally.”
…
Carroll’s wife complained that media reports about traumatized children and babies were emotionally manipulative.
“I think people need to stop constantly bringing up the poor children, the poor children — the parents are the problems, they’re the ones coming in illegally,” said Madeline Carroll. “Quit trying to make us feel teary-eyed for the children. Yes, I love children a great deal, but to me, it’s up to the parents to do things rightfully and legally.”
Trump lowered the refugee cap from 75,000 to just 45,000, cut the refugee resettlement program by 25% causing over a dozen offices to close, cancelled the program that allowed unaccompanied minors to apply for asylum in their own country before reaching our border and has changed the rules from being able to apply for asylum at any point along the border to requiring people first go to a "point of entry" but that wasn’t the process until recently.
Some asylum seekers, instead of coming to a port, cross the border between ports of entry and are caught by Border Patrol agents. Some purposefully cross where they see an agent stationed to ask for help requesting asylum. Agents call these “self-surrenders.”
Border Patrol agents, like their counterparts at ports of entry, are required to ask if people they encounter are afraid to go home.
This false policy change is creating a bottle-neck at the border points of entry which actually asylum advocates argue you shouldn’t do because you can be immediately deported and can not reapply for years…
If You Must Request Asylum at the Port of Entry
The reason to avoid requesting asylum at the port of entryto the U.S. is that the inspections officers have the power to quickly find youinadmissible and deport you, in which case you will not be allowed to returnfor five years. This can happen if an inspector believes that you are making amisrepresentation (committing fraud), or misrepresented the truth when you gotyour visa, or if you do not have the proper travel or visa documents at thetime you request entry.
This quick deportation procedure is known as “summaryexclusion.” It can be applied to anyone except people entering the UnitedStates under the Visa Waiver Program (according to a 1999 decision by the Boardof Immigration Appeals).
There is an exception to the summary exclusion process forpeople who fear persecution and request asylum. So, even if you do not have theproper documents or you have made a misrepresentation, you could still beallowed to enter the U.S. if you make clear that your reason is to apply forasylum and you can show that you’d be likely to win asylum.
And then with Sessions denying asylum claims for those seeking to escape domestic and gang violence what these people are saying about doing this “rightfully and legally" is bullshit. Trump has changed the rules in mid-game specifically to catch them in a moral trap, this is his choice, his decision, not their’s.
Wednesday, Jun 20, 2018 · 5:04:30 PM +00:00 · Frank Vyan Walton
Ok, so Trump just had a round-table with Senate Republicans where he spent most of the time either trashing Democrats for being “pro-crime” or whining that they don’t want to help.
So basically Trump is Gary Sinise in Ransom, he’s the kidnapper and he's gonna pretend to be the rescuer and take the bounty money for himself. And he does seem to take after Mel Gibson's "brilliant” he-man shit-head negotiating strategy.
Trump: "If you’re weak, if you’re really really pathetically weak the country is going to be overrun with millions of people. But if you’re strong they say you have no heart.”
Obama deported Millions of people and his border patrol interdiction numbers were more than 3 times higher than Trump’s, but he didn’t separate families, so that’s Bullshit.