Education & Children's Issues
Posted on June 22, 2018 at 12:00 AM
Many questions remain about the heart-wrenching separation of parents from their children at the Mexico-US border. From questions about our national identity asked in TIME’s July 2 cover story (“What kind of country are we?”) to the immediate and crucial #WhereAreTheGirls?, a hashtag that calls attention to the lack of girls in photos of children separated from their parents provided by the Department of Homeland Security. The hashtag has been tweeted at least 125,000 times since the April 6 imposition of “zero tolerance” has been used to justify separating children from their parents at the border. The question is all the more powerful after the administration’s dehumanizing, pre-genocidal language against Latin Americans (“animals,” “infest,” etc.), the characterization of this policy as a negotiating tool, and continued manifest disrespect for the law, women, and people of color.
The executive order of June 30 may end this practice. Yet urgent questions remain:
All this is unfolding while we have happier news about world leaders and little girls: New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern became the first world leader to give birth in 28 years; an affirmation we can move beyond human rights to equal opportunity for women at the highest level. But for now, we must demand answers, accountability, and an affirmation of who we are as a nation.
— PPC Task Forces on Global Women and on Social and Economic Justice
FORMER FIRST LADIES OUTRAGED BY TRUMP POLICY ON FAMILY SEPARATIONS AT BORDER
Many of the earliest voices of moral outrage about the Trump immigration family policy came from women! Specifically, the former First Ladies of America spoke clearly and forcefully against the “zero tolerance” immigration policy that is leading to migrant families being separated at the US-Mexico border. The former First Ladies, joining a chorus of criticism, called this practice “immoral,” “disgraceful,” and a “humanitarian crisis.” They are appalled by how the Trump administration has used children as pawns in this immigration policy-border situation.
President Trump, under tremendous pressure for this controversial immigration policy (ordering immigrants being taken into federal criminal custody, at which