It is with sorrow that I learned of the latest Trump administration policy change designed to persecute immigrants.
Migrants here on medical visas received letters telling them their status has ended and they have 33 days to leave the country. The administration is making vague noises about an appeals process, but that’s not what the letters say.
One 16-year-old boy here for a serious medical condition said in tears that he will die if he is sent back to his home country, which lacks treatment facilities.
Step by step, making it less noticeable, the administration is ending policies requiring the humane treatment of immigrants. Family separation; children in cages without education, proper sanitation or comfort; adults kept in chilled, terribly crowded conditions. It’s just as bad as it sounds.
But other policies are being made: Ending a policy against keeping children locked up for very long; making asylum seeking illegal (it’s been legal for a long time); making it so only wealthy, educated people will be able to immigrate legally (not our nation’s history); and now throwing people needing serious medical treatment out of the country.
Those affected are almost always poor and brown. Yes, that’s racism — supported by Donald Trump and designed by white supremacist Stephen Miller, whose position in the halls of power should appall us all.
Even if you’re among those who wants to take the poem off the Statue of Liberty and edit the Bible, please think. Tearing apart families and housing people in inhumane conditions is wrong. Denying them their human rights is immoral.
It is unworthy of our democracy.
Kate Coombs, Bountiful
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