The July 12 article, “Could Cities Help Resettle Refugees?” offers a disturbing account of the situation with the camps in our midst and how to address it.
First, the article refers to “undocumented immigrants” and “enforcement,” which is not neutral language. Folks in the camps are very “documented” — they have crossed the border legally and, often after a long wait being metered in Mexico, have stated a case for asylum. While they await an asylum hearing, according to U.S. and international law, they are in the country lawfully.
According to the Flores Settlement, which resolved a class action lawsuit on behalf of immigrant children under the Reagan and Clinton administrations (and still the law of the land), children seeking asylum can only be held if they have no guardian in the country, and then only in a licensed facility. Which is to say, if we need “enforcement” against anyone, it is Customs and Border Protection, which is illegally holding refugee children.
The article describes a proposal from Vincent O’Connor that people released from detention camps be brought to other people’s homes in the Pioneer Valley. While clearly well-intentioned, the idea seems rife with the potential for abuse — will hosts expect their guests to work in their homes? Can we vouch for their safety? It is also a solution in search of a problem.
Asylum-seekers have been released to humanitarian shelters throughout the border region and sometimes just bus stations. Many are also being returned to border cities in Mexico under a new Trump administration policy to force them to await their U.S. asylum hearings in Mexico. Workers in shelters and bus stations are simply connecting them with medical care and helping them buy bus tickets to meet up with family members in the U.S. — because these folks have long been our neighbors.
They don’t need rescue, for the most part. They need to be released and allowed to reunify with their families, split across the Americas by waves of deportations by Democrats and Republicans alike, ill-considered immigration policies, and a failed War on Drugs that has militarized all our communities.
Laura Briggs
Northampton