Martin Luther King: “We have to repent in this generation, not merely for the hateful words and actions of bad people, but for the appalling silence of good people.”
When I was ten years old, I lived in Harrisburg, Pa. It’s a nice place. But I was thinking. What if my government suddenly forced me to give up my job, to give up my home, to give up my wife and cats, to give up my church, and unceremoniously deposited me in Harrisburg. With no job. No place to live. No nearby relatives. Just dumped me there and I had to fend for myself.
That’s basically what happened to Jorge Garcia of Detroit, who has been dumped in the foreign country which he left at age 10, which for him was thirty years ago. It’s yet another outrage from the Trump Administration’s unbending, no-exceptions-allowed policies. Yet another American family ripped apart by an uncaring government (though a whole lot of my Facebook friends will applaude his deportation).
Garcia was deported on Martin Luther King Day. King once wrote: “The Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not…the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to ‘order’ than justice.” That nails what is happening here. Give me law and order, make me feel safe, protect my interests, coddle my fears and paranoia…even if it tramples on justice.
Jorge Garcia was brought to the US illegally at age 10. He has lived here 30 years, and has lived, by all accounts, a commendale life–working as a landscaper, paying taxes, no problems with the law. He married an American citizen 15 years ago, and they have two children who are American citizens, ages 12 and 15. The Trump administration killed an Obama administration policy which protected from deportation the parents of American citizens.
He has tried to get legal, but efforts have been unsuccessful. He has checked in with ICE for 13 years, so when a new president took office, they knew where to find him. He won’t be allowed to re-enter the US–for any reason, I understand–for at least ten years. If his family wants to see him, they’ll need to go to Mexico.
When Garcia’s 12-year-old son was asked how he felt, he said, “Sad, angry,” and then bowed his head and began crying. For ICE, just another day at work. For that boy, a life-altering trauma.
“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”–Edmund Burke.
It’s outrageous–it’s EVIL–to tear apart families like this. Previous administrations made compassionate allowances, but those days are gone. I won’t be quiet about this.
