The United States has never been quite able to attain the aspirations on which this Republic was founded. The soaring, poetic language of the Declaration of Independence and the careful logic of government structure described in the Constitution have always been just a little beyond our reach as a society. That shouldn’t be surprising given that this country was “discovered” by mass-murdering European representatives of empirical crown princes and the great words described above were written by slave owners. Our national failings can be recited by rote: slavery, Native American genocide, Jim Crow laws, woman’s subjugation, religious and cultural prejudices, and the internment of American citizens of Japanese descent during World War II. Well, now we have another shameful episode for current citizens to look away from and pretend to not see and future generations to review with guilt and horror.

The United States government has, as you all know, followed a carefully planned policy of separating parents from their children along the US-Mexico border for over 2 years now. That sentence is hard enough to write about a country that considers itself “exceptional” and once was viewed as a global moral leader, but the actual real-life impacts of such a policy and its impact on children, babies, and toddlers is gut-wrenching. Let’s first review the main actors.

The Orange One – Trump is a vacant, narcissistic buffoon, who just happens to temporarily be the most powerful person on earth. Two characteristics of this blowhard to keep in mind at all times are that he knows nothing about anything and he cares for no one. I am amazed at how often these 2 facets of his character (can we even use the term “character” when referring to this person?) come into play when I hear him speak or see the results of his actions. He is a dangerous, mean-spirited, small-minded, tiny-handed man. He is the power and maniacal force behind the plan that we are discussing today.

Stephen Miller – Now, we’ve gone from a dangerous buffoon to pure evil. Ostensibly, Miller is the director of domestic policy for the White House, but you can see his oily fingers in everything. This is a man who hates because it is what he does. It is easy to see how perfectly Miller would have fit into Nazi Germany in the 1930’s. The only problem in envisioning that scenario is that, had they met, Joseph Goebbels would have said, “This guy’s way too mean for me”. It is said by people in the White House that Miller casts no reflection when he passes a mirror. Miller is the architect of the “zero tolerance” plan.

Jeff Sessions – A craven, little man and I mean little in every way. In any dictionary, when you look up the word “coward” there is a picture of Jeff Sessions. A man who history has already forgotten. He drove the US Department of Justice to rabidly pursue this policy, against the objection of 5 of his own US Attorneys in the border region.

(Most of what follows is based on the reporting of NY Times reporters and taken from a draft IG Report form Homeland Security. I ask that you read this with your imagination wide open. Don’t just read the words, picture, in whatever level of detail you can stomach, what the words are describing to mothers, fathers, and children – including toddlers and breast-feeding infants.)

On April 19, 2018, the US government’s Department of Justice initiated a policy referred to as “zero tolerance” with the aim of preventing all illegal immigration on the US-Mexico border. A key tenet, actually the major tenet, of this policy was the separation of children from their parents to act as a deterrent for families seeking asylum in the US. All adults were to be prosecuted and those with children were to have their children taken away. Five US Attorneys in districts along the border told DOJ headquarters that they were “deeply concerned” about the human impacts such a policy. In fact, 2 of those Attorneys had refused to prosecute cases where the children were infants. In a conference call with those recalcitrant US Attorneys, Attorney General Jeff Sessions stated, “We need to take away children.” and “We won’t give amnesty to people with kids.” Please understand at this point, no part of US Immigration law permits for amnesty to be withheld because an applicant has children.

Two days later, Deputy AG, Rod Rosenstein went even further on a call to the same US Attorneys. Rod the Mod told the attorneys that they did not have the right to turn down any prosecutions because of the age of the dependent child. Rosenstein then overruled one of his prosecutors who, as a functioning human being, had declined 2 cases because he could not imagine that the US government would take these young infants from their mothers. We could and we did.

Many agencies were involved in the initiation and application of the “zero tolerance” policy, but Session and the DOJ were the drivers. Ironically, when it all began to fall apart, the Director of Homeland Security, Kirstjen Nielson, fell on her sword. I say ironically because Nielson was the most reluctant of Trump’s flying monkeys to sign on to this trip to hell. Her Homeland Security staff dragged their feet in referring people with children to DOJ for prosecution. However, in a meeting in April 2018 led by Sessions, he pressured Nielson to increase the referrals. Also, sometime in late April a meeting was held in the Oval Office where Trump was described as “ranting and raving” about increasing the number of prosecutions. The day after the meeting with Sessions, Nielson sent a memo to her staff to refer all potential cases to DOJ.

Also at this time, one of the border area’s US Attorneys wrote in an email that he didn’t believe that the DOJ had taken a “breast feeding infant from the mother” until he read it in the detention facility log. (Please, stop and think about that for a long moment and that was NOT an isolated case. Who are these fucking people?)

The children were taken from their parents and guardians and shipped to the Department of Health and Human Services, who were not prepared in any way for an influx of unaccompanied children. Their awful, private-run prison facilities were quickly overwhelmed. Children, including infants and toddlers, were housed in cages inside locked warehouses. Others were sent to live in tents or “big box” stores that had been converted. Importantly, neither DOJ nor HHS had any system or plan on how to reunite these children with their parents. Congressional delegations that demanded to view the children and the conditions were turned away at the door. So, there was no Congressional oversight. Yes, this happened. No, this was not exaggerated by the press or by anyone else.

By May 31, domestic and international condemnation rose to such levels that even these bastards had to cease. Laura Bush had publicly called the program “evil and immoral”. Trump announced that the policy was ending May 31. Between April 19 and May 31, 2018, over 2300 children had been separated and warehoused, including over 100 toddlers and infants under the age of 4. (Stop and think: a 2 year old toddler taken from his mother and put in a cage inside a warehouse by your government. Can you imagine the fear and heartache for those children and parents? It frightens me.)

So the policy was ended on May 31. If you believe that, you don’t know the mendacity and depravity of the people you are dealing with here. In July 2018, the DOJ offered parents a choice: either leave the country with your children or continue to seek asylum without their children. That is not any different from what was in place under “zero tolerance”! Also in July 2018, a Federal Judge noted the at least 463 parents had been removed from the US without their children. Amnesty International reported that from the initiation of the program until August 15, 2018 (11 weeks after the program was supposedly abandoned) 6022 families had been separated, a significantly higher number than the US government had ever admitted in any official counts.

The policy had not ended at all. Miller was just pursing his evil under the cover of darkness, aided and abetted by the cowardly lion, Jeff Sessions. One year after the policy was ostensibly rescinded, in May 2019, 245 children were separated from their parents by our government. In January of this year, the government reported that it had separated 1142 children since the policy’s “end”. Separations continue to this day. We’ll never know the extent of our sin here until after this administration is driven back to the mud from where they arose.

“Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore”

We have beautiful language and aspirations. We are humans and we sometimes fall short, but we strive as individuals and as a country to better ourselves. How did we end up with this government? Who are these bastards? I know. They are the worst of us.