I am deeply alarmed about the aggressive buildup and militarization of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). What began as an immigration enforcement agency is rapidly evolving into something far more ominous. It is rapidly becoming an unaccountable domestic force with powers that echo Nazi Germany.
The recent creation of new ICE detention centers (such as the so-called “Alligator Alcatraz”) along with disturbing reports of detainees being held without due process, sent to foreign prisons, or locked in privately run facilities with little oversight, should horrify every American who values liberty and the rule of law.
In 1930s Germany, the Gestapo became the enforcement arm of a rising fascist state, targeting Jews, immigrants, LGBTQ individuals and political dissenters. It began with “detention,” “removal” and “security.” It ended with atrocity. We are headed for a repeat of this historical atrocity.
We must not be naïve. These are not just abstract concerns or dramatic analogies. The machinery for mass repression is right now being built in plain sight.
And yet, Utah’s entire congressional delegation remains silent or complicit. Where is the moral leadership that defends due process, human dignity and constitutional limits on state power?
We are at the brink. We cannot afford indifference. The people of Utah, and of this nation, deserve representatives who are willing to stand against authoritarianism before it’s too late; but it seems clear that they will continue blind fealty to Trump unless we confront them and vote them out.
Fellow Utahns, I implore you to put our fragile constitutional democracy over unwavering allegiance to a would-be dictator.
Dale Palmer, Sandy
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