The latest contemptible effort of leftists within and without the Catholic Church to use kids to batter down the borders of the US is put into proper context by Rich Lowry at National Review Online:
The Trump administration isn’t changing the rules that pertain to separating an adult from the child. Those remain the same. Separation happens only if officials find that the adult is falsely claiming to be the child’s parent, or is a threat to the child, or is put into criminal proceedings.
It’s the last that is operative here. The past practice had been to give a free pass to an adult who is part of a family unit. The new Trump policy is to prosecute all adults. The idea is to send a signal that we are serious about our laws and to create a deterrent against re-entry. (Illegal entry is a misdemeanor, illegal re-entry a felony.)
When a migrant is prosecuted for illegal entry, he or she is taken into custody by the U.S. Marshals. In no circumstance anywhere in the U.S. do the marshals care for the children of people they take into custody. The child is taken into the custody of HHS, who cares for them at temporary shelters.
The criminal proceedings are exceptionally short, assuming there is no aggravating factor such as a prior illegal entity or another crime. The migrants generally plead guilty, and they are then sentenced to time served, typically all in the same day, although practices vary along the border. After this, they are returned to the custody of ICE.
If the adult then wants to go home, in keeping with the expedited order of removal that is issued as a matter of course, it’s relatively simple. The adult should be reunited quickly with his or her child, and the family returned home as a unit. In this scenario, there’s only a very brief separation.
Where it becomes much more of an issue is if the adult files an asylum claim. In that scenario, the adults are almost certainly going to be detained longer than the government is allowed to hold their children.
That’s because of something called the Flores Consent Decree from 1997. It says that unaccompanied children can be held only 20 days. A ruling by the Ninth Circuit extended this 20-day limit to children who come as part of family units. So even if we want to hold a family unit together, we are forbidden from doing so.
The clock ticking on the time the government can hold a child will almost always run out before an asylum claim is settled. The migrant is allowed ten days to seek an attorney, and there may be continuances or other complications.
This creates the choice of either releasing the adults and children together into the country pending the ajudication of the asylum claim, or holding the adults and releasing the children. If the adult is held, HHS places the child with a responsible party in the U.S., ideally a relative (migrants are likely to have family and friends here).
Even if Flores didn’t exist, the government would be very constrained in how many family units it can accommodate. ICE has only about 3,000 family spaces in shelters. It is also limited in its overall space at the border, which is overwhelmed by the ongoing influx. This means that — whatever the Trump administration would prefer to do — many adults are still swiftly released.
Why try to hold adults at all? First of all, if an asylum-seeker is detained, it means that the claim goes through the process much more quickly, a couple of months or less rather than years. Second, if an adult is released while the claim is pending, the chances of ever finding that person again once he or she is in the country are dicey, to say the least. It is tantamount to allowing the migrant to live here, no matter what the merits of the case.
Go here to read the rest. With thirty six years at the Bar, I find this all vastly amusing. Kids are separated from parents all the time in legal proceedings: by criminal proceedings where a parent goes to jail or prison, by juvenile proceedings where a child is placed in juvenile detention, by intervention by child protective services, by orders of protection usually initiated by one parent against another, by divorce proceedings. If the idiots who have compared the usually brief separation of parents and kids at the border to actions of the Nazis were serious, there would be much to be outraged over by the way our legal system handles hundreds of thousands of cases each and every day. Of course these are not serious people, but rather Leftists attempting to use ginned-up outrage to accomplish what they could not accomplish at the ballot box. That our Bishops in the US have signed on to this unfunny farce says all that needs to be said about our hapless bench of Bishops.
Yep, just like a concentration camp if you squint real hard and remove your brains.
What bothers me most is not that these people (USCCB included) play politics–because they do, but mostly that the masses that believe this farce either, also play politics, or belong to the most anti-intelligent cult going, the cult of the three monkeys; see no evil, hear no evil….
Seeking the truth in all things apparently is no longer a Catholic duty?
I still remember an argument I once had with a past pastor, it was over some liberal thing, I don’t remember exactly the subject. But I do remember my pastor at the time exclaiming “I follow the USCCB!”, I thought that exceedingly strange, there’s no mention of the USCCB in the Gospels.
Than you for this.
I have the solution!
Put the children and their parents on air-conditioned buses and drive then south of the border, where they came from.
As with everything from the left, this is “. . . is a tale told by idiots, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” MacBeth
At Mass yesterday we were subjected to no less than five separate “prayers of the faithful” bemoaning the terrible sin of “separating families at the border”, no doubt written for us by the geniuses at the USCCB. No prayers for the safety of law enforcement personnel attempting to defend our borders, of course. Can’t recall ever hearing one of those.
I’m wondering, did others have to endure this political farce in the midst of the Sunday liturgy?
Bravo, T. Shaw, great suggestion. After I posted my earlier comment I saw one elsewhere proposing that the students at the Ivy League schools be evicted from their dormitories and put in tents while “migrant families”are housed in the dorms. That would be amusing, although why stop with the Ivy League? 🙂
Thank you for the information provided here regarding a situation that is, once again, a crisis created by leftists. Just once I would love for the Bishops in this country to talk about the responsibility the countries of origin have in creating this problem. No, it’s just so much easier to pile on hard working Americans. Most of our Bishops aren’t Catholic anymore, and I doubt they’re even Christian. They are global leftists, just like Francis. Everyone, including kids, are simply a means to their end which is power.
“I’m wondering, did others have to endure this political farce in the midst of the Sunday liturgy?”
I am wondering what is stopping the prelates from donating their citizenship, their homes, their benefits to the invading hordes? Sure, It is easy to donate what does not belong to you: the parishioners hard earned largess, but that is in collusion with the invaders, the vandals, the sackers. Isn’t it?
Let the USCCB give up their livelihood, instead of ours. Now, I will probably get excommunicated.
Thank you, Mr. McC, for summing this up so well.
Texas Thomist-
I’m in El Paso, and we had the squishy priest yesterday, so yeah. Although only one lecture about how terrible it was to remove kids from family, and we had a prayer for God to watch over those enforcing our laws, because something like 70% of the border patrol nation-wide is “latino,” and we’ve got a LOT of law enforcement centers here. (It was mildly passive-aggressive, but eh.)
At the end, Father invited everybody to a protest at the detention center. /sigh
Much easier to take after figuring out that he really is sincerely sold on all the balderdash he pushes….
That was also the reasoning behind the Texas Catholic Conference (TCC) condemning the most effective and most powerful Pro-Life Group in Texas. The TCC was more concerned about illegal immigrants with criminal backgrounds rather than innocent children.
[…] Fr. Germán Arana, the Jesuit Who Advised Pope Francis Badly – Sandro Magister, Settimo Cielo Think of the Children! – Donald R. McClarey J.D., The American Catholic Bishop: Deny Communion to Border Agents, […]
Since 1973, democrats and liberals caused more than 63 million separations of children from their mothers’ wombs. It’s OK! They employed infant-skull-crushing forceps, toxic solutions, . . .
T Shaw. I thought that too.
Add ankle bracelets and a weekly check-in requirement to the game of Catch and Release. Those are minimum requirements to demonstrate that this President is serious about suppressing illegal immigration.
Foxfier- at least you had one prayer for the law enforcement people. We didn’t even get that. I’m in the DFW area in a parish that is more orthodox than most non-TLM parishes, but we still got the full SJW treatment in the intercessory prayers. That said, the homily was strictly about fathers and fatherhood.
Interesting too is your info about the ethnic makeup of the ICE personnel at the border. Matthew Schmitz of First Things made the same point on Raymond Arroyo’s The World Over program last Thursday evening, and Arroyo said he was hearing from many agents and their families who were distraught over the Tucson bishop’s speech. I haven’t seen that anywhere in the MSM, of course.
One more thing- Arroyo also ran a clip of Cardinal Joe “Nighty-night baby” Tobin proposing that the bishops send a delegation to the border to “inspect” the activity there. I’d guess we will wait until Hell freezes over before he or any of the other bishops ever proposes a similar mission to an abortion mill.
T. Shaw, Mary De Voe – legal abortion would be eliminated within 2 to 4 years in the U.S. if the U.S. Bishops would acknowledge and inform their sheep that just like joining the Nazi Party or the KKK is a mortal sin, against the 5th Commandment, so is joining the Democrat Party for it “support and promotion of abortion. These 2 organizations’ (Nazi Party and the KKK) support and promotion of racial and religious prejudice “… hurts the feelings of our neighbor and is therefore a sin against charity. To deny any person her or his rights is a sin against justice as well as charity. This is particularly true in the case of joining an organization (such as the Nazi Party or the Ku Klux Klan) which promotes racial, ethnic or religious hatred.” (Life in Christ – A Catholic Catechism for Adults – 1995).
Self identified Catholics voted for the most pro-abortion president ever, Obama, 54% in 2008, and 50% in 2012. The self identified Catholics voted for someone who would be worse for the unborn than Obama, Hillary Clinton, 48% vrs 45% for Trump. in 2016.
For the the U.S. bishops to teach that about the Nazi Party and the KKK, and not the Democrat Party, begs the question – WHY? The Catholic Church teaching is “To deny any person her or his rights is a sin against justice as well as charity.” That is a mortal sin against the 5th Commandment. Why are the U.S. Bishops silent about this in relationship to the Democrat Party’s platform and actions in support of the murder of unborn babies, now exceeding 61,000,000 baby boys and girls? Catholics are the largest single group in the Democrat Party, some 45 years since Roe v. Wade. Our 45 President, Donald Trump, is the most pro-life President we have ever had since Ronald Reagan. Is it just a coincidence that we are in the 45th year of Roe v. Wade, and our nation has its 45th President, a President who is proving himself to be pro-life?
Rich Lowry is only partially correct about the Flores Consent Decree and subsequent clarification. Lowry is right that this Decree is guiding the current policy. But as Ilya Somin has argued, the Flores settlement does not require children to be separated from their parents. In fact, the settlement requires that the immigration office must “treat all minors in its custody with dignity, respect and special concern for their particular vulnerability as minors.” With ProPublica’s release yesterday of that audio of children crying for their parents inside a US Customs and Border facility, it raises the question, does that reflect dignity, respect, and special concern? And how does being punitive toward children, who are innocent, comport with Catholic beliefs on the dignity of the human person? It’s wrong to murder children in the womb through abortion, then it’s also wrong to torment young children in this way, especially when we do not have to do it.
Somin goes on to note that Attorney General Sessions and his allies have for years opposed any effort to make legal immigration more simple. He, therefore, bears some responsibility for this situation.
And that video you posted of the shelter tour comes directly from the U.S. government. What happened to traditional conservative skepticism of a narrative mediated by the State? These same HHS facilities have not permitted media outlets to bring their cameras inside these places. Why do you think that is? And even if they were holding these kids at Disney World, how many children do you know who would be happy under such circumstances if they had no idea where their parents were?
And you blame all of this on leftists. So, I ask you, is Laura Bush, who wrote an impassioned op-ed calling for an end to family separation, a leftist? Is Senator Ted Cruz, who yesterday introduced emergency legislation to end family separation, a leftist?
Finally, to everyone complaining about enduring prayers of the faithful during mass about the separation of families, from your descriptions, it sounds as though you view these people at the border as your enemies. Doesn’t Christ enjoin us to pray for our enemies? Therefore, what’s wrong with those petitions?
The press is ginning up great opposition to the Trump policy of prosecuting adult illegals crossing our border and holding their children in separate facilities. About 80% of the kids are coming here not accompanied by their parents in the first place but the press won’t mention that fact. I hope that the truth gets out and that this controversy doesn’t result in blue wave for the Demoncrats this November. We’re on the brink of losing our country and President Trump is our last chance to save it. Let’s pray that he is successful!
. “Why do you think that is?”
Probably to protect the privacy of the minors, especially considering the litigiousness of illegal alien advocates.
“it raises the question, does that reflect dignity, respect, and special concern?”
Sure it does, especially considering that they will be ultimately re-united with their parents, unless the parents are held on criminal charges. Let us be honest however, the kids are there only because the parents thought they would give them a chance to be release on their own recognizance into the US pending a hearing on their amnesty petition, a hearing they would in all likelihood not appear for. This is a transparent ploy of the open borders crowd.
“So, I ask you, is Laura Bush, who wrote an impassioned op-ed calling for an end to family separation, a leftist?”
She is pro-abortion and pro gay marriage. The only thing she has ever given conservatives is contemptuous silence.
“So, I ask you, is Laura Bush, who wrote an impassioned op-ed calling for an end to family separation, a leftist?”
He wants 14 day amnesty hearings so that parents and kids can be held together under the time limits of the Flores decree.
“Doesn’t Christ enjoin us to pray for our enemies?”
Sure, I pray these people are hale and hearty in their own country or that they seek refuge in Mexico, as Central American “refugees” were required to do under international law.
“Probably to protect the privacy of the minors, especially considering the litigiousness of illegal alien advocates.”
You know that the media would appropriately protect the privacy of minors through edits and blurring out faces. The fact of the matter is that you are uncritically accepting a video that the government gave you. I doubt you’d be so accepting of such a video if it were the Obama HHS.
” Let us be honest however, the kids are there only because the parents thought they would give them a chance to be release on their own recognizance into the US pending a hearing on their amnesty petition, a hearing they would in all likelihood not appear for. This is a transparent ploy of the open borders crowd.”
No, these migrants are not partisans of the open borders crowd. They are fleeing threats of violence and actual violence that was done to them in their home countries. Our government has made the choice to split them up when they come. We can adjudicate their cases without employing such a cruel measure that punishes innocent children. And because you brought up open borders, that’s usually employed as a scare tactic that these “brown hordes” are going to come across the border, steal jobs, and vote Democrat. Why is that accepted as a natural fact of life? It wasn’t that long ago that some Republicans said that Hispanics are much more at home in the Republican party given their faith commitments, work ethic, and the way they value family. In a country where unemployment is currently at historic lows, why not let them in, use a system of e-verify to root out the undocumented, and compete for their votes? How does the status quo, where it appears that we hate them for being brown, serve us while also according with the respect we should show to everyone?
“He [Senator Cruz] wants 14 day amnesty hearings so that parents and kids can be held together under the time limits of the Flores decree.”
You have correctly described this conservative senator’s bill, which would end family separation. Do you oppose that? Do you think we should keep the current policy in place?
“Sure, I pray these people are hale and hearty in their own country or that they seek refuge in Mexico, as Central American “refugees” were required to do under international law.”
Many have applied for asylum in Mexico. But reports have shown that Mexican officials discourage people from applying and mangle the application process. The fact of the matter is that United States has obligations toward refugees and asylum seekers, too.
You know that the media would appropriately protect the privacy of minors through edits and blurring out faces.
No, considering the irresponsibility of the media on display each and every day I do not know that.
No, these migrants are not partisans of the open borders crowd.
Their advocates in this country certainly are. The illegal aliens believe they have a right to jump to the front of the immigration line and come live in the US. They are wrong. It is for the American people to determine our immigration laws. If you favor open borders, convince people and change laws and do not attempt to backdoor it by aiding massive illegal immigration.
“But reports have shown that Mexican officials discourage people from applying and mangle the application process.”
Boy isn’t that a surprise! The Mexican government aids Central American illegal aliens to trek through their country to get to the US, and why not. The Mexican government has been exporting its poor to the US for generations. Uncle Sucker should not tolerate this for a second longer.
So, if a parent of a child ever committs any crime – we should just never jail them because that would be so cruel to the child, eh? Doesn’t matter how vicious say… a drug dealer or gang member is – if they have a child, it’s a get-out-of-jail free card because we can’t “torment” them.
And what do we do with the children in those facilities who’s parents aren’t here? Turn them back over to the cartels? Let the coyotes have them? That you believe every case is so cookie cutter shows how little you really know.
Nate Winchester
“So, if a parent of a child ever committs any crime – we should just never jail them because that would be so cruel to the child, eh? Doesn’t matter how vicious say… a drug dealer or gang member is – if they have a child, it’s a get-out-of-jail free card because we can’t “torment” them.”
I never said that the parent of any child who commits a crime should never go to jail. It’s just that in those cases, even when the parent is a drug dealer or a gang member, the children are left in the custody of relatives or guardians selected by the family. Also, children in such cases know where their parents are and can visit them according to the policies of the particular jail or prison. These children themselves are not housed in detention facilities with no clue where their parents are. So no, I don’t believe in a get-out-of jail free card in these cases. Currently, the first time offense of crossing the border illegally is a misdemeanor with a penalty of either 6 months in prison or a small fine. I don’t think punishing people for a misdemeanor necessitates splitting up families when we don’t have to do it.
“And what do we do with the children in those facilities who’s parents aren’t here? Turn them back over to the cartels? Let the coyotes have them? That you believe every case is so cookie cutter shows how little you really know.”
For unaccompanied minors, I certainly do not believe we should turn them back over to the cartels or coyotes. I think their cases should be adjudicated fairly and for those whose cases have merit, they should either be placed with relatives, which many unaccompanied minors already have in the U.S. or appropriately placed in the foster care system. Those whose cases do not have merit should be safely returned to family in their country of origin. I hope what I’ve said here demonstrates that I do not believe every case is so cookie cutter. Moreover, I actually believe the current zero-tolerance policy is cookie cutter because it bluntly separates families without discretion.
I never said that the parent of any child who commits a crime should never go to jail. It’s just that in those cases, even when the parent is a drug dealer or a gang member, the children are left in the custody of relatives or guardians selected by the family.
IF such is available. If they are not (like say… you’re in a foreign country) they would be put where?
Also, children in such cases know where their parents are and can visit them according to the policies of the particular jail or prison.
Yeah, I’ve known so many children that can tell me the address of the local jail. /sarc Heck in most cases they barely can recite their own address.
And you know those jail visit policies don’t take into account when children want to visit, right? So if it’s say… 9pm and the kid’s crying for daddy – guess what? They just get to keep crying.
These children themselves are not housed in detention facilities with no clue where their parents are. So no, I don’t believe in a get-out-of jail free card in these cases.
No, you just apparently believe in a fantasy world where children are never heartbroken by the criminal justice system or inconvenienced. Or that the current scofflaws are apparently held in super-special jails that don’t have visiting hours.
Currently, the first time offense of crossing the border illegally is a misdemeanor with a penalty of either 6 months in prison or a small fine. I don’t think punishing people for a misdemeanor necessitates splitting up families when we don’t have to do it.
Or! And here’s the fun part: they can be immediately released BACK into their home country, right away with no separation at all. Hm. I wonder why that option isn’t chosen more…
For unaccompanied minors, I certainly do not believe we should turn them back over to the cartels or coyotes. I think their cases should be adjudicated fairly and for those whose cases have merit, they should either be placed with relatives, which many unaccompanied minors already have in the U.S. or appropriately placed in the foster care system.
So what do you do with them why their cases are being examined? Where should we put those kids? What should we do with children while we’re trying to even find relatives in the country… Hm… what would you do with them?
Those whose cases do not have merit should be safely returned to family in their country of origin. I hope what I’ve said here demonstrates that I do not believe every case is so cookie cutter. Moreover, I actually believe the current zero-tolerance policy is cookie cutter because it bluntly separates families without discretion.
Oh so it’s a zero-tolerance policy now? So now you just believe that everything is instantaneous and there’s no problems with processing times or ever a challenge to contact relatives or any other of a thousand other issues which anybody with common sense could grasp is a consideration.
Pro Publica, the group that taped the children allegedly crying in a detention center, is also the group that arsoned Robert Spencer’s Jihadwatch.org by alleging that he was an Islamophobe—they pressured Paypal to drop his subscription and funding, which Paypal did immediately. Pro Publica refused to discuss matters with Spencer because they are deceitful little snipes. I doubt highly this tape, just as the “cage” photo was faked.
…
Everyone likely knows that the reason for separating the “children” generally falls into 3 main categories: the adult already has a criminal record and/or has been deported; for the safety of the minor; and the last category, the adult is not really their parent. On the tape by Pro Publica, when the ICE agent asks one child a question, the child says “Quiero ir con mi tia” (“I want to go with my ‘aunt'”. ) “Aunt”, “Uncle”, Sobrino, etc. are highly fluid terms in Latin America. It is highly doubtful that the adult is even her natural- born aunt—only DNA testing would prove that, and imagine the caterwauling by the Left if DNA testing was required (of course it should be) of asylum-seekers and their “families” (Why it should be: when the FBI actually did this in some cases on Syrian immigrants under Comey’s direction, they werent related at all: just more jive on the stupid Americans).
Don I screwed up my blockquote tags. Any chance you could straighten them out? (if not, I humbly accept my penance)