Borders Aren't Racist Part 2: Why 20 Days?

Part 1 here.

Since the original Flores Agreement didn't mention 20 days, why do people keep saying that?  Well, the initial agreement didn't state anything about a length of time that children should be released, but DHS was sued for breaching that agreement in 2015.  Here's a short summary of how we got from 'kids are placed at the least restrictive level of detainment' to 'release all kids at 20 days'.

20 Days

In 2015, DHS wanted to modify the agreement because it had been 20 years, and the influx of unaccompanied minors had risen to insane levels (in 2014, almost 69,000 unaccompanied minors were caught by Border Patrol Agents) and the recent phenomenon of families illegally crossing the border en masse (38,000 more accompanied minors).  The Flores Agreement was made at a time when 130 beds being filled by kids was 'an emergency', and in 2014, it had risen to 110,000.  Thanks, Obama.

The Judge Gee's response  referenced Flores and other laws extensively, but still doesn't mandate that every child is released after 20 days: "Families who are determined to have a credible fear or reasonable fear by DHS will be released under this provision as expeditiously as possible (in light of necessary screenings and assessments that reflect legitimate government interests) and in any case within an average of 20 days from the day that such families arrive in ICE custody." (highlighting mine)

The following time isn't included in that 20 days:
"b. The following time will not count against the time within which release must occur:

     (i) Any time in ICE custody before the families have expressed a fear of persecution or torture if returned to their country of origin.
    (ii) The time between a negative credible fear or reasonable fear determination by DHS and a finding of credible fear or reasonable fear by the EOIR.
    (iii)Time requested by the family or counsel to adjourn or delay the credible fear or reasonable fear interview or service of the determination by DHS.
    (iv) Any time where exceptional circumstances, such as natural disasters or medical emergencies,  preclude conducting credible or reasonable fear interviews."

In addition, "3. Consistent with Paragraph 14 of the Agreement, if Defendants determine that there are no conditions under which release is appropriate, or if a family does not meet the conditions of release set by Defendants [DHS, INS] or by EOIR, the family may remain in an ICE Family Residential Center."  

Another example, "Recognizing the principle of family unity, in cases where only an accompanied child (but not the accompanying parent) is determined to have a credible or reasonable fear or is otherwise placed in removal proceedings under 8 U.S.C. § 1229a, the accompanied child may, in Defendants’ discretion, remain with the accompanying parent if the parent so requests until the accompanying parent’s release or removal. If Defendants determine that the accompanying parent will not be released, Defendants will consider the preferences of the accompanying parent and, in the case of a child aged 14 years or older, the preference of such child."

What discretion do they have?  That's also in the order: "In determining whether to release, Defendants shall determine whether any family member poses an unreasonable risk of flight, a danger to themselves or to others, or a threat to national security".

Now, why would the government like to hold them rather than immediately release them?  Well, there's a few public safety reasons.  They want to vet the people coming in so that they can determine who is coming in.  They want to perform health check ups and vaccinate anyone who will be released into the US.  Our government has largely wiped out Polio, Smallpox, Measles, Diphtheria and more with vaccines.  The Americans most at risk are the ones who haven't been vaccinated and are susceptible to diseases which have been wiped out in this country.  Finally, there's the compassionate side which wants to ensure that they are not being released into terrible situations, at least they're safe in these detention centers.  

The TVPRA adds another layer of bureaucracy to the mix with extra provisions related to human trafficking. 


Part 3 here.

Borders Aren't Racist Part 1: Flores Consent Agreement

    I had a dozen conversations with people about illegal immigration and detainment on the Southern border in one week alone.  There has been a lot of fact checking and reading legal documents filled  to look up what various things meant.  The amount of documents and legal rulings involved in just the issue of how illegal immigrants and kids are treated at the border is quite staggering.  It's no surprise that the government moves glacially slow with how many different documents and agreements have to be checked before anything can happen.  I would guess that the amount of material to read is just a part of why Congressional Democrats don't want to touch immigration policy.

    Democrats have claimed that parent/child separations at the border are THE proof that Trump's racist, that Jeff Sessions is racist, and that anyone who doesn't hate Trump is literally a Nazi.  Republicans claimed that a law was passed in 1997 ordering family separations, and Trump has nothing he can do.  Both are wrong.

    Jeff Sessions started a 'zero tolerance' illegal immigration policy, so that every adult caught trying to enter the country illegally would be prosecuted for breaking the law.  Great move by him, ending the amnesty train.  The problem is that with increased familial illegal immigration, the kids weren't to be kept with adults (just like any other time where parents break the law), and that is now a big deal because Trump is in office.  It happened for every administration the last 20 years.

    There is a 'perfect storm' south of the border, and our government, historically, has made vocal promises that illegal immigrants might get amnesty.  Drug violence in Mexico, Honduras, and El Salvador; the socialist implosion in Venezuela and the influx of starving immigrants into Colombia.  Adding more potential trouble is the recent Mexican election, which saw Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (AMLO) win the Presidency, after saying that Mexicans have a 'human right' to not live in Mexico, but in America.  Illegal immigration will only get worse in the near future.

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    Here's a summary of what's actually in the legal statutes, starting with the Flores Consent Agreement, which sets the precedent which separates unaccompanied minors from adults.

    In 1985, there was a class action lawsuit alleging that children were being kept inhumanely at the border.  In 1987, the courts agreed that minors should be housed with certain standards.  In 1993, the case reached the Supreme Court, which demanded that they reach a settlement.  In 1997, the Flores Consent Agreement (FCA) was signed by Janet Reno ending the lawsuit for a time and agreeing to make changes to how unaccompanied children were treated.

Unlike I've heard several times, the Agreement itself neither says that children are outright released, nor that kids are released in 20 days.  There is no specific time given for when the are to be released, just that they must be placed (not released) into the least restrictive environment without unnecessary delay.  Immigration services had been pretty slow complying with the rules, but that's the government.

    So, what does the FCA say?

    The kids should be kept in programs somewhat close to where they were apprehended, given treatment if they have special needs.  Minors will be separated and transported separately from unrelated adults, and if that's not immediately possible, it will happen within 24 hours.  If a suitable program isn't found, then they're placed in immigration detention centers that have separate accommodations for children. 

    If keeping children in detainment isn't required to get them to show up for their hearing, then they are to be released to a parent, or a guardian, or any adult relative, or any adult willing to house them, or a licensed program, or as a last resort, another adult immigrant if family reunification isn't possible.

    Any adult taking the child must sign an affidavit promising to care for the physical, mental, and financial well-being of the child.  They promise that the child will show up to future hearings, will tell authorities 5 days before they change their address, and 5 days before they leave the country unless the child is self deporting.

    At the time, more than 130 minors being in a licensed program at one time was considered enough to be 'an emergency' which mandated 80 more beds to be found.  If they say they're a minor, but a reasonable person would think they're an adult, then they're treated as an adult unless a medical or dental exam proves that they're a minor.

    If they get into any more trouble, or are an escape risk, they can be placed in juvenile detention centers.   That includes other criminal activity or if they're a risk to other children.  If any minor does not agree with their placement, they can get a judicial review of their case.  Any transfer of the minor will include all of their belongings and appropriate paperwork.

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So if the FCA doesn't say anything about '20 days', where does that come from?  Stay tuned, that's next.

A Declaration of Independence

Today, the Independence Holiday of America, I figured maybe we should study the document itself, to refocus our energies on what is right and good rather than what 'feels' a certain way.  With the freedom that we enjoy today comes a solemn responsibility to continue improving ourselves and our country.

A modern English translation:

We 13 colonies unanimously declare that we are independent.  It is proper that when people declare independence, they explain the causes for which they are seeking independence.

All men are created equal before the law and before the God who has given them unalienable rights to Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of "Happiness".  To secure these rights, we create governments who derive their powers from the governed and if a government becomes too destructive, it is right for people to abolish it.  Governments should not be changed for 'light and transient causes', but people should suffer without violence, attempting to correct the wrongs until it is too much, and then the government should be overthrown and replaced by new 'Guards for their security'.  The King has been a tyrant, and here are the facts.

• We have sent our grievances to England and the King has ignored them.
• He forbade his governors from passing our local laws until the King reviewed them, and then he ignored them.
• He has refused to incorporate the American colonies as part of the legislature of England.
• He calls legislative bodies together at odd times and places to force them to comply with his wishes.
• He dissolves the representative houses that we try to create.
• He does not let anyone else create representation for us, and the colonies have remained in danger from internal and external conflicts.
• He refuses to allow people to immigrate here, doesn't naturalize foreigners, and does not let us expand West.
• He obstructs the creation of Judiciary powers in the colonies.
• He makes judges rule the way he wishes, and they are solely reliant on him for pay.
• He has created a bureaucracy in the colonies to harass the colonists and take what they want.
• He keeps standing armies in our cities during times of peace without our consent.
• He has given the military authority over everyone else in the colonies.
• He joined with others to submit us to jurisdiction separate from our colonial governments and they come up with their own legislation.
• For Quartering large armies among us.
• For protecting the military from the murders they commit against colonials.
• For refusing allow us to trade with anyone but England.
• For taxing us without our consent.
• For refusing our right to trial by jury.
• For transporting us to England for fake offenses.
• For abolishing another province's laws and creating arbitrary governance and enlarging it's boundaries so that the same can be done to the colonies.
• For removing colonial Charters and fundamentally changing forms of colonial governments.
• For suspending colonial legislatures, and giving the authority to England.
• He has abdicated government by refusing to protect the colonies and waging war against us.
• He plundered our ships, ravaged the coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed people's lives.
• He is transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to fight against us, and they are barbaric.
• He has taken our citizens prisoner on the high Seas to fight against us, and forces them to execute each other.
• He has created domestic insurrections among us, and is trying to get the Indians to attack us, who destroy without distinguishing between combatants and civilians.
• In every stage, we have tried to work things out with the King, and he insults us at every turn.  He is unfit to rule a free people, he is a tyrant.

We have also tried appealing to our fellow Britons, about the attempts at unwarrantable jurisdiction.

We tried reminding them why we came here to begin with, we appeal to their respect for the rule of law.  They, too, have been deaf to our pleas, and we hold them as enemies in war, but friends in peace.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the free USA do publish and declare our right to be free and independent States, absolved from allegiance to the crown and any political connection therein.  We have the right, as independent states, to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and everything else that nations do.  With a firm reliance on divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

Moral Preening Replaces Historical Fact

In 2015, reporters caught Trump off guard with a question about Japenese internment.  Why do I say he was caught off guard? His answer was the answer given by someone wants to remain neutral, and at the same time, score points and has no idea what you're talking about.  "I certainly hate the concept of it. But I would have had to be there at the time to give you a proper answer.”, he said.

It's a terrible answer, honestly.  FDR and his cronies decided that the threat of Japanese invasion was too great to keep American citizens with Japenese ancestry free and ordered that any and all Japenese be placed in internment camps. They were given days, or even just hours, to gather the things they thought were most valuable, before being taken to temporary camps before finally being transported to the more permanent internment camps that were poorly and hastily built.

This was an unconstitutional order, like many others under the FDR administration.  They had their businesses stolen from them, their possessions given to others, and uprooted from their lives.  While at the camps, they tried to keep living life in the crappy conditions, getting married, having kids, continuing to contribute to society.  It took 40+ years for an official US Government apology, by a Republican, Ronald Reagan, along with a financial reparation.

Remember when I said they were American citizens?  The men were still required to register for the draft and serve in the military (in Europe, of course) even though they'd had their rights and lives violated by a President who didn't care about the Constitution.  Some of them refused, and were jailed.

Now, why am I bringing this up?

There's a young woman in Hawaii, Beth Fukumoto, who has used Trump's answer as part of her reason for joining the Democrats.  She was the House Minority Leader for the Republican Party in Hawaii, and when she got ousted, she switched parties.

"This election, I saw members of my party marginalizing and condemning minorities, ethnic or otherwise, and making demeaning comments towards women," Fukumoto wrote in her letter. "So, when I listened as our now top office holder refused to condemn the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II, speaking out didn't seem like a choice."

Instead of trying to meet with him and fill him in on something he's clueless about, she is leaving the Republican party to join the party responsible for placing Japenese Americans into internment.  That is a serious case of cognitive dissonance, and a lack of historical knowledge.  I'm guessing her losing her position has more to do with it than what Trump clumsily said, or she'd have NOT joined the party responsible for placing them in the internment camps to begin with, that also started a war to keep slaves, voted against desegregation, voted against ending Jim Crow, broke treaties with Indians and forced them to travel the Trail of Tears, supported racist eugenics via abortion.

Not one of these things has the Democratic Party apologized for.  They just try to shift the blame to Republicans, and move on, so spare us the sanctimonious BS. 

If you want more information about Japenese internment, here are a few resources:
The Densho Encyclopedia
Heart Mountain Interpretive Center