Trump slammed the door on immigrants, not just those without papers, but those who were vetted and approved. Sonali Kolhatkar is a journalist, talk show host, and activist in California. She expected to bring her parents from India, but Trump blocked their entry. Now she hopes that Biden will open the door to legal immigration.
She writes:
In April 2020, just as I was putting together the final stages of an arduous sponsorship application for my parents to obtain legal residency, President Trump signed an executive order upending our lives. Under cover of the COVID-19 pandemic, he enacted a 60-day suspension of most immigrant visas including those that enable citizens to sponsor their non-citizen parents. Two months later, Trump added more visa categories to the ban and extended it until the end of the year.
Trump’s cruel anti-immigrant agenda separated untold numbers of families, including mine. Will the new administration fix the mess?
Although the authority to change immigration laws lies with Congress, Trump managed to push through many aspects of an anti-immigrant wish list he has been touting for years. Americans like me suddenly have no access to the same rule that first lady Melania Trump used to sponsor her parents from Slovenia.
While the horrifying cases of family separation at the U.S.-Mexico border have justifiably drawn public indignation, the spectrum of separation is broader than most Americans realize. According to the advocacy group Value Our Families, Trump’s green card ban affects people like my parents who are being sponsored by their adult U.S. citizen children, as well as the spouses and children of green card holders, and the children and siblings of U.S. citizens. An estimated 358,000 people attempting to immigrate through available legal processes are affected...
As we wait for Biden to take the reins of government and do the right thing, my family will remain separated. Meanwhile, each day I can see from my backyard the newly built home, financed through the savings of my foreign-born parents, that sits empty and waiting for them.
“Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.”
Not in Trump’s America! Trump has retooled the immigration policies so that the highly skilled and wealthy get priority entrance. I have mentioned the nearly ten year saga of getting a green card for my son-in-law. Even before Trump with the existing laws legal status is far out of reach for most people coming from poor countries. For those coming from Mexico or Central America, there is over a twenty year wait period unless people have the money to expedite the process. Fortunately, my son-in-law had just received his green card a week before the changes were announced.
Sent from my iPhone
I agree. 🙂
Several moral imperatives here.
First and foremost, the Biden administration must reunite with their parents the children still separated from them.
Second, it must pay reparations to the asylum seekers who were so cruelly abused by the racist, white supremacist Trump maladministation.
Third, it must enact sweeping immigration reform, including, among many other things, tossing the Trumpish requirements that immigrants are already wealthy and skilled. Ours is an immigrant nation that holds forth to tired, poor, huddled masses the hope and promise of the American Dream.
Fourth, it must create a reasonable path to citizenship for all immigrants in the United States today.
Fifth, it must reaffirm birthright citizenship as fundamental law, protected by Fourteenth Amendment.
Sixth, it must fund assistance to those countries in Central America that, as a result, in part, of past US actions and policies, are experiencing the corruption and violence and hunger and gang activity that drive people to seek asylum here.
Seventh, it must recognize the International Criminal Court, hold a truth and reconciliation convention with subpoena and investigatory powers, and remand for prosecution to that international court the racist perpetrators in the Trump maladministration of such evils as caging children, separating them from their parents (kidnapping), denying asylum seekers their legal rights, deporting children alone, forcing women among asylum seekers to have hysterectomies, and subjecting detainees to sexual and physical abuse and unsanitary, inhumane conditions. Trump, Miller, Sessions, Rosenstein–these are a few of the many criminals in the previous administration who, if there is to be justice, must be made to pay for these crimes against humanity, including kidnapping and assault.
Well stated. There is much work to be done.
“Sixth, it must fund assistance to those countries in Central America that, as a result, in part, of past US actions and policies, are experiencing the corruption and violence and hunger and gang activity that drive people to seek asylum here.”
You can say that again. No need. I did it for you. Man is technology great!
There is more to the promotion of world wide stability than in any other policy. The de-stabilization of Syria moved Europe harder to the right than any single force since the last Great Depression. The movements of large groups of people in Africa has continually disrupted Countries there as they tried to get a handle on democratic institutions. To some extent, US policies during the Cold War and after have contributed to mass migrations since 1947. Some will be hard to change, especially in the face of hostility from a large part of the American population.
We also need to join other countries in confronting climate change. Some of the migrants are climate refugees as well as political and economic refugees.
Thank you, Ms. Kolhatkar, for describing what real family values government policy would look like.
A political party that advocates for the destruction of families cannot claim to be one that cares about family values. That should be clear enough.
It needs to be clear in our law and regulation as well.
Since Ellis Island closed in 1952, the US has not had a clear process for immigration. It is time to establish a “New Ellis Island”. Maybe somewhere in New Mexico or Arizona, then we establish a clear process for immigration and asylum. Making it up as we go has not worked out very well for 68 years.
I would say here what, exactly, I think of Propaganda Minister Stephen Miller, but Diane does not allow such language on her site. The metaphors that come to mind when I think of this lowlife Nazi draw heavily upon the scatological and upon excrescences, disgorgements, and evacuations caused by various disease conditions.
Did I say lowlife Nazi? That, of course, is redundant. Make that Nazi lowlife (i.e., that variety of lowlife that is Nazi).
Racism is rooted to two character traits: profound ignorance and profound cowardice. Not very admirable qualities, Miller.
Sonali Kolhatkar, I am so sorry for your plight. Hopefully, Biden, who is a compassionate person, will work to undo all the damage that Trump has done.
Trump spouts racism and doesn’t care anything about the extensive hurt that his anti-immigration policies have put upon many wishing to come to the U.S.
My best wishes go to you and your parents. They surely deserve to be here as much as Melania’s parents.
Biden needs to try to fix whatever the hell Trump did to Quitobaquito Springs, which sits on the US /Mexico border.
https://cronkitenews.azpbs.org/2020/08/10/border-wall-construction-quitobaquito-springs-desert/
I visited that area back in the early 90’s and it was lush and beautiful, with no border fence.
The area is sacred to the Tohono O’Odham tribe and critical for local wildlife as well.
“Bogan said what’s happening now at the spring and its pond have been years in the making, but recent construction activity could be making things worse.
“What we have here is basically a worst-case scenario where we have declining spring flow, declining water coming into the pond and a structural problem with the pond itself. And then the construction traffic, heavy duty trucks and trenching,” he said. “On top of that, we’re in the hottest month of the year.”
They are also pumping groundwater for concrete for Trump’s idiotic wall, which certainly does not help an already declining spring flow.
I can only imagine how deep the wall must go to (supposedly) keep people from digging underneath, which is THE problem with any wall, of course.
That and the fact that people can just go around the ends!
The whole thing is dumb beyond belief, even for Trump.
SomeDAM Poet: Smugglers have already proven that they can purchase a cheap saw and cut holes in the wall.
Why doesn’t that make a difference to those who continue to waste taxpayer money so that Trump can brag?
SomeDAM Poet: One does not mess with Native American burial grounds. This is sacred ground and there will be results that aren’t pleasant.
…………………………..
The spring flows into a pond just a few paces from the U.S.-Mexico border at Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument in southern Arizona. Hia C-ed O’odham and the Tohono O’odham tribal members lived and passed through here long before the monument or the border existed.
Amber Lee Ortega has family from both tribes. This site is where some of her relatives are buried.
We can always hope that Trump and his family will suffer a curse of the Tohono O’Odham for disturbing their burial ground.
Then again, maybe Rudy Giuliani IS the Tohono O’odham curse.
Presidents’ approval ratings tend to improve after they leave office. If this turns out to be the case for Trump, that’s REALLY bad news, for those ratings could help him to hang onto his following and pass it along to an even more dangerous wannabe fascists–one with Trump’s amorality but smarter, more eloquent, slicker.
This is another reason why Biden is UTTERLY WRONG in not wanting to see Trump prosecuted and imprisoned. It is essential that once he’s out of power, the truth-telling about Trump and his spawn begin.
cx: fascist, singular, ofc
Don’t worry now with Biden prez.