tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/family-separation-55441/articlesFamily separation – The Conversation2023-06-13T20:05:24Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2015712023-06-13T20:05:24Z2023-06-13T20:05:24ZBrenda Matthews was ripped from a loving family twice. But she was born too late to be officially recognised as Stolen Generations<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531497/original/file-20230613-15-fmujwv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=62%2C80%2C1061%2C641&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Brenda Matthews</span> </figcaption></figure><p>The woman’s face is in profile, her eyes looking into the distance – or the past, or the future. This is a quiet woman, a thoughtful one; possibly one who also carries sadness in her soul. This woman’s face is natural, a face with features as familiar as my own – a strong brow, deep-set and dark eyes, and full unvarnished lips set with an appealing cupid’s bow. Her hair is swept up, the background is purple-blue – evocative of a beautiful night sky. </p>
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<p>I don’t know why it takes me the full read of her book before I see the photograph of two children superimposed on her right cheek: one child white-skinned with blonde hair, the other dark-skinned with dark hair. It’s a happy photo, as natural as they come. </p>
<p>Before this photograph of the children came into focus, my mind’s eye assumed it was white ochre, placed ready for a ceremony of some sort. The book, <a href="https://www.textpublishing.com.au/books/the-last-daughter">The Last Daughter</a>, recounts the woman’s life to a certain midlife point. It ends with insight into the making of a <a href="https://www.thelastdaughter.com.au/">documentary feature film</a>, released this week. </p>
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<p><em>Review: The Last Daughter – Brenda Matthews (Text Publishing)</em></p>
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<p>The book is a ceremony of sorts: a bringing together of the woman’s story of families, Country, love, separation, heartache. And at its centre, a truth-seeking quest to right the wrongs perpetrated by a government hell-bent on doing “as they saw fit” when it came to Aboriginal peoples, with little regard for the consequences. The woman is Brenda Matthews, née Simon, born 1970.</p>
<p>This birth year renders her officially ineligible for being recognised as part of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/stolen-generation-redress-scheme-wont-reach-everyone-affected-by-the-policies-that-separated-families-166499">Stolen Generations</a>: the New South Wales Aborigines Protection Act was repealed and the <a href="https://theconversation.com/capturing-the-lived-history-of-the-aborigines-protection-board-while-we-still-can-46259">Aboriginal Welfare Board</a> abolished in 1969. She was removed from her family four years later, in 1973.</p>
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<span class="caption">The Last Daughter ends with insight into the making of a documentary feature film, released this week.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
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<h2>Stolen, again and again</h2>
<p>Brenda was one of eight children, seven of whom were heartbreakingly removed from and then haphazardly returned to their parents, Brenda Simon née Hammond and Gary Simon. Brenda was the last to be returned home: after five years. She was two years old when she was taken and seven when she was returned.</p>
<p>She describes her mother’s memory of doing the household chores with a friend one day, “a few days” after she took her sick child Karla to the local hospital. “A car pulled up outside and two Welfare Department officers got out.” Her friend asked if they’d come to inspect the house. “Welfare officers were often inspecting Aboriginal homes to check if they were clean, which was often an excuse and a precursor to taking the children.” </p>
<p>But they had arrived “to take the kids”, on mysterious charges of neglect. Local knowledge about collusion between the local hospital matron and the Welfare Department does not escape mention.</p>
<p>After three months in a home, Brenda was fostered by a White family, who had a daughter of a similar age. “She is my younger sister and I love her,” recalls Brenda in the book. They believed they had adopted Brenda, and that a single mother had given her up. Five years later, she was returned home, with almost no transition. “I was ripped from both these families,” she writes later in the book, looking back.</p>
<p>This memoir reveals Brenda reconciling with this past, 40 years later, bringing her “Black family” and her “White family” together. The trauma impacts of these separations can be read through this life story, not least when 18-year-old Brenda tells no one she is pregnant and ends up giving birth alone in her bedroom: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>I think deep down inside, I’m scared of this baby being taken from me because I was taken away from my Mum and Dad. I don’t want history to repeat itself.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Baby Keisha enjoys unbroken bonds with her parents and both extended families. Later, she is joined by four brothers, then by four more siblings, through her mother’s marriage to stepfather Mark. By the end of this book, Keisha has two children of her own – who become central to Brenda’s commitment to her story, her families, and a future free from cruel intervention. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531506/original/file-20230613-15-wcvsxn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531506/original/file-20230613-15-wcvsxn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531506/original/file-20230613-15-wcvsxn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531506/original/file-20230613-15-wcvsxn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531506/original/file-20230613-15-wcvsxn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531506/original/file-20230613-15-wcvsxn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531506/original/file-20230613-15-wcvsxn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531506/original/file-20230613-15-wcvsxn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Brenda with her children.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
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<p>History as told in The Last Daughter – family separation and its resulting trauma – does not repeat for future generations. But its effects continue to find sad reverberation in the life experiences of Brenda, her parents and her siblings. </p>
<p>Before her own children were “shoved” into a government car, Brenda’s mum had lived in fear of exactly this – as a teenager, she witnessed a cousin taken from her Aunty Greta.</p>
<p>Thinking about these removals under false charges, Brenda wonders what other lies are recorded as fact in government files about other family members, particularly after uncovering – with the help of historian and Wiradjuri woman Kim Burke – that Brenda’s maternal grandmother and great-grandmother were also stolen. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>What chance did we have? Stolen, again and again and again. This is one family heirloom that didn’t need passing down, and the only blessing is that Mum was not stolen.</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/vince-copley-had-a-vision-for-a-better-australia-and-he-helped-make-it-happen-with-lifelong-friend-charles-perkins-192097">Vince Copley had a vision for a better Australia – and he helped make it happen, with lifelong friend Charles Perkins</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
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<h2>‘This is real history’</h2>
<p>Members of Brenda’s White family are also left affected by the brutality of government policy: they provided a home to a little girl they fell in love with and whom their biological children considered a sibling. The youngest of this family, Brenda and Rebecca, are the girls on the cover image. And while there was nothing natural about how they became siblings, the love and joy between them is impossible to ignore. </p>
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<span class="caption">This photo of Brenda with her ‘White sister’ Rebecca is part of the book’s cover image.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
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<p>Brenda tells the story of reconnecting with her White family. The young ones – Mark’s daughters – prove pivotal in this; their internet sleuthing and Facebook friend requests prove the bridge to the reconnection. Kiara gets a notification ping while in class and her teacher “reminds her that she is in a history lesson”. Kiara replies, “this is real history”, as she walks out. Later, she is able to confirm with Brenda that her White mum wants to see her. </p>
<p>Brenda’s ability, with the help of her husband Mark, to blend a new family across culture and history – despite the intergenerational trauma – is another feature of this life story. </p>
<p>There are many moments in The Last Daughter that make a reader pause and reflect on the power of love and belonging. When Brenda and her mum uncover, with the help of historian Kim Burke, that they are Wiradjuri rather than Wailwan, it’s a difficult adjustment to make. But after much work, Brenda is now comfortable saying she is a proud Wiradjuri woman. </p>
<p>“I can see her wrestling with this new information and who she thought she was all along,” writes Brenda of watching her mother in their moment of discovery. “This is common for a lot of Indigenous people who were taken from their Country and placed somewhere else,” Kim tells them.</p>
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<span class="caption">Brenda with her mother (centre left) and her ‘White parents’, Mac and Connie.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
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<p>Reconnecting with Country and culture is part of Brenda’s story. She learns the ancient art of weaving and works with Mark running camps on Country, in northern New South Wales and South East Queensland (with the endorsement of influential Indigenous figure <a href="https://40stories.com.au/people/kyle-slabb/">Kyle Slabb</a> from Fingal). This informs and deepens Brenda’s strength of Aboriginality.</p>
<p>It is at one of these camps where Mark encourages Brenda to tell her story: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>I walk up to the line that Mark has drawn in the sand where he’d like me to stand, and I rub it out with my foot, drawing a new one a bit further back where I’m more comfortable. I am about to tell my story to strangers for the first time in my life. I’m fiddling with my hands and fingers. I take a deep breath and as the words start coming out of my mouth, memories come flooding back, and tears roll down my cheeks.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531509/original/file-20230613-17-o7nsp1.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531509/original/file-20230613-17-o7nsp1.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531509/original/file-20230613-17-o7nsp1.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531509/original/file-20230613-17-o7nsp1.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531509/original/file-20230613-17-o7nsp1.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531509/original/file-20230613-17-o7nsp1.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531509/original/file-20230613-17-o7nsp1.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531509/original/file-20230613-17-o7nsp1.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Learning the ancient art of weaving has been part of Brenda’s process of reconnecting with Country and culture.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-we-are-the-voice-why-we-need-more-indigenous-editors-182222">Friday essay: we are the voice – why we need more Indigenous editors</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Countering lies and bearing witness</h2>
<p>Finding voice, being heard and validated, is part of the human condition. The Last Daughter expresses it so well.</p>
<p>Brenda tells her story simply, with nothing exaggerated for effect; known facts, recalled memory and renewed encounters are drawn together in spare, first-person prose. A memoir born from journal entries reproduced as exposition throughout, The Last Daughter is inspired by Brenda’s need to know and share the truth. </p>
<p>She is motivated to counter lies about her parents, grandparents and great-grandparents – recorded as fact in government files. In just one example, the files record Brenda’s mother requesting a photograph and progress report on Brenda while she was with her White family; it says these were supplied, but Brenda’s mother never received anything. Even the date Brenda was returned to her family was incorrect.</p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/q29vqBO1CM0?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Trailer for Brenda Matthews’ feature film, The Last Daughter.</span></figcaption>
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<p>Brenda’s motivation increases when she and her siblings are excluded from formal recognition as being part of the Stolen Generations. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>The letter leaves me feeling like a microcosm of this land. It has been declared <a href="https://theconversation.com/pastoral-ponderings-and-settler-politics-how-a-colonial-judge-and-poet-wrote-terra-nullius-into-law-199962">terra nullius</a> – empty land – despite my people living here. Now my emotions, my memories, my trauma don’t exist in the eyes of the government.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Brenda’s pursuit of truth is reflected in the difficult conversations she has with herself, and with so many others in her Black, White, own (and eventually blended) family. </p>
<p>I can’t fully imagine the courage, fear, heartache and dedication it took for Brenda to peel back the years and the layers to find truth for so many. The book is a project of love and reconnection. </p>
<p>Keeping everyone inside the warmth of that fire cannot have been easy. That fire and its warmth are offered with immense grace to readers – and now viewers – of Brenda’s story. It is up to us to step inside that embrace and bear witness. </p>
<hr>
<p><em>The documentary feature film, <a href="https://www.thelastdaughter.com.au/film/">The Last Daughter</a>, will screen in cinemas Australia-wide from 15 June 2023.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/201571/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sandra Phillips receives funding from the Australian Research Council. </span></em></p>Brenda Matthews’ story is a truth-seeking quest to right the wrongs perpetrated by a government hell-bent on doing ‘as they saw fit’ when it came to Aboriginal peoples, writes Sandra Phillips.Sandra Phillips, Associate Professor of Indigenous Australian Studies, School of Humanities and Communication Arts, Western Sydney UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2055622023-05-18T05:29:22Z2023-05-18T05:29:22ZGovernment’s family law bill is a big step forward. But it doesn’t do enough to address family violence<p>The Labor government’s <a href="https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Bills_Legislation/Bills_Search_Results/Result?bId=r7011">Family Law Amendment Bill 2023</a> is making its way quietly through Australia’s federal parliament. It will become one of the most important laws passed this year.</p>
<p>It <a href="http://classic.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/bill_em/flab2023204/index.html">proposes to</a> overhaul the family law system to make it “safer and simpler for separating families to navigate, and ensure the best interests of children are placed at its centre”. </p>
<p>We should celebrate the fact this bill is passing through parliament. It shows the government has responded to <a href="https://www.anrows.org.au/publication/no-straight-lines-self-represented-litigants-in-family-law-proceedings-involving-allegations-about-family-violence/">insistent calls for change</a> to protect families. </p>
<p>But here’s why it doesn’t go far enough in addressing family violence.</p>
<h2>What’s the bill for?</h2>
<p>The bill will make important changes to the rules that govern parenting arrangements after separation.</p>
<p>It will remove the presumption of “<a href="http://classic.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/fla1975114/s61da.html">equal shared parental responsibility</a>”. Under the current law, this presumption means both parents have a role in making major, long-term decisions about their children.</p>
<p>However, it’s often misinterpreted. <a href="https://consultations.ag.gov.au/families-and-marriage/family-law-amendment-bill/consultation/view_respondent?_b_index=240&uuId=931667378">Many people believe</a> it means parents are entitled to equal time with their children, regardless of domestic and family violence or abuse.</p>
<p>This bill will finally make it clear that equal time isn’t always appropriate or safe for families with a history of abuse.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1655807754471342080"}"></div></p>
<h2>The problem of family violence</h2>
<p>The grim reality is that family violence is the norm, not the exception in family law. <a href="https://www.fcfcoa.gov.au/sites/default/files/2021-11/mr101121_0.pdf">Recent data</a> shows well over half of cases before the family court involve allegations of family violence against children or one parent.</p>
<p>Separation often doesn’t mean an end to the violence, but <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1084682">more harm and control</a>, especially at contact changeover times for children or during the court process.</p>
<p>Helen Politis, a victim-survivor of abuse and veteran of the family law system explains what this meant for her:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The reign of chaos my children and I experienced prior to separation escalated post separation. Even worse was that this damaging behaviour was inadvertently enabled, legitimised, perpetuated and, I fear, normalised for my children.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Victim-survivors face a <a href="http://hdl.handle.net/2123/6255">common belief from family law professionals</a> that children need a relationship with their father, no matter the abuse they have suffered. As Helen explains:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Despite the overwhelming evidence of continued abuse and countless examples of the ways in which my children were being used as pawns, my own lawyers denied my situation. Routinely my desperate pleas to my lawyers were met with dismissive responses such as “it takes two to tango” and “you can’t clap with one hand”.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This is even worse when the system itself is deliberately used by perpetrators to control and intimidate victim-survivors. Research in <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1748895817728380">Australia</a> and <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/895175/domestic-abuse-private-law-children-cases-literature-review.pdf">the United Kingdom</a> demonstrates this “legal systems abuse” is common in family law. </p>
<p>For Helen, the legal system was a core component of family violence:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Being caught in the family law system felt very dangerous. I was in an impossible situation, with no way out and no way of protecting my children.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>What needs to be done?</h2>
<p>This bill makes important progress, but there are two main reasons why it doesn’t go far enough. </p>
<p><strong>It must allow histories of violence</strong></p>
<p>First, the bill needs to be stronger in recognising where family violence has occurred. </p>
<p>In the bill, there will be six principles to help judges, lawyers and parents decide what arrangements would be in children’s best interests. The bill includes reference to “safety” as one of these six principles, but at the same time proposes to remove a <a href="http://classic.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/fla1975114/s60cc.html">reference in the current law</a> to a history of violence in considering the best interests of children. </p>
<p>Simplification of the law shouldn’t come at the cost of harm. As family law expert Zoe Rathus from Griffith University explains: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Talking about safety is talking about the future. Talking about violence is talking about the past – and talking about the past is critical to women and children being able to tell their stories when they have experienced family violence.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>There’s significant evidence that many <a href="https://theconversation.com/separated-parents-and-the-family-law-system-what-does-the-evidence-say-62826">victim-survivors’</a> allegations of family violence aren’t believed, and their experiences are <a href="https://search.informit.org/doi/10.3316/INFORMIT.702873923415841">minimised in the family law system</a>. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/separated-parents-and-the-family-law-system-what-does-the-evidence-say-62826">Separated parents and the family law system: what does the evidence say?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Helen’s own lawyers advised her not to raise her experiences of past family violence in her case, for fear it would be held against her: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>I believed that the family law system would provide my children with the safety and support that they rightfully deserved. What I experienced was an incredibly lengthy, frightening and financially depleting process. Family violence is what led me into the family law system, yet despite the irrefutable evidence, it was routinely ignored.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>As it stands, this bill reinforces this problem. It suggests we should ignore information and evidence about past violence, and pretend it isn’t relevant to the future safety of victim-survivors or the children at the heart of these arrangements. </p>
<p>To address this, the bill should retain the provision that allows evidence of any family violence to be considered. </p>
<p><strong>It must recognise ‘legal systems abuse’</strong></p>
<p>Second, the bill needs to do more to address <a href="https://dfvbenchbook.aija.org.au/understanding-domestic-and-family-violence/systems-abuse/">legal systems abuse</a>. </p>
<p>A major achievement of this bill is it will introduce a new power for judges to make orders that stop people bringing court proceedings where it would cause harm to the other family members involved.</p>
<p>However, it needs to go further. The bill needs to reflect global evidence and finally recognise “systems abuse” as a form of family violence. </p>
<p>Systems abuse could be explicitly listed as an example of family violence in the <a href="http://classic.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/fla1975114/s4ab.html">Family Law Act 1975</a>, as recommended by a recent unpublished study by Lucy Foster from Monash University. </p>
<p>We believe the bill could add systems abuse into the existing definition of family violence used in law.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/no-simple-solution-when-families-meet-the-law-58641">No simple solution when families meet the law</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>It’s important parliament takes this opportunity to get our family laws as strong as possible on the issue of family violence. </p>
<p>We support Helen in her hope for this new law:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Although too late for me and my children… I am hopeful this time we have the courage to step up and deliver a Family Law Act that does not further damage the lives of vulnerable people. Simple changes such as recognising past violence can make all the difference. The proposed changes do not seem to go far enough to address the harms inflicted on vulnerable people before the family law system, overwhelmingly women and children.</p>
</blockquote>
<hr>
<p><em>The authors would like to acknowledge Helen Politis, who coauthored this article. Helen is a workplace advisor and advocate. She works with organisations, including 1800 Respect and the Judicial College of Victoria towards ending family violence.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/205562/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Becky Batagol provided advice to Zoe Daniels MP on the Family Law Amendment Bill 2023. Helen Politis provided statements and input to the solutions proposed for this story based upon her lived experience of family violence in the family law system. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jessica Mant provided advice to Zoe Daniels MP on the Family Law Amendment Bill 2023.</span></em></p>We should celebrate that this bill is passing through parliament. But there are 2 key concerns.Becky Batagol, Associate Professor of Law, Monash University, Monash UniversityJessica Mant, Lecturer in Law, Monash UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1791312022-03-20T11:43:23Z2022-03-20T11:43:23ZFamily separations in Ukraine highlight the importance of children’s rights<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/452815/original/file-20220317-13-hgtosn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=44%2C0%2C5000%2C3285&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A 41-year-old man presses his palms against the window of a train as he says goodbye to his five-year-old daughter as she leaves for Lviv at the Kyiv station on March 4, 2022. He was staying behind to fight Russian forces.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source"> (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 175px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/family-separations-in-ukraine-highlight-the-importance-of-children-s-rights" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>Given the conscription of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2022/mar/09/ukraine-urged-to-take-humane-approach-as-men-try-to-flee-war">men aged 18 to 60 in Ukraine</a>, the majority of Ukrainians fleeing into neighbouring countries are <a href="https://reliefweb.int/report/ukraine/ukraine-situation-unhcr-supplementary-appeal-2022">women and children</a>. </p>
<p>Most adult men and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/03/09/disabled-ukrainians-desperate-plea/">many disabled</a> and <a href="https://www.helpage.org/newsroom/latest-news/ukraine-older-people-face-abandonment-and-isolation-as-conflict-with-russia-intensifies/">older people have been left behind</a>. The resulting family separation poses legal and social challenges that need to be addressed in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/00220380902862952">gender- and age-sensitive ways</a>.</p>
<p>Unaccompanied and separated children require <a href="https://www.unicef.org/ukraine/en/press-releases/unaccompanied-and-separated-children-fleeing-escalating-conflict-ukraine-must-be">specific protection and care</a> because of their developing capacities to care for themselves and <a href="https://www.fmreview.org/young-and-out-of-place/clarkkazak">intergenerational power hierarchies</a>. That means that most of the time, adults control resources and decision-making, while children have fewer opportunities to advocate for their own choices, well-being and rights.</p>
<p>As the number of children who flee without their families increases, it’s not clear <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2022/mar/12/children-going-missing-amid-chaos-at-ukraine-border-report-aid-groups-refugees">whether there’s local capacity to respond effectively and appropriately</a>. Even before the Ukraine war, lone refugee youth who arrived in the United Kingdom without family were living unsupervised in hotels and disappearing <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/child-refugees-missing-hotels-home-office-uk-b1974945.html">at a rate of one per week</a>.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1500682721840046081"}"></div></p>
<h2>‘Best interests principle’</h2>
<p>The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child — <a href="https://tbinternet.ohchr.org/_layouts/15/TreatyBodyExternal/Treaty.aspx?Treaty=CRC&Lang=en">the most widely ratified human rights treaty in the world</a> — requires that all decisions affecting children are guided by what’s known as the <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/en-my/4ba09bb59.pdf">best interests principle</a>. </p>
<p>This principle is especially important in cases involving separated children, as well as the evacuation of children in institutional care, such as those in hospitals, prisons or orphanages. In fact, Canada has paused <a href="https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/new-child-adoptions-between-canada-ukraine-on-hold-due-to-war-1.5817483">all adoptions from Ukraine</a> in <a href="https://www.unicef.org/media/intercountry-adoption">line with international guidelines, law and practice</a>. </p>
<p>These safeguards are put in place so that children are not inadvertently taken away from their families when their identities cannot be verified or when their parents’ whereabouts are unknown.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A row of babies swaddled in blankets in a crib, one crying." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/452826/original/file-20220317-17-1fpr8y2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/452826/original/file-20220317-17-1fpr8y2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452826/original/file-20220317-17-1fpr8y2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452826/original/file-20220317-17-1fpr8y2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452826/original/file-20220317-17-1fpr8y2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452826/original/file-20220317-17-1fpr8y2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452826/original/file-20220317-17-1fpr8y2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Premature babies who were left behind by their parents lie in a bed in a hospital in Mariupol, Ukraine, on March 15, 2022.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Critiques of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/17504902.2018.1428784">the German kindertransport</a>, for example — an effort to rescue children from Nazi-controlled territory in the months prior to the outbreak of the Second World War — show how some Jewish children, although saved from persecution by the Nazis, were also in most cases permanently separated from their parents and their Jewish identities. </p>
<p>Given the scale and speed of Ukrainian forced migration, adults making decisions on behalf of separated children and those in care should look to the lessons of the past when focusing on the best interests of children. </p>
<p>For example, the <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-ukrainian-children-with-cancer-to-be-flown-to-toronto-hospital-for/">recent announcement</a> of evacuation of children with cancer to Sick Children’s Hospital in Toronto includes provisions for family members to accompany them.</p>
<h2>Temporary protection</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/pandemic-border/ukraine-refugee-asylum-europe-temporary-protection/">European countries</a> <a href="https://theconversation.com/is-canadas-welcome-to-fleeing-ukrainians-a-new-era-of-refugee-policy-178501">and Canada</a> are offering temporary protection, rather than permanent refugee status. </p>
<p>Under the <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/news/2022/03/canada-launches-new-temporary-residence-pathway-to-welcome-those-fleeing-the-war-in-ukraine.html">newly announced Canada-Ukraine Authorization for Emergency Travel</a>, Ukrainians and their immediate family members of any nationality are permitted to stay in Canada as temporary residents for up to three years via a three-year open work permit.</p>
<p>But temporary protection offers fewer formal resettlement and integration structures. Reliance on informal networks can result in exploitation and, in extreme cases, forced prostitution and other forms of <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/berlin-warns-ukrainian-refugees-about-trafficking-danger-2022-03-14/">human trafficking</a>. </p>
<p>In particular, <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/b-c-expecting-thousands-of-ukrainian-refugees-1.6382019">lack of affordable housing or designated shelters</a> can result in people accepting rooms in private homes without a <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/ukraine-refugees-modern-slavery-exploitation-sponsorship-uk-b2035384.html">proper vetting process or ongoing oversight</a>. </p>
<p>Due to this extreme dependency on others’ hospitality, the private sphere of domestic spaces and unequal gender and age power relations, displaced children, young people and women may be at higher risk of <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/man-allegedly-rapes-ukrainian-refugee-poland-exploitation-fears-grow-1687468?amp=1">sexual violence</a> or unwaged domestic work.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/we-need-to-pay-attention-to-the-experiences-of-children-in-ukraine-during-the-russian-invasion-178772">We need to pay attention to the experiences of children in Ukraine during the Russian invasion</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Legal challenges</h2>
<p>As the violence continues and displacement increases in scope and duration, secondary and tertiary migration is taking place, within Europe and to other regions, including to the United States and Canada. </p>
<p>This causes particular legal and immigration challenges, especially for families helmed by women whose male partners are prohibited from leaving Ukraine. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Two women carry a baby each, one in a bright pink snowsuit and the other in a pale blue patterended snow suit." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/452804/original/file-20220317-17-1wfdzht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C8482%2C5637&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/452804/original/file-20220317-17-1wfdzht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452804/original/file-20220317-17-1wfdzht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452804/original/file-20220317-17-1wfdzht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452804/original/file-20220317-17-1wfdzht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452804/original/file-20220317-17-1wfdzht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452804/original/file-20220317-17-1wfdzht.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Women carry children after crossing the border from Ukraine in Medyka, Poland, on March 9, 2022.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Daniel Cole)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><a href="https://www.cic.gc.ca/english/helpcentre/answer.asp?qnum=1022&top=16">Canadian immigration officials</a> may require a parent travelling with minor children without their spouse to present a copy of the child’s birth certificate, a letter of authorization from the other parent and a photocopy of the non-accompanying parent’s passport or national identification card.</p>
<p>Such documentation requirements are in accordance with the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/he/9780198806691.003.0021">1996 Hague Convention on the Protection of Children</a>, aimed at protecting children against cross-border abduction in cases of custody disputes. However, because people fled quickly from Ukraine and because some men who have been conscripted may have died or moved with military units, these documents may not be easy to obtain. </p>
<p>As a result, women and their children could be “stuck” in the first country of asylum, even if they have extended family support in other countries.</p>
<h2>Mental health impacts</h2>
<p>Research shows that long-term family separation has severe impacts for <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0004867420967427">mental health</a>. Children and young people, especially girls and older siblings, in single-parent households often take on additional child care, household and paid labour to <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/520183">support their families</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/452819/original/file-20220317-15-17yr88b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="An elderly woman is coated in snow as she sits in a wheelchair under a pink blanket." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/452819/original/file-20220317-15-17yr88b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/452819/original/file-20220317-15-17yr88b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452819/original/file-20220317-15-17yr88b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452819/original/file-20220317-15-17yr88b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452819/original/file-20220317-15-17yr88b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452819/original/file-20220317-15-17yr88b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452819/original/file-20220317-15-17yr88b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">An elderly woman is coated in snow as she sits in a wheelchair after being evacuated from Irpin, on the outskirts of Kyiv, on March 8, 2022.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Vadim Ghirda)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Older people left behind in Ukraine may feel <a href="https://www.voanews.com/a/elderly-disabled-unable-to-flee-ukraine-war-charities-say/6478084.html">isolated and abandoned</a>. </p>
<p>Violence and migration have different impacts <a href="https://theconversation.com/we-need-to-pay-attention-to-the-experiences-of-children-in-ukraine-during-the-russian-invasion-178772">due to age</a>, family status and gender. Policies and programs to address conflict-induced displacement in Ukraine must explicitly take into account the rights of children, including the best interests of the child. They also need to be attentive to gender and family relationships.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/179131/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christina Clark-Kazak receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. </span></em></p>Policies and programs to address war-induced displacement in Ukraine must explicitly take into account the rights of children, including the best interests of the child.Christina Clark-Kazak, Associate Professor, Public and International Affairs, L’Université d’Ottawa/University of OttawaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1570422021-03-22T12:26:57Z2021-03-22T12:26:57ZBiden immigration overhaul would reunite families split up by deportation<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/390503/original/file-20210318-13-f8h1x0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=51%2C8%2C5699%2C3819&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A mother who was deported to Mexico reconnects with her daughters at a family reunification event put on at the U.S.-Mexico border, November 2017. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/cristal-brayan-ramirez-cervantes-hugs-lucia-cervantes-while-news-photo/875978220?adppopup=true">Sandy Huffaker/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://www.immigrationresearch.org/system/files/Implications-of-Immigration-Enforcement-Activities-for-the-Well-Being-of-Children-in-Immigrant-Families.pdf">Hundreds of thousands of immigrant families have been separated by deportation</a> from the United States, in many cases with a parent on one side of the border and children on the other, according to estimates by the Urban Policy Institute and Migration Policy Institute. Reunification is a priority in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/18/us/politics/house-democrats-biden-immigration.html">President Joe Biden’s proposed immigration overhaul</a> and in bills that both the <a href="https://lindasanchez.house.gov/sites/lindasanchez.house.gov/files/2021.02.18%20US%20Citizenship%20Act%20Bill%20Text%20-%20SIGNED.pdf">House</a> and <a href="https://www.menendez.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/USCitizenshipAct2021BillText.pdf">Senate</a> will debate in coming weeks. </p>
<p>Both bills have provisions to preserve “family unity.” These include giving immigration judges increased discretion in deportation cases and allowing the secretary of homeland security or attorney general to waive deportation orders or allow deported parents of U.S. citizen children to return to the U.S.</p>
<p>Under U.S. immigration law, any noncitizen – including legal permanent residents – may be <a href="https://theconversation.com/deported-veterans-stranded-far-from-home-after-years-of-military-service-press-biden-to-bring-them-back-154320">deported for committing a serious crime</a>. Undocumented immigrants may be removed simply for being in the country without a valid visa and banned for 10 years or more.</p>
<p>Since 2016, I have coordinated a digital storytelling project called “<a href="http://humanizandoladeportacion.ucdavis.edu/en/">Humanizing Deportation</a>,” which has published personal narratives, in audiovisual form, from over 250 migrants. It is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780199366439.013.855">the world’s largest qualitative database</a> on the human consequences of deportation and other harsh penalties of U.S. immigration law. </p>
<p>Our research shows that deportation doesn’t just hurt the migrants who get deported – it also does serious harm to <a href="https://globalmigration.ucdavis.edu/deported-mothers-mental-health-and-family-separation">their families, especially children</a>. </p>
<p>Here are two such stories, told by the separated families themselves. Our project does not verify migrants’ stories, and what you read here is based on their recollection of events.</p>
<h2>Tania’s story</h2>
<p>Tania Mendoza arrived in California in 1989 at age 3, brought by her parents from Mexico, undocumented, to escape poverty. </p>
<p>In 2010 Tania was arrested after <a href="http://humanizandoladeportacion.ucdavis.edu/en/2018/11/05/115a-dreaming-in-the-shadows/">a domestic dispute with a guy she was dating</a>. Though no charges were filed and Tania had no criminal record, she was turned over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement and deported. She was 24 and a mother.</p>
<p>Just two years later, Tania would have qualified as an undocumented childhood arrival, or “Dreamer,” and been protected from deportation by the Obama-era <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/article/what-is-daca.html">Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals</a>. </p>
<p>Her toddler daughter remained with the child’s father in Los Angeles. </p>
<p>Tania recalls her daughter watching her get detained by the L.A. Police Department: “That was the last time I ever saw her,” <a href="http://humanizandoladeportacion.ucdavis.edu/en/2018/11/05/115b-feelings-are-feelings-and-family-is-family-part-ii/">she told us tearfully</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Black-and-white image of a woman standing on a beach with a large fence in the background" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/390655/original/file-20210319-19-yyzehx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/390655/original/file-20210319-19-yyzehx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/390655/original/file-20210319-19-yyzehx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/390655/original/file-20210319-19-yyzehx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/390655/original/file-20210319-19-yyzehx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/390655/original/file-20210319-19-yyzehx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/390655/original/file-20210319-19-yyzehx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Tania Mendoza on the Mexican side of the border wall with California. Mendoza was deported to Mexico, which she left at age 3, in 2010.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.leopoldopena.com/">Leopoldo Peña</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Tania says separation from her daughter was the hardest part of life after deportation. Since she shared custody with the father, she could not take her daughter with her to Mexico without his consent. </p>
<p>Mother and daughter stayed in touch by phone until 2016, when the father – to whom she was not married – cut off all contact. </p>
<p>“He took her phone away and just decided she was better off without me,” Tania said. “So my heart broke even more.” </p>
<p>After two years without contact, a family court judge awarded Tania phone visitation rights – the best proxy for enforcing the existing shared custody agreement due to Tania’s removal from the country. </p>
<p>Tania has communicated regularly with her daughter since but has not seen her, except on a screen, for over 10 years. </p>
<p>Nowadays, she says, getting a simple text like “Hi, Mom, how was your day?” fills Tania with feelings of hope. </p>
<h2>Losing mom or dad</h2>
<p>Family separation made headlines during the Trump administration, when Central American families seeking asylum were separated at the border. <a href="https://www.voanews.com/usa/immigration/obstacles-persist-reuniting-families-separated-us-mexico-border">About 500 families remain separated</a> today. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/390504/original/file-20210318-17-oufmkk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Group crosses the Brooklyn Bridge holding signs that promote 'Reunited Families' and an American flag" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/390504/original/file-20210318-17-oufmkk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/390504/original/file-20210318-17-oufmkk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/390504/original/file-20210318-17-oufmkk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/390504/original/file-20210318-17-oufmkk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/390504/original/file-20210318-17-oufmkk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/390504/original/file-20210318-17-oufmkk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/390504/original/file-20210318-17-oufmkk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">People march in New York City against the Trump administration’s family separation policy.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/thousands-of-people-march-in-support-of-families-separated-news-photo/988040988?adppopup=true">Spencer Platt/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But family separation <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2014/oct/15/immigration-boy-reform-obama-deportations-families-separated">occurred during the Obama administration</a>, too. Between 2009 and 2016, the U.S. expelled an <a href="https://www.dhs.gov/immigration-statistics/yearbook/2019/table39#">average of 383,000 immigrants per year</a>, according to Department of Homeland Security data. That surpasses Trump, whose government deported 325,000 annually over the first three years of his administration. George W. Bush’s administration averaged 252,000 deportations a year. </p>
<p>So many <a href="http://humanizandoladeportacion.ucdavis.edu/en/about-the-project/">deported immigrants who’ve shared their stories with us</a> tell of the deep and enduring damage inflicted when their removal meant that their children lost their mom or dad. </p>
<p>Parents are <a href="https://theconversation.com/deported-twice-man-struggles-to-help-his-family-survive-90734">rarely able to provide or care for their families from abroad</a>. And the trauma of losing a loved one for an extended, indefinite period can be significant, <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2Ftra0000177">especially for children</a>. Psychologists have observed <a href="https://theconversation.com/living-on-the-edge-are-americas-deportation-laws-traumatising-immigrants-74663">anxiety, depression, hyperactivity and other symptoms commonly associated with post-traumatic stress disorder</a> in children who’ve lost a parent to deportation.</p>
<p>Why don’t deported parents just take the kids with them? As Tania’s story shows, this is not always practical, or even possible. </p>
<h2>Rosa and Zuri</h2>
<p>When Rosa Ortega’s husband was taken to an immigration detention center in San Bernardino, California, in 2017, and then deported to his native Peru, it was a devastating ordeal for the couple’s three young children. </p>
<p>In the <a href="http://humanizandoladeportacion.ucdavis.edu/en/2017/12/04/steppin-in/">story Rosa and her daughter Zuri recorded for us that same year</a>, Rosa says she didn’t know how to explain to the children why their father was taken from their house in handcuffs, nor answer their questions about how long he would be gone.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/390506/original/file-20210318-19-30475v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Small girl in striped shirt hugs a man in a red jumpsuit, in an institutional setting" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/390506/original/file-20210318-19-30475v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/390506/original/file-20210318-19-30475v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/390506/original/file-20210318-19-30475v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/390506/original/file-20210318-19-30475v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/390506/original/file-20210318-19-30475v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/390506/original/file-20210318-19-30475v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/390506/original/file-20210318-19-30475v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A family visit at the ICE-run Adelanto immigration detention center in San Bernardino County, Calif.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/an-immigrant-detainee-holds-his-children-during-a-family-news-photo/450371271?adppopup=true">John Moore/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Rosa’s eldest child, Zuri, a teenager, had to step in and assume responsibilities usually handled by her father. </p>
<p>“Instead of him being there on [my sister’s] first day of kindergarten, it was me,” Zuri told us.</p>
<p>She said losing her father had forced her to “mature and grow up” and that she deals with “more than what you are supposed to” because she is “filling in that role as a parent but still being a child at the same time.” </p>
<p>Zuri is among the thousands of children who just might get to see their dad again under Biden’s immigration reform plan. </p>
<p>But it has to pass the House and Senate first.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/157042/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Robert McKee Irwin does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>When a child loses mom or dad to deportation, the harm can be severe and lasting. New immigration bills in the House and Senate seek to avoid family separation and allow deported parents back home.Robert McKee Irwin, Deputy Director, Global Migration Center, University of California, DavisLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1501122021-01-13T16:52:56Z2021-01-13T16:52:56ZJoe Biden and Kamala Harris could transform American childhood<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/378313/original/file-20210112-23-1wlv14i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C718%2C6000%2C3269&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Children wave American flags before an event with President-elect Joe Biden in November 2020, in Wilmington, Del. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Inauguration Day approaches in the United States after a bitterly divisive election and the unprecedented events surrounding <a href="https://theconversation.com/pro-trump-rioters-storm-u-s-capitol-as-his-election-tantrum-leads-to-violence-149142">the confirmation of Joe Biden’s electoral college victory</a>. The world is waiting to see what changes a Joe Biden/Kamala Harris administration might bring to the beleaguered nation. </p>
<p>Many believe that the president-elect bears the responsibility for the <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/trump-coup-election-michigan/">future of American democracy</a>, while others assert that what’s at stake is the fate of the nation’s <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-biden-administration-must-double-down-on-science/">scientific capacity</a> to respond both to the pandemic and to the climate crisis. </p>
<p>As researchers who study childhood, we believe that the new administration could also play an important role in determining the future of another important ideal — the “<a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2F0003-066X.34.10.815">American child</a>.” What happens over the next four years could have a lasting impact on how childhood is understood and experienced in the United States and beyond.</p>
<h2>Inventing the ‘American child’</h2>
<p>Children were central to political debate throughout the 2020 presidential election. From unfounded fears of a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/27/technology/pizzagate-justin-bieber-qanon-tiktok.html">bogus child-trafficking conspiracy</a> to inspiring messages of <a href="https://www.parents.com/news/kamala-harris-acceptance-speech-was-a-message-of-hope-for-kids-of-all-genders-this-is-a-country-of-possibilities/">possibility and equity</a>, the child was an important campaign tool for winning hearts and minds on both ends of the political spectrum. </p>
<p>As Yale psychologist William Kessen pointed out more than four decades ago, the “<a href="https://quote.ucsd.edu/childhood/files/2013/04/kessen-amerchild.pdf">American child</a>” at the heart of these debates is a cultural invention. What Kessen was pointing out was that childhood is not an undisputed truth, but a malleable and changing social construct. </p>
<p>In the U.S., and in the western world more broadly, one of the most common beliefs about childhood has been that it should be a <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0907568218811484">universal time of innocence</a>, or separation from “adult” realities like work, politics and war. This belief became widespread in the late 19th century when concern over the living and working conditions of the poor led to a crusade for child protection. </p>
<p>The preservation of childhood innocence became a guiding factor for laws and policies on child care, education and labour. </p>
<h2>Questioning innocence</h2>
<p>In recent decades, this assumption of innocence has increasingly been recognized as a myth. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/coronavirus-isnt-the-end-of-childhood-innocence-but-an-opportunity-to-rethink-childrens-rights-134478">Coronavirus isn't the end of 'childhood innocence,' but an opportunity to rethink children's rights</a>
</strong>
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<hr>
<p>Particularly in 2020, given the twin crises of the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/31/us/george-floyd-protests-coronavirus.html">COVID-19 pandemic and police violence</a> in the U.S., it’s clear that few people, including children, escape adversity. Yet innocence is a persistent fantasy that has real consequences. </p>
<p>As the articles featured in the newest issue of <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rcui20/50/4?nav=tocList"><em>Curriculum Inquiry</em></a> illustrate, the myth of childhood innocence is continually employed as a political tool that diminishes difficult lived experiences, limits historical understanding and shapes social interactions. In other words, advocating for the protection of innocence does not actually protect children. </p>
<p>As we observe in the <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03626784.2020.1851521">issue’s editorial</a>, when childhood innocence is held up as an unquestioned ideal, its politics — the colonial and racist beliefs and practices on which it is founded — are erased.</p>
<p>More specifically, campaigning for the protection childhood innocence can be understood as an act of <a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/preserving-my-childrens-innocence-is-an-act-of-preserving_b_57d2d8f4e4b0273330ac3dae">preserving white supremacy</a>, as seen numerous times in outgoing President Donald Trump’s political rhetoric. </p>
<h2>Strict immigration policies</h2>
<p>In 2016, Trump <a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2016/08/donald-trump-immigration-address-transcript-227614">campaigned on strict immigration policies</a>, in part, he claimed, as a response to the loss of innocent lives due to insecure borders. He described the need to control future immigration as an obligation to the American children of newcomers “to ensure assimilation, integration and upward mobility.” </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/yxD5QkzmVOA?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">At the 51-minute mark, Trump talks about the obligation to American-born children. Via CNN.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Once elected, Trump made it clear which children he believed were entitled to innocence and protection with the enactment of his <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/04/trump-administration-family-separation-immigrants-joe-biden">family separation policy</a> that tragically split <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/more-5-400-children-split-border-according-new-count-n1071791">more than 5,400 children</a> from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border. </p>
<p>Trump’s supposed efforts to protect innocent children have actually undermined children’s safety and well-being. His exclusionary actions, including <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/31/us/politics/trump-travel-ban.html">Muslim and African travel bans</a>, his repeated attempts to repeal the <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jemimamcevoy/2020/06/18/all-the-times-trump-promised-to-repeal-daca/?sh=66d6f26d679a">Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program (DACA)</a> and his frequent refusals to <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/09/30/918483794/from-debate-stage-trump-declines-to-denounce-white-supremacy">denounce white supremacy</a> have <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/donald-trump-asks-children-to-build-the-wall-on-halloween">normalized cruelty and incited fear</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A Guatemalan mother cries at a news conference." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/378187/original/file-20210112-13-5fr021.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/378187/original/file-20210112-13-5fr021.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/378187/original/file-20210112-13-5fr021.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/378187/original/file-20210112-13-5fr021.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/378187/original/file-20210112-13-5fr021.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=487&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/378187/original/file-20210112-13-5fr021.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=487&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/378187/original/file-20210112-13-5fr021.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=487&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A mother from Guatemala who was separated from her two children after entering the U.S. in May 2018 weeps while speaking at a news conference in Boston in September 2018. She was among plaintiffs in a lawsuit against Trump’s administration for separated kids from their parents at the border.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Steven Senne)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Not only have Trump’s attacks on racialized people left marginalized children afraid for themselves and their families, they have also made racial hostility and violence more acceptable. </p>
<p>As former first lady Michelle Obama pointed out in a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/oct/14/michelle-obama-speech-transcript-donald-trump">high-profile speech</a> in 2016 in support of Hillary Clinton, electing Trump would mean telling “kids that bigotry and bullying are perfectly acceptable in the leader of their country.” While <a href="https://news.un.org/en/story/2020/06/1065572">racism and violence</a> have a long history in the U.S., Trump’s tenure may mark the first time that young American children have regarded <a href="https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/early-childhood/news/2017/01/27/297352/when-president-trump-speaks-our-children-are-listening/">their president as someone to fear</a>.</p>
<h2>Choosing justice over innocence</h2>
<p>Although the impact of the Trump presidency will not be easily overcome, a Biden-Harris administration offers hope for the nation’s children. Biden has vowed to “<a href="https://joebiden.com/immigration/">reverse the Trump administration’s cruel and senseless policies that separate parents from their children at our border</a>” and to reinstate the DACA program. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Joe Biden speaks from a stage with Kamala Harris on video screen behind him." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/378182/original/file-20210112-19-wgzv8l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/378182/original/file-20210112-19-wgzv8l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=433&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/378182/original/file-20210112-19-wgzv8l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=433&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/378182/original/file-20210112-19-wgzv8l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=433&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/378182/original/file-20210112-19-wgzv8l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=544&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/378182/original/file-20210112-19-wgzv8l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=544&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/378182/original/file-20210112-19-wgzv8l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=544&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Biden speaks as Harris looks on via video during a news conference in Wilmington, Del., in December 2020.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Kevin Lamarque/Pool via AP)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>He’s also committed to <a href="https://joebiden.com/racial-economic-equity/">advancing racial equity</a> by addressing racial disparities in health care, policing and education. </p>
<p>These efforts will go a long way toward assuring all children in the U.S. that they are valued members of society who deserve to have their <a href="https://theconversation.com/world-childrens-day-young-people-deserve-to-be-heard-during-covid-19-149904">rights supported and protected</a>. </p>
<p>However, we believe that there’s more Biden and Harris can do to transform childhood for the better. Instead of relying on the rhetoric of <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03626784.2020.1851521">childhood innocence</a>, we hope that the new administration focuses on justice. This requires asking questions that address children’s basic <a href="https://www.unicef.org/child-rights-convention/what-are-human-rights">human rights</a>, which include the right to be healthy, safe and free from discrimination.</p>
<p>As cultural historian <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/26/opinion/black-kids-discrimination.html">Robin Bernstein</a> explains: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“All children deserve equal protection under the law not because they’re innocent, but because they’re people.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Addressing racial and economic disparities in education, health care and criminal justice is a step toward expanding equal protection for all children, but true reform requires that politicians look to children themselves to inform the policies that govern their lives.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Children, one wearing red eyeglasses, wave U.S. flags." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/378184/original/file-20210112-15-1ri7liv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3099%2C2064&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/378184/original/file-20210112-15-1ri7liv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/378184/original/file-20210112-15-1ri7liv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/378184/original/file-20210112-15-1ri7liv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/378184/original/file-20210112-15-1ri7liv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/378184/original/file-20210112-15-1ri7liv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/378184/original/file-20210112-15-1ri7liv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Children join their parents watching Joe Biden speak during a campaign rally in March 2020, in Kansas City, Mo.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Harris’s <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/11/07/kamala-harris-victory-speech-transcript/">victory speech</a>, in which she spoke directly to kids, suggests a willingness to take seriously children’s rights and to address the doubts and fears that a Trump administration fuelled.</p>
<p>In her address, Harris invited children not simply to dream of what they can do in the future, but to be leaders and agents of change in this moment. Inviting young people into the political process in this way can undermine the political power of childhood innocence by recognizing children as knowing, experienced and capable human beings and valued members of society in their own right.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/150112/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Julie C. Garlen has received funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Neil Ramjewan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>What happens over the next four years in Joe Biden/Kamala Harris administration could have a lasting impact on how childhood is understood and experienced in the United States and beyond.Julie C. Garlen, Associate Professor, Childhood and Youth Studies, Carleton UniversityNeil Ramjewan, PhD candidate, Pedagogy, Carleton UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1144792019-07-03T13:04:36Z2019-07-03T13:04:36ZMexicans in US routinely confront legal abuse, racial profiling, ICE targeting and other civil rights violations<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/281444/original/file-20190626-76722-1o2gl80.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The civil rights of 11.3 million Mexican nationals who live in the US are routinely violated, according to a comprehensive new report on U.S. immigration enforcement since 2009.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Arizona-Immigration/191bc70a2f7a4f84a8cfc93dd7885e9d/37/0">AP Photo/Matt York</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Officially, the <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/amendmentxiv">Constitution of the United States</a> gives everyone on U.S. soil equal protection under the law – regardless of nationality or legal status. </p>
<p>But, as recent stories of the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/25/us/john-sanders-cbp.html">neglectful treatment of migrant children in government detention centers</a> demonstrate, these <a href="https://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals/duklr59&div=52&id=&page=">civil rights</a> are not always granted to immigrants.</p>
<p>We are scholars focused on U.S.-Mexico migration. Our <a href="http://ccis.ucsd.edu/_files/conference_papers_present/CNDH-final-3.4.19.pdf">report on the enforcement of U.S. immigration law under presidents Barack Obama and Donald Trump</a>, presented in February to Mexico’s <a href="http://www.cndh.org.mx">National Human Rights Commission</a>, documented pervasive and systematic civil rights violations against Mexicans living in the United States. </p>
<p>Some of the abuses we documented – which include racial profiling, discriminatory treatment and due process violations – result from the <a href="https://theconversation.com/us-zero-tolerance-immigration-policy-still-violating-fundamental-human-rights-laws-98615">Trump administration’s anti-immigration policies</a>. Others <a href="https://theconversation.com/trumps-immigration-policies-will-pick-up-where-obamas-left-off-70187">began much earlier</a>, under Obama or well before. </p>
<p>All paint a troubling picture about the rule of law in the United States and the challenges facing America’s largest immigrant group.</p>
<h2>Discrimination and deportation</h2>
<p>An estimated <a href="https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/mexican-immigrants-united-states">11.3 million</a> people born in Mexico now live in the United States – 3% of the total U.S. population. </p>
<p>About 5 million of them are unauthorized immigrants, meaning Mexicans <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/06/12/us-unauthorized-immigrant-population-2017/">make up just under half</a> of the 10.5 million undocumented immigrants in the country. The other <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/06/12/5-facts-about-illegal-immigration-in-the-u-s/">6.3 million Mexicans in the U.S.</a> are either lawful permanent residents or dual nationals who are naturalized U.S. citizens. </p>
<p>Based on these figures, we found, Immigration and Customs Enforcement – or ICE, the agency that carries out the nation’s immigration laws – arrests Mexican immigrants at levels that are <a href="http://ccis.ucsd.edu/_files/conference_papers_present/CNDH-final-3.4.19.pdf">disproportionate</a> to their share of the unauthorized immigrant population. </p>
<p>Roughly 70% of immigrants deported from the U.S. interior in 2015 <a href="https://trac.syr.edu/phptools/immigration/removehistory/">were Mexican</a>, the most recent year that such detailed deportation data are available. </p>
<p>Another 550,000 young Mexican American “Dreamers” – immigrants who were brought to the U.S. unlawfully as children – <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-deporting-the-dreamers-is-immoral-91738">became subject to deportation</a> when Trump in September 2017 rescinded the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which gave them temporary protection from deportation.</p>
<p>Not all deportations violate immigrants’ civil rights. The <a href="https://www.uscis.gov/legal-resources/immigration-and-nationality-act">Immigration and Nationality Act</a> says immigrants may be deported for violating a long list of criminal and administrative laws.</p>
<p>But <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1057/lst.2013.14">evidence suggests</a> that Mexicans and other Latinos are sometimes targeted for arrest based on their race or ethnicity. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/281443/original/file-20190626-76738-1h5yxo3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/281443/original/file-20190626-76738-1h5yxo3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/281443/original/file-20190626-76738-1h5yxo3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281443/original/file-20190626-76738-1h5yxo3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281443/original/file-20190626-76738-1h5yxo3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281443/original/file-20190626-76738-1h5yxo3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281443/original/file-20190626-76738-1h5yxo3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281443/original/file-20190626-76738-1h5yxo3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In 2013 a federal judge ruled that police in Maricopa County, Arizona, were racial profiling Latinos in traffic stops that targeted immigrants.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Racial-Profiling-Traffic-Stops/2c5a68d8a5634af7a96cd088f3ab8573/1/0">AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In 2014, <a href="http://phparivaca.org/?page_id=1174">independent monitors</a> at a Customs and Border Protection checkpoint in Arivaca, Arizona, just north of the U.S.-Mexico border, found that vehicle occupants who appeared to be Latino were 26 times more likely to be asked to show identification than white-looking vehicle occupants, who are frequently waved through the checkpoint. </p>
<p>And in 2012, a U.S. Department of Justice investigation in Alamance County, North Carolina, found that the sheriff had <a href="https://www.newsobserver.com/news/local/article213085749.html">instructed deputies</a> to “go out there and get me some of those taco eaters” by targeting Latinos in traffic stops and other law enforcement activities.</p>
<p>The DOJ <a href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-releases-investigative-findings-alamance-county-nc-sheriff-s-office">concluded</a> that the county demonstrated an “egregious pattern of racial profiling” – a violation of the <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/amendmentxiv">14th Amendment</a>, which guarantees everyone equal protection under the law.</p>
<h2>Family separation</h2>
<p>Mexicans in the United States have seen their constitutional rights violated in other ways. </p>
<p>The most egregious example was the <a href="https://theconversation.com/trump-and-sessions-can-end-immigrant-family-separations-without-congress-help-98599">forced separation of families found to have crossed the border illegally</a>. </p>
<p>Under this Trump administration policy, which began in April 2018, at least <a href="https://www.aclu.org/issues/immigrants-rights/immigrants-rights-and-detention/family-separation">2,654 migrant children</a> – and perhaps <a href="http://cdn.cnn.com/cnn/2019/images/01/17/oei-bl-18-00511.pdf">thousands more</a> – were taken from their parents and held in government custody while their parents were criminally prosecuted for crossing the border unlawfully. </p>
<p>Thirty of the children known to have been separated from their families were Mexican; the rest were from Central America. <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/immigration/emails-show-trump-admin-had-no-way-link-separated-migrant-n1000746">Poor record-keeping</a> has made it difficult for all of them to be reunited with their families before their parents’ deportation. </p>
<p>Together, these actions violate the constitutional rights to legal due process, equal protection and, according to <a href="https://www.politico.com/f/?id=00000169-603d-d102-a76d-ebbd03e30001">the Southern District of California</a>, the right of parents to determine the care for their children.</p>
<p>“The liberty interest identified in the Fifth Amendment provides a right to family integrity or to familial association,” wrote Judge Dana M. Sabraw in a June 2018 ruling. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/281446/original/file-20190626-76701-oxey35.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/281446/original/file-20190626-76701-oxey35.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/281446/original/file-20190626-76701-oxey35.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=389&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281446/original/file-20190626-76701-oxey35.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=389&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281446/original/file-20190626-76701-oxey35.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=389&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281446/original/file-20190626-76701-oxey35.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=489&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281446/original/file-20190626-76701-oxey35.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=489&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281446/original/file-20190626-76701-oxey35.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=489&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A child from Guerrero, Mexico, clings to her mother as the family waits in Tijuana to apply for asylum in the U.S., June 13, 2018.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Immigration-The-Goal/c9eba4dce9d040308ec4cfef408ac1f6/13/0">AP Photo/Gregory Bull</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>More routine civil rights violations happen to Mexicans in the U.S. every day, our report found. </p>
<p>Though children born in the U.S. are entitled by law to American citizenship regardless of their parents’ immigration status, hundreds of undocumented Mexican women in Texas have been <a href="https://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-texas-immigrant-birth-certificate-20151016-story.html">denied birth certificates</a> for their U.S.-born children since 2013, according to a <a href="https://www.latimes.com/nation/immigration/la-na-texas-immigrant-birth-20150718-story.html">lawsuit filed by parents</a>. In 2016, Texas <a href="https://www.texastribune.org/2016/07/25/texas-agrees-to-resolve-birth-certificate-case/">settled the lawsuit</a> and agreed to expand the types of documents immigrants can use to prove their identity.</p>
<p>And in both Arizona and Texas, so-called “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/may/09/texas-immigration-sanctuary-cities-law-arizona">show me your papers</a>” laws allow police to demand identification from anyone they have a “reasonable suspicion” may be undocumented, which may lead to <a href="https://www.justice.gov/crt/file/785481/download">discriminatory targeting</a> of Latinos.</p>
<p>Once in government detention, <a href="https://www.colef.mx/emif/eng/">surveys conducted in Mexico</a> of recently deported immigrants show, Mexican deportees are often badly treated. </p>
<p>On average, in 2016 and 2017, about half of all recently deported Mexicans reported having no access to medical services or a bathroom while in government custody. One-third reported experiencing extreme heat or cold. </p>
<p>Mexicans are <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/secret-border-patrol-facebook-group-agents-joke-about-migrant-deaths-post-sexist-memes">not alone in their negative experiences at border patrol facilities</a>. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://www.oig.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/assets/2019-06/OIG-19-47-Jun19.pdf">recent report by the Office of Inspector General</a> found unsafe and unsanitary conditions at several U.S. immigrant detention centers, and immigration lawyers found <a href="https://time.com/5607608/migrant-conditions-holding-centers-border/">food shortages at some migrant children’s shelters</a>.</p>
<h2>A climate of fear</h2>
<p>While Mexicans in the United States have faced <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1163/156916306777835376">biased law enforcement</a> and <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3846170/">discrimination</a> for many decades, their treatment appears to have worsened since President Trump took office in 2017 with an openly <a href="http://time.com/3923128/donald-trump-announcement-speech/">anti-Mexican agenda</a>.</p>
<p>A survey of Mexicans recently deported from the United States <a href="https://www.colef.mx/emif/eng/">found</a> that the number of people who reported experiencing verbal abuse or physical assault during their time in the U.S. increased 47% between 2016 and 2017. </p>
<p>The number of hate crimes against Latinos reported to the <a href="https://ucr.fbi.gov/hate-crime/2016/tables/table-1;%20https:/ucr.fbi.gov/hate-crime/2017/tables/table-1.xls.">FBI</a> also rose 24% in 2017 compared to 2016 – increasing from 344 incidents to 427. </p>
<p>Mexico is concerned about its citizens in the United States. </p>
<p>In March, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and foreign minister Marcelo Ebrard <a href="https://www.vidaenelvalle.com/news/politics-government/article227092954.html">announced</a> it would provide more consular services online to increase the reach of Mexico’s 50 brick-and-mortar consulates in the U.S. and provide more legal training to consulate officials. </p>
<p>To support Mexicans in the U.S. with deportation and other immigration cases, the Mexican government will also <a href="https://www.gob.mx/sre/prensa/nuevos-consules-generales-en-ee-uu-presentan-estrategia-para-fortalecer-defensa-de-connacionales?idiom=es">strengthen its official ties with U.S.-based legal aid providers</a>. </p>
<p>In theory, Mexico shouldn’t have to scramble to defend the rights of its citizens in the U.S. because the U.S. Constitution would. But, in practice, the civil rights of immigrants are simply not always guaranteed.</p>
<p>[ <em>Like what you’ve read? Want more?</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=likethis">Sign up for The Conversation’s daily newsletter</a>. ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/114479/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David FitzGerald has received research funding from Mexico's National Human Rights Commission.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Angela Y. McClean and Gustavo López do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A new report on Mexicans in the US paints a troubling picture about the treatment of the country’s largest immigrant group.David FitzGerald, Theodore E. Gildred Chair in U.S.-Mexican Relations, Professor of Sociology, and Co-Director of the Center for Comparative Immigration Studies, University of California, San DiegoAngela Y. McClean, Ph.D. Candidate in Sociology, Fellow and Graduate Researcher at Center for Comparative Immigration Studies, University of California, San DiegoGustavo López, Graduate Researcher at Center for Comparative Immigration Studies, University of California, San DiegoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1042772018-10-04T14:46:29Z2018-10-04T14:46:29ZAre joint custody and shared parenting a child’s right?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/238980/original/file-20181002-85632-j4r4n6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C30%2C1200%2C765&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">In France, nearly three-quarters of the children of divorced couples see their fathers only one weekend every fifteen days.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://pixabay.com/fr/p%C3%A8re-fille-fils-enfant-papa-2342674/">Pixabay</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Many families with children separate all around the world. In France, for instance, nearly <a href="http://www.justice.gouv.fr/budget-et-statistiques-10054/infostats-justice-10057/les-decisions-des-juges-concernant-les-enfants-de-parents-separes-27681.html">200,000 children per year</a> are affected by the divorce of their parents. After divorce, just over seven out of ten children (73%) live only with their mother and visit their father on alternate weekends. This phenomenon begs the question of the short- and long-term fate of these children, particularly in light of research showing that the <a href="https://www.wiley.com/en-fr/The+Role+of+the+Father+in+Child+Development,+5th+Edition-p-9780470405499">active involvement of both parents in children’s lives is vital</a> to their development and well-being.</p>
<p>The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989), as well as the European Union Charter of Fundamental Rights (2011, Article 24), mandates that children should be allowed to maintain meaningful relationships with both of their parents. In parallel, the father’s involvement in rearing and childcare tasks in the family has grown significantly in recent decades, which in association with the salience of mothers’ engagement in labour market participation, has called for new family arrangements that need to be taken into account in public policies. </p>
<p>Most importantly, recent studies have clearly demonstrated that children’s ongoing relationships with both parents are vital, regardless of children’s age and situation. These convergences raise the question about needed reforms in social-legal policies and the therapeutic practices focused in post-divorce/separation relationships and living arrangements, in order to improve the welfare, development, and the “best interests” of children whose parents live apart. Additionally, they point out to the importance of raising public awareness about the importance of carrying out these reforms.</p>
<h2>The right to maintain regular relations with both parents</h2>
<p>The <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx">Convention on the Right of the Child</a>, Article 9-3, emphasizes </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“the right of a child separated from both parents or one of them to regularly maintain personal relationships and direct contact with both parents, unless it is contrary to the best interests of the child”. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>This right is most salient to situations of parental separation, referred to in Article 9-1, which states that, “States Parties shall ensure that a child shall not be separated from his or her parents against their will, except when competent authorities subject to judicial review determine, in accordance with applicable law and procedures, that such separation is necessary for the best interests of the child.”</p>
<p>However, neither children’s rights nor the definition of their best interests is a straight forward definition, either in the Convention or in family laws. These concepts need to be interpreted according to the unique situation and circumstances of each child. This interpretation falls under the responsibility of the judges, but it is also the concern of international organizations focused on the well-being of children. Thus, a <a href="https://book.coe.int/eur/en/children-s-rights-and-family-law/6862-the-best-interests-of-the-child-a-dialogue-between-theory-and-practice.html">2014 conference</a> under the aegis of the Council of Europe concluded that: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“There is no comprehensive definition of the concept [‘best interests of the child’], and that its vagueness has resulted in practical difficulties for those trying to apply it. Some suggest that ‘best interests’ should therefore only be used when necessary, appropriate and feasible for advancing children’s rights, whereas others see the flexibility of the concept as its strong point.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>We advocate a “best interests of the child from the perspective of the child” approach to replace the current standard, taking into account the results of child-focused research on the consequences of parental divorce on children’s well-being.</p>
<h2>The balance between work and family life</h2>
<p>The recognition that the child benefits from both the care and close relationships with both parents reflects changes toward <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1467-954X.2010.01899.x">more equal divisions</a> of parenting and domestic tasks between mothers and fathers, as well as in the role of each in work-family articulation, in the <a href="https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/brinton/files/knight.brinton.ajs_.pdf">context of the dual earner family model</a>. This means that the male breadwinner/female housewife and caregiver family model has <a href="https://academic.oup.com/sp/article-abstract/8/2/152/1734373?redirectedFrom=fulltext">become obsolete</a> either as a family practice or as a basis for family policies.</p>
<p>Social and political advances have resulted in girls’ access to higher education and women’s integration into the professions. Undeniably, further progress remains in this regard. For instance, maternity leave should be adapted to allow for better retention in employment, and paternity leave should be extended to allow fathers to build, maintain or strengthen ties with babies and very young children.</p>
<p>Current psychological research demonstrates that there is no competition between <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15379418.2018.1425105?scroll=top&needAccess=true">children’s attachment to the father and mother</a>. Instead, children are predisposed to build and enjoy multiple attachment bonds. Mothers are not necessarily, by nature, more sensitive and responsive to children than fathers. A key factor in the development of attachment bonds is the amount of time spent interacting with the child: the more the parent is engaged in the care of the infant and child, the more sensitive and responsive the parent becomes to the child’s signals.</p>
<p>A balance between work, family and personal life, allowing both parents to build a secure bond with their child, reinforces the application of Article 9-3 of the UNCRC. Since the children have established significant relationships with both parents, they must have a residential arrangement that allows them to maintain and preserve these relationships after divorce/separation.</p>
<h2>The consequences of residential arrangements on health and welfare</h2>
<p>Current research converges in the results on the consequences of different residential arrangements of children whose parents have separated. The large-scale studies conducted in recent years are enlightening.</p>
<p>Research from Sweden and other jurisdictions shows that <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/apa.14004?identityKey=59a01d32-9dad-45e3-9957-dea28f3554e2&wol1URL=%2Fdoi%2F10.1111%2Fapa.14004%2Ffull">young children (3-5 years old)</a> who live in equal shared parenting have a level of well-being equivalent to that of the children from intact families. Parents and teachers, on the other hand, note psychological problems in children living mainly with one parent. Identical results are shown with <a href="https://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1471-2458-13-868">teenagers aged 12-15</a>. These results are <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4735678/">independent of the socio-cultural level of parents</a>. A study with <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12187-017-9443-1">5,000 teenagers aged 10-18</a> confirms and clarifies these results: neither children in equal shared parenting nor their parents are disadvantaged or hampered for changing frequently their place of residence. In Norway, <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10502556.2017.1402655">a study with more than 7,000 teenagers aged 16 to 19</a> does not show significant differences between teenagers living in equal shared parenting or nuclear families in terms of their physical health, their emotions and their social behaviour.</p>
<p>On the other hand, in all cases and on almost all indicators, children and teenagers living in a single parent residence are disadvantaged. This does not mean that only sole residence is the cause of this situation.</p>
<p>Studies conducted in the United States show that <a href="https://asu.pure.elsevier.com/en/publications/should-infants-and-toddlers-have-frequent-overnight-parenting-tim">these benefits are also valid for very young children, under three years.</a> Regardless of the level of conflict of the parents, their degree of study or income, the more the baby (1 year) or toddler (2 years) spent nights with his or her father, up to 50%, the more relationship with both his or her parents at the age of young adult (19 years) is healthy and balanced.</p>
<h2>The best interests of the child in the 21st century</h2>
<p>International organizations and national courts are focused on preserving the well-being and best interests of children. However, many constraints to child well-being persist, and keep infants, toddlers, children and teenagers within a mother-centred mode of care and education in post-divorce/separation families. These barriers work to the detriment of children, fathers and mothers.</p>
<p>The maternal deference standard is unfavourable to children, and seems contrary to article 2-2 of the UN CRC, which states that, “States Parties shall take all appropriate measures to ensure that the child is protected against all forms of discrimination or punishment on the basis of the status […] of the child’s parents.”</p>
<p>Parents’ and professionals’ reflections and decisions might be more relevant, if professional practices and legal judgments <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10502556.2018.1454196">prioritize the terms of residence that allow the child to have “personal relationships and contacts with both parents’ to the maximum degree possible</a>.</p>
<p>The concept of the "best interest of the child in the 21st century’ will be the focus of discussion and debate at the Fourth International Conference on Shared Parenting, to be held in Strasbourg, at the Palais de l’Europe, on 2018, November 22 and 23.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>All information about the program and the registrations are available at <a href="http://strasbourg2018.org/">strasbourg2018.org</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/104277/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michel Grangeat is a member of the Conseil International sur la Résidence Alternée (CIRA/ICSP). </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sofia Marinho is a reserch felow at Institute of Social Sciences, University of Lisbon. Her research work is sponsored by FCT- Portuguese Funding Agency for Science and Technology, by Grant SFRH/BPD/84273/2012.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Malin Bergström is a clinical psychologist for children.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sofia Marinho is a reserch felow at Institute of Social Sciences, University of Lisbon. Her research work is sponsored by FCT (Portuguese Funding Agency for Science and Technology) by grant SFRH/BPD/84273/2012. </span></em></p>Families in the 21st century have changed, making it necessary to rethink what has been “traditional” ways of sharing the custody of children.Michel Grangeat, Professeur Emérite de Sciences de l'Education, Université Grenoble Alpes (UGA)Edward Kruk, Associate Professor of Social Work, University of British ColumbiaMalin Bergström, Professor, Stockholm UniversitySofia Marinho, Research fellow, Universidade de Lisboa Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/997342018-07-18T10:41:38Z2018-07-18T10:41:38ZWhy attorneys represent immigrants for free<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/227868/original/file-20180716-44076-14ldbjj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Honduran mother and child with a Border Patrol agent. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Immigration-Separating-Families/b47aff13862543d5ab454925256231b0/1/0">AP Photo/David J. Phillip</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/por-que-los-abogados-representan-a-los-immigrantes-de-manera-gratuita-101490">Leer en español</a></em>.</p>
<p>Scores of <a href="https://www.texastribune.org/2018/06/18/heres-list-organizations-are-mobilizing-help-separated-immigrant-child/">lawyers, paralegals and law students</a> are volunteering to help immigrant families caught in the crosshairs of the Trump administration’s bid to drastically reduce the number of people without papers in the U.S. One of these movement’s highest priorities is assisting the <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2018/07/16/politics/immigration-whats-new-whats-next/index.html">more than 2,500 children</a> separated from their parents in government custody. </p>
<p>Mobilized by the <a href="https://www.americanbar.org/advocacy/governmental_legislative_work/priorities_policy/immigration/familyseparation.html">American Bar Association</a>, nonprofits like <a href="http://www.abajournal.com/news/article/lawyers_for_good_government_launches_project_to_reunite_immigrant_families/">Lawyers for Good Government</a>, the <a href="https://www.aclu.org/issues/immigrants-rights">American Civil Liberties Union</a> and the <a href="https://www.immigrationadvocates.org/probono/partner/item.2440-American_Immigration_Lawyers_Association">American Immigration Lawyers Association</a>, and big law firms like <a href="https://www.paulweiss.com/">Paul, Weiss</a> and <a href="https://www.kirkland.com/sitecontent.cfm?contentID=367">Kirkland and Ellis</a>, these legal professionals are providing services “pro bono” – for free.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.americanbar.org/groups/probono_public_service/policy/aba_model_rule_6_1.html">Pro bono</a> is shorthand for “pro bono publico,” a Latin expression that means “for the public good.” Working pro bono simply means rendering professional services voluntarily without charge.</p>
<p>The ethic dates back to <a href="https://works.bepress.com/judith_maute/18/">Roman times</a>, when patrician men dispensed patronage as counselors and representatives to their relatives and servants.</p>
<p>In the U.S., working pro bono is also rooted in the English sense of “<a href="https://works.bepress.com/judith_maute/18/">noblesse oblige</a>” – the elite’s obligation to act generously toward the less privileged. Doing this unpaid work is <a href="https://www.americanbar.org/groups/probono_public_service/policy/aba_model_rule_6_1.html">not just encouraged but expected</a>.</p>
<p>The American Bar Association encourages all lawyers to <a href="https://www.americanbar.org/groups/probono_public_service/policy/aba_model_rule_6_1.html">volunteer at least 50 hours</a> of pro bono service per year. Attorneys may use this time to represent the poor in court or help charities address legal issues. They may also spend this time changing laws for the better. </p>
<p>Some states go further. In <a href="https://www.americanbar.org/groups/probono_public_service/policy/bar_pre_admission_pro_bono.html">New York</a>, for example, law students must spend 50 hours doing pro bono work before they can be admitted to the bar.</p>
<h2>The lawyer shortage</h2>
<p>There’s a good reason for mandates like that as the need for free legal help goes well beyond the current immigration crisis. </p>
<p>The problem is not that we don’t have enough lawyers. </p>
<p>With <a href="https://www.americanbar.org/resources_for_lawyers/profession_statistics.html">1.3 million lawyers</a> nationwide, <a href="https://www.census.gov/topics/population.html">one for every 245 Americans</a>, the U.S. is the country with the most lawyers on the planet. Yet because it usually <a href="https://www.lawyers.com/legal-info/research/how-and-how-much-do-lawyers-charge.html">costs around US$100-400 to hire one</a>, four-fifths of poor Americans and up to three-fifths of middle-class Americans with a civil legal problem <a href="http://digitalcommons.lmu.edu/llr/vol42/iss4/2">can’t afford an attorney</a>.</p>
<p>In my home state of Montana, where <a href="http://www.umt.edu/law/faculty/directory/default.php?ID=3211">I teach law and lawyering</a>, some <a href="https://courts.mt.gov/portals/189/supreme/boards/a2j/docs/justicegap-mt.pdf">77 percent of poor households needing an attorney</a>, more than 14,000 per year, do not get one because they can’t afford it.</p>
<p>The throngs of <a href="https://www.theindianalawyer.com/articles/47506-pro-bono-at-the-border-lawyer-assists-separated-immigrant-families">lawyers aiding immigrants</a> along the border and across the country are needed for another reason besides their clients’ inability to pay.</p>
<p>Everyone present in the U.S. has a <a href="https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/amendments-11-27">right to due process</a> <a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/immigration/255281-yes-illegal-aliens-have-constitutional-rights">regardless of their immigration status</a>. But because most immigration cases are civil rather than criminal in nature, undocumented immigrants in deportation proceedings have no right to an attorney.</p>
<p>The government does provide detained immigrants with some crucial information through <a href="http://immigrationimpact.com/2018/04/25/justice-department-legal-orientation-program-not-halt/">a program it nearly eliminated in the spring of 2018</a>. But this assistance falls short of what asylum-seekers and other undocumented people require.</p>
<p>So the only way many people attempting to cross the border without papers can get the legal representation they need is when pro bono lawyers and other volunteers fill this gap.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/99734/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Eduardo Capulong has volunteered for Montanans for Immigrant Justice, a nonprofit.</span></em></p>This tradition is so strong in the US that all lawyers are encouraged to volunteer at least 50 hours of pro bono service per year.Eduardo Capulong, Associate Dean for Clinical and Experiential Education; Professor of Law, University of MontanaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/996732018-07-15T18:51:09Z2018-07-15T18:51:09ZThe disgrace of detaining asylum seekers and other migrants<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/227585/original/file-20180713-27015-134syg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Javier Garrido Martinez holds his four-year-old son during a news conference in New York on July 11, 2018. The pair were reunited after being separated for almost two months when authorities stopped them at the U.S. southern border. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Robert Bumsted)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Donald Trump administration is continuing its “<a href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1049751/download">zero tolerance</a>” approach to <a href="https://theconversation.com/forced-migration-from-central-america-5-essential-reads-98600">Central Americans</a> seeking asylum at the southern border of the United States. </p>
<p>Despite no evidence that it <a href="https://www.justsecurity.org/58354/detention-migrant-families-deterrence-ethical-flaws-empirical-doubts/">deters asylum-seekers</a>, the administration is prioritizing the use of <a href="https://read.dukeupress.edu/public-culture/article-abstract/10/3/577/77218/Refugees-in-a-Carceral-Age-The-Rebirth-of">immigrant prisons</a> or <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1867366">detention centres</a> in their attack. </p>
<p>As a detention expert, I argue that we must not lose sight of how the administration is steadily expanding its detention arsenal under the cover of massive changes to its immigration and asylum architecture.</p>
<p>The mind boggles at the scale and speed of the rollbacks to accessing asylum, humanitarian protection and residence rights, among them:</p>
<ul>
<li> Withdrawing “<a href="https://www.cnn.com/2018/01/09/politics/temporary-protected-status-countries/index.html">temporary protected status</a>” protections against deportation for 200,000 Salvadoreans, plus Haitians, Sudanese and Nicaraguans, living in the United States.</li>
<li> Intervening to undermine <a href="https://cgrs.uchastings.edu/our-work/matter-b">asylum protections</a> for women and others fleeing persecution at the hands of non-state individuals, including abusive spouses.</li>
<li> Stepping up <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-crossing-the-us-mexico-border-became-a-crime-74604">prosecutions of unlawful entries</a> across the U.S.-Mexico border.</li>
<li> Turning back asylum-seekers at <a href="http://cmsny.org/publications/heyman-slack-asylum-poe/">ports of entry</a>.</li>
<li> Hollowing out protections for children not at immediate risk of human trafficking for sexual, forced labour or other forms of exploitation.</li>
<li> Prosecuting <a href="https://www.justice.gov/usao-mdfl/pr/undocumented-guatemalan-sentenced-paying-smugglers-bring-unaccompanied-minor-guatemala">parents who pay agents</a> to bring their children to the U.S.</li>
<li> Prosecuting <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/07/us/politics/homeland-security-prosecute-undocumented-immigrants.html"><em>everyone</em></a> who enters the U.S. without preauthorization.</li>
</ul>
<p>The most shocking of these recent changes is perhaps the Trump administration’s <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/affording-congress-opportunity-address-family-separation/">now-revoked</a> order to <a href="https://qz.com/1290676/lost-immigrant-children-families-split-the-stories-behind-the-us-immigration-headlines/">deliberately remove</a> children from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border. Again, this action was enabled through expanding the uses — and moral and legal thresholds — of immigration detention. </p>
<h2>Long-lasting trauma</h2>
<p>How did this work? U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents arrested the parents and transferred them to detention centres operated by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (I.C.E.). </p>
<p>Their approximately 3,000 kids became “unaccompanied minors” in the custody of the already <a href="https://apnews.com/e87200e7361b412fa8c1d5003b7bf357">under-resourced</a> Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Refugee Resettlement. This ripping apart and subsequent detention of family members in separate facilities has caused <a href="https://www.thecut.com/2018/07/what-family-detention-for-immigrants-is-really-like.html">long-lasting</a> trauma <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/video/2018/jun/30/minors-separated-from-parents-and-detained-at-us-border-tell-of-anguish-video">and anguish</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/ive-seen-the-lasting-emotional-damage-to-detained-children-98807">the depths of which</a> we are only beginning to grasp. Psychologists are flagging the lifelong <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/future-development/2018/07/09/the-enormous-cost-of-toxic-stress-repairing-damage-to-refugee-and-separated-children/">“toxic stress”</a> that has now infected these childrens’ minds and bodies.</p>
<p>White House Chief of Staff John Kelly memorably waved off the outcry and moral culpability for this pointless and needless trauma: The parent-less <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/year-old-baby-appears-in-immigration-court_us_5b4290e3e4b07b827cc1e76c">babies</a>, toddlers, children and youth would <a href="https://www.npr.org/2018/05/11/610116389/transcript-white-house-chief-of-staff-john-kellys-interview-with-npr">“be taken care of — put into foster care or whatever</a>.” </p>
<p>The HHS has found the “whatever” for these asylum-seeking children: facilities ranging from <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2018/06/21/us/immigrant-children-foster-parents/index.html">foster homes</a> to blacked-out floors of <a href="https://www.revealnews.org/article/defense-contractor-detained-migrant-kids-in-vacant-phoenix-office-building/">corporate buildings</a>, a <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-06-20/walmart-says-use-of-former-store-to-detain-kids-is-disturbing">disused Walmart</a>, a Texan <a href="https://www.reuters.com/news/picture/tent-city-for-immigrant-children-in-texa-idUSRTX69U2N">tent city</a>, <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-07-03/teen-taken-at-u-s-border-tells-of-icebox-cages-with-60-girls">“icebox” cages</a> and plans to detain children and families on <a href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/trumps-new-plan-for-immigrants-jail-them-on-military-bases">military bases</a>, among them.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/227593/original/file-20180713-27012-1qsoqaw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/227593/original/file-20180713-27012-1qsoqaw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=645&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227593/original/file-20180713-27012-1qsoqaw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=645&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227593/original/file-20180713-27012-1qsoqaw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=645&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227593/original/file-20180713-27012-1qsoqaw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=810&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227593/original/file-20180713-27012-1qsoqaw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=810&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/227593/original/file-20180713-27012-1qsoqaw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=810&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Lidia Karine Souza hugs her son Diogo De Olivera Filho at a news conference in Chicago on June 28, 2018. A federal judge ordered the immediate release from detention of the nine-year-old Diogo who was separated from his mother at the U.S.-Mexico border in May.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The breadth of the Trump administration’s recent expansion of its detention architecture is stunning: The federal government is operating <a href="https://projects.propublica.org/graphics/migrant-shelters-near-you">at least</a> 100 detention sites with or without the <a href="https://www.citylab.com/equity/2018/07/where-cities-help-detain-immigrants-mapped/563531/?utm_source=citylab-daily&silverid=Mzc5NjAyNTQ3OTUzS0">local cooperation</a> of municipalities.</p>
<p>Detention has flown under the public radar for too long. Warnings and protests from <a href="https://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/news/immigrant-detainees-go-on-hunger-strike-over-conditions-at-pinal-county-jail-6650744">current and former detainees</a>, <a href="https://idcoalition.org/idc-four-key-areas-of-work/">civil society</a> and <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2464239">researchers</a> have not been widely heeded. </p>
<p>The U.S. is flouting international and domestic rules on detention. It engages in <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-immigration-prisons-exclusive/exclusive-u-s-immigration-authorities-sending-1600-detainees-to-federal-prisons-idUSKCN1J32W1">co-mingling</a> <a href="https://www.motherjones.com/crime-justice/2018/07/immigrant-kids-are-being-sent-to-violent-juvenile-halls-without-a-trial/">of children</a> and adults in detention and prisons, and won’t reunite all of the <a href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/government-says-half-of-separated-kids-under-5-wont-be-reunited">“tender age” kids</a> — those under five years old — with their parents outside of detention.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/trumps-act-of-state-terrorism-against-children-98612">Trump's act of state terrorism against children</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The American immigration detention system must be called what it is: <a href="https://theintercept.com/2018/04/11/immigration-detention-sexual-abuse-ice-dhs/">Abusive</a>, <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/behind-the-criminal-immigration-law-eugenics-and-white-supremacy">racist</a>, <a href="https://www.buzzfeed.com/emaoconnor/pregnant-migrant-women-miscarriage-cpb-ice-detention-trump?utm_term=.xuAoV8VN0o#.ys2Z1Q1XkZ">sexist</a> and <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-administration-zero-tolerance-policy-immigration-confusion/">haphazardly implemented</a> with a dysfunctional but financially profitable <a href="https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/09/immigration-detainees-bond-ankle-monitors-libre/">bail system</a>. The system is designed not to administer asylum claims, but to punish and even terrorize people attempting to realize their rights. </p>
<p>Pilot projects show that asylum seekers with proper legal, social, health and other supports will appear for their court hearings; there is no need to detain them or, as we do in Canada too, shackle them with remotely controlled surveillance tools.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/electronically-monitoring-migrants-treats-them-like-criminals-90521">Electronically monitoring migrants treats them like criminals</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Let us not forget that the Trump administration ended the <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/immigration-border-crisis/obama-era-pilot-program-kept-asylum-seeking-migrant-families-together-n885896">Family Case Management Program</a>, an alternative that would have kept families together, and for less money. </p>
<p>The Trump administration is now working to exploit a legal loophole to keep children and their parents in detention together past the 20-day limit set by <a href="https://www.humanrightsfirst.org/resource/flores-settlement-brief-history-and-next-steps">the 1997 Flores Settlement Agreement</a>. They are asking for <a href="https://www.texastribune.org/2018/07/11/trump-border-separation-immigrant-families-choice/">“consent” for indefinite detention together</a> and offering deportation to parents as the alternative. </p>
<p>Under cover of massive curtailment of protections extended to asylum-seekers and other migrants, the Trump administration is trying to normalize detention for children and adults alike, a truly reprehensible agenda.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/99673/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Stephanie J Silverman received funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, and is a member of the International Detention Coalition.</span></em></p>The U.S. immigration detention system under Donald Trump is abusive, racist, sexist and haphazardly implemented, all designed to terrorize people attempting to exercise their right to seek asylum.Stephanie J Silverman, Adjunct professor, University of TorontoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/989122018-06-30T02:37:24Z2018-06-30T02:37:24ZMexico’s next president likely to defy Trump on immigration<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225535/original/file-20180629-117389-kkruuv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Trump administration's new family separation policy has become a hot issue in Mexico's presidential election. All four candidates say that Mexico must do more to respect the human rights of Central American migrants. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Jae C. Hong</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>United States President Donald Trump has <a href="https://theconversation.com/twitter-diplomacy-how-trump-is-using-social-media-to-spur-a-crisis-with-mexico-71981">long blamed Mexico</a> for the flow of Central Americans seeking to enter <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/06/us/politics/southwest-border-arrests-rise-trump-.html">the United States’ southern border</a>. </p>
<p>Migrants just cross Mexico like they’re “walking through Central Park,” <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUSjDgSdkMc">Trump once claimed</a>.</p>
<p>In truth, Mexico is <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-us-is-outsourcing-border-enforcement-to-mexico-69272">aggressive in enforcing U.S. immigration policy</a>. In 2014 President Enrique Peña Nieto implemented a robust deterrence effort, the Southern Border Program, to deter migration across Mexico’s border with Guatemala. </p>
<p>Between 2014 and 2015, Mexican deportations of Central Americans traveling to the U.S. – primarily Guatemalans, Hondurans and Salvadorans – more than doubled, from <a href="http://www.politicamigratoria.gob.mx/work/models/SEGOB/CEM/PDF/Estadisticas/Boletines_Estadisticos/2013/Boletin_2013.pdf">78,733</a> in 2013 to <a href="http://www.politicamigratoria.gob.mx/work/models/SEGOB/CEM/PDF/Estadisticas/Boletines_Estadisticos/2015/Boletin_2015.pdf">176,726</a> in 2015. During the same period, U.S. border agents <a href="http://hrbrief.org/2016/10/rights-central-american-migrants/">detained half as many Central American migrants</a> at the border.</p>
<p>That compliant attitude is about to change. Mexicans <a href="http://www.senado.gob.mx/consultoria/calendario-electoral.php">elect their next president</a> – and <a href="https://www.animalpolitico.com/2018/03/historicas-elecciones-presidenciales-mexico/">18,000 other elected officials</a>, from mayors all the way up to senators – on Sunday, July 1. It is the biggest and <a href="https://www.forbes.com.mx/infografia-esto-cuestan-las-elecciones-mas-caras-en-la-historia-de-mexico/">most expensive election</a> in Mexico’s history. And Trump’s draconian new immigration policies, which include <a href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/speech/attorney-general-sessions-delivers-remarks-discussing-immigration-enforcement-actions">detaining children and criminally prosecuting migrants</a>, have <a href="https://cnnespanol.cnn.com/video/protesta-mexicanos-embajada-eeuu-tolerancia-cero-inmigrantes-trump-vo-perspectivas-mexico/">taken center stage in the presidential race</a>.</p>
<p>Mexico’s four presidential candidates <a href="http://www.americasquarterly.org/content/candidates-mexico">argue over many issues</a>, from corruption to the economy. But they all agree on this: Mexico can no longer maintain its <a href="https://theconversation.com/mexico-seeks-to-become-country-of-refuge-as-us-cracks-down-on-migrants-97668">policy of helping enforce U.S. immigration laws</a>.</p>
<h2>Nobody’s piñata</h2>
<p>Presidential front-runner Andrés Manuel López Obrador is an outspoken <a href="https://theconversation.com/in-mexico-a-firebrand-leftist-provokes-the-powers-that-be-including-donald-trump-78918">Trump critic</a> who <a href="https://twitter.com/lopezobrador_/status/1009123450299076608">recently denounced</a> separating migrant families as “arrogant, racist and inhuman.” </p>
<p>He is widely expected to win on Sunday. The 64-year-old leftist has led the four-way race for months and currently has 49 percent of voter support, according to the <a href="https://elpais.com/internacional/2018/06/26/mexico/1530028476_088201.html">latest polls</a>. </p>
<p>López Obrador launched his presidential bid on April 1 with a rally in Ciudad Juárez, the northern Mexico city where thousands of migrants <a href="http://www.redalyc.org/html/859/85927874010/">cross</a> into the U.S. each year. In a fiery speech, López Obrador <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jlerUkf0kUk">promised</a> that, with him as president, Mexico would reassert itself as a “free, sovereign and independent” nation and would not be the “piñata” of any foreign power.</p>
<p>An early critic of President Peña Nieto’s Southern Border Program, López Obrador has <a href="https://www.sdpnoticias.com/nacional/2016/03/28/gobierno-hace-lo-mismo-con-migrantes-que-trump-amlo">accused</a> the Mexican government of committing human rights violations in its persecution and deportations of Central American migrants. </p>
<p>On his watch, Mexico <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books/about/2018_La_salida.html?id=0-zmDQAAQBAJ&redir_esc=y">would still “pay special attention”</a> to its southern border, López Obrador says, but it would no longer do Trump’s “dirty work.” López Obrador wants Mexico to <a href="https://theconversation.com/mexico-seeks-to-become-country-of-refuge-as-us-cracks-down-on-migrants-97668">respect existing laws</a> that protect the human rights of migrants and guarantee that asylum-seekers can find refuge in its borders.</p>
<p>Ricardo Anaya, the <a href="https://politico.mx/central-electoral/elecciones-2018/presidencial/amlo-arriba-en-segundo-anaya-seg%C3%BAn-parametr%C3%AD/">right-of-center second-place candidate</a>, has also attacked President Peña Nieto’s <a href="http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/elecciones-2018/politica-migratoria-debe-respetar-los-derechos-humanos-anaya">policy of detaining and deporting</a> Central American migrants. Anaya says his country must be a “<a href="https://www.ricardoanaya.com.mx/">moral authority</a>” on immigration, treating Central Americans in Mexico as justly and humanely as Mexican immigrants would like to be treated in the U.S.</p>
<h2>The changing face of migration</h2>
<p>Illegal immigration to the U.S. has changed radically over the past two decades. </p>
<p>The number of Mexicans apprehended crossing illegally has <a href="https://www.cbp.gov/sites/default/files/assets/documents/2017-Dec/BP%20Total%20Apps%2C%20Mexico%2C%20OTM%20FY2000-FY2017.pdf">plummeted</a>, from more than 1.6 million in 2000 to 130,000 last year. </p>
<p>Central Americans, driven by <a href="https://theconversation.com/forced-migration-from-central-america-5-essential-reads-98600">endemic violence and pervasive poverty</a>, now make up <a href="https://www.lawfareblog.com/whos-really-crossing-us-border-and-why-theyre-coming">a bulk of all people</a> caught trying to cross the U.S.-Mexico border. In 2017, U.S. Border Patrol agents there arrested 303,916 migrants. Just over half of them – <a href="https://www.cbp.gov/sites/default/files/assets/documents/2018-May/usbp-apprehensions-citizenship-sector-fy2017.pdf">162,891</a> people – were from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador.</p>
<p>Mexico has thus become a <a href="https://www.wola.org/analysis/wola-report-mexicos-southern-border-security-central-american-migration-u-s-policy/">major transit</a> country for migrants. </p>
<p>It is also, increasingly, their <a href="http://www.cndh.org.mx/sites/all/doc/Informes/Especiales/Informe-Especial-Desafios-migracion.pdf">final destination</a>. Mexico saw <a href="https://www.nodal.am/2018/05/agencia-de-la-onu-para-los-refugiados-alerta-sobre-incremento-de-desplazamiento-forzado-en-centroamerica/#Mexico_es_el_segundo_pais_de_acogida_a_centroamericanos_ONU">12,700 asylum requests from Central American refugees</a>, up from <a href="https://www.eleconomista.com.mx/politica/Solicitudes-de-asilo-aumentaron-159-en-el-2016-20171219-0024.html">8,800 in 2016 and 3,400 in 2015</a>. Only the U.S. received more Central American asylum-seekers, according to the United Nations Refugee Agency. </p>
<p>Rather than <a href="http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0024/002477/247760s.pdf">welcome Central Americans</a>, President Peña Nieto’s administration in 2014 accepted <a href="https://wilsonquarterly.com/quarterly/after-the-storm-in-u-s-mexico-relations/the-m-rida-initiative-and-shared-responsibility-in-u-s-mexico-security-relations/">US$90 million of American funding</a> to better secure its borders. His government <a href="https://www.wola.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/WOLA_Mexicos-Southern-Border-2017-1.pdf">has ruthlessly</a> persecuted migrants who journey through the country. </p>
<p>Mexico detained 40,920 Central American migrants <a href="http://www.politicamigratoria.gob.mx/work/models/SEGOB/CEM/PDF/Estadisticas/Boletines_Estadisticos/2018/Boletin_2018.pdf">between January and April 2018 alone</a>. Nearly 35,000 were deported.</p>
<p>In 2016, the Obama administration recognized Mexico for “<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2016/09/20/obama-thanks-mexico-for-absorbing-central-american-refugees-his-own-administration-wants-to-turn-them-away/">absorbing</a>” so many Central American migrants. Trump has expressed no such gratitude. </p>
<h2>The high cost of appeasing Trump</h2>
<p>In 2016, Peña Nieto’s advisers invited both U.S. presidential candidates to visit Mexico. </p>
<p>Clinton <a href="https://www.excelsior.com.mx/global/2016/09/05/1115122">declined</a> the invitation. Trump, whose 2016 campaign was fueled by promises to build a <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2015/10/28/donald-trump-mexico-going-to-pay-for-wall.html">“big, fat, beautiful” border wall</a>, accepted. </p>
<p>In a joint press conference on Aug. 31, 2016, Peña Nieto emphasized his country’s contribution to U.S. immigration enforcement. The border, Peña Nieto <a href="http://time.com/4475102/donald-trump-enrique-pena-nieto-transcript/">said</a>, represents a “shared challenge” and a “great humanitarian crisis.” </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225540/original/file-20180629-117377-1euwfe6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225540/original/file-20180629-117377-1euwfe6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225540/original/file-20180629-117377-1euwfe6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225540/original/file-20180629-117377-1euwfe6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225540/original/file-20180629-117377-1euwfe6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225540/original/file-20180629-117377-1euwfe6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225540/original/file-20180629-117377-1euwfe6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Trump’s August 2016 visit to Mexico was calamitous for President Enrique Peña Nieto.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Dario Lopez-Mills</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Trump was subdued at that event. But he ridiculed the Mexican president at a campaign rally later the same day, insisting that Mexico would indeed <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-wall-and-the-beast-trumps-triumph-from-the-mexican-side-of-the-border-68559">pay for a border wall</a>. </p>
<p>“They don’t know it yet,” he <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/02/us/politics/transcript-trump-immigration-speech.html">told supporters</a> in Phoenix, Arizona, “but they’re going to pay for it.” </p>
<p>Peña Nieto never recovered from this diplomatic disaster. According to the <a href="http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/articulo/nacion/politica/2016/09/12/fue-una-mala-decision-invitar-trump-encuesta">newspaper El Universal</a>, 88 percent of Mexican citizens were offended by Trump’s visit – and by Peña Nieto’s <a href="https://www.sdpnoticias.com/nacional/2018/05/20/recibir-a-trump-en-los-pinos-fue-una-humillacion-anaya">polite, submissive</a> behavior. The Mexican president’s approval rating <a href="https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/09/trump-mexico-visit-pena-nieto-failure-214211">plunged</a> to below 25 percent and never bounced back. </p>
<p>His party has paid the price. José Antonio Meade, the presidential candidate for Peña Nieto’s Revolutionary Institutional Party, has been stuck in <a href="https://www.proceso.com.mx/528033/meade-en-tercer-lugar-y-con-todo-en-contra">third place</a> throughout the 2018 election season. </p>
<h2>Another Mexican revolution</h2>
<p>López Obrador, a savvy career politician, has benefited from Peña Nieto’s mistake. </p>
<p>Even the choice of location for his campaign launch, Ciudad Juárez, <a href="http://www.letraslibres.com/espana-mexico/revista/el-mesias-tropical">sent a powerful message</a> that López Obrador’s attitude toward Trump would not be one of deference. </p>
<p>Juárez is not just a border city – it’s a symbolic place in Mexican history. It was the bulwark where Mexico’s only indigenous president, Benito Juárez, in 1867 fought back a French invasion and re-established a sovereign Mexican government. Juárez is also the city whose 1911 capture by pro-democracy forces during the <a href="https://edsitement.neh.gov/feature/mexican-revolution-november-20th-1910">Mexican Revolution</a> forced dictator Porfirio Díaz to resign. </p>
<p>López Obrador closed his campaign on June 27, four days before the election <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.es/2018/06/27/termina-la-campana-presidencial-en-mexico-y-da-paso-a-la-reflexion-de-los-votantes_a_23468928/">as required by Mexican law</a>. At a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYzxg2136-4">massive rally in Mexico City’s Azteca stadium</a>, he promised 100,000 supporters that he would “transform” their country. </p>
<p>Like so many of López Obrador’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/amnesty-for-drug-traffickers-thats-one-mexican-presidential-candidates-pitch-to-voters-96063">lofty campaign commitments</a>, his immigration plan is short on details. But it’s clear Trump has already lost his power of intimidation south of the border – even if, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/02/us/politics/transcript-trump-immigration-speech.html">to paraphrase his own verbal jab</a>, he doesn’t know it yet.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/98912/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Luis Gómez Romero does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Mexico elects a new president on July 1. Frontrunner Andrés Manuel López Obrador says Trump’s immigration policy is ‘arrogant, racist and inhuman’ and that he won’t do the US’s ‘dirty work’ anymore.Luis Gómez Romero, Senior Lecturer in Human Rights, Constitutional Law and Legal Theory, University of WollongongLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/986692018-06-28T12:36:29Z2018-06-28T12:36:29ZHow the media dealt a major blow to Donald Trump’s family separations policy<p>After weeks of dramatically negative coverage, Donald Trump recently moved to end a policy which, starting in mid-April, separated more than 2,300 children from their undocumented parents as they tried to cross the US-Mexico border. This he did in the face of intense pressure to change course: <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/two-thirds-of-americans-say-separating-children-parents-at-border-unacceptable/">two-thirds of Americans</a> disapproved of the policy – <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jun/19/child-separation-camps-trump-border-policy-backlash-republicans">including prominent conservatives</a> – suggesting that maintaining the policy might have been deemed too <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/2b40efe8-739f-11e8-aa31-31da4279a601">costly in electoral terms</a>. </p>
<p>That in turn indicates that while Trump has long made political capital out of his disdain for the mainstream media, he may be more vulnerable to its pressure than he likes to admit.</p>
<p>An extensive body of research has documented the unique power of photojournalism and television to make the suffering of victims visible, particularly when it comes to mothers and children. To quote the important work of the University of Maryland’s Susan D. Moeller, <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=2nGTAgAAQBAJ&pg=PT153&lpg=PT153&dq=%E2%80%9CSeldom+heard,+though+often+photographed%E2%80%9D&source=bl&ots=s2rzwd1qP0&sig=UIPXGfPvxsIJA_g-24JmUpEzcKE&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiLup_FhvbbAhUJthQKHdgmDiwQ6AEwAHoECAEQLQ#v=onepage&q=%E2%80%9CSeldom%20heard%2C%20though%20often%20photographed%E2%80%9D&f=false">as far as the media are concerned</a>, these people “make ideal victims”. “Seldom heard, though often photographed”, mothers and their children who are subject to unjustified suffering are essential to a “morality play story line [which] rests on the fact that it is easy to understand and appreciate”.</p>
<p>The news media’s pictures and footage of the family separation policy in action, quickly disseminated via Facebook and Twitter, became ubiquitous around the world. Images of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jun/17/separation-border-children-cages-south-texas-warehouse-holding-facility?CMP=fb_gu">young children in cages</a> covered with foil sheets for blankets shaped a narrative that the Trump administration is cruel and indifferent to the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/what-separation-from-parents-does-to-children-the-effect-is-catastrophic/2018/06/18/c00c30ec-732c-11e8-805c-4b67019fcfe4_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.b428e9b9d76d">suffering of innocent victims</a>. That narrative was publicly restated by prominent leaders at <a href="https://www.facebook.com/NowThisNews/videos/2109624519069027/?hc_ref=ART1wB5UIJFGVJ8WwUIRClzftodb2wu64M6B7koby4P6KR4zmlrumxILEN5psmi5Th4">home</a> and <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-un-rights/un-rights-boss-calls-for-end-to-trumps-policy-of-family-separation-idUSKBN1JE0NA">abroad</a>, including individuals who might otherwise be seen as <a href="https://www.facebook.com/traecrowder/videos/788516714692327/">typical Trump supporters</a>.</p>
<h2>Brutality on camera</h2>
<p>Western publics have long been used to heartbreaking images of distant suffering, even to the point of what Moeller <a href="https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-0-415-92097-1">calls</a> “compassion fatigue”, but this ongoing episode has made clear that horror of this kind can happen in America too.</p>
<p>A good measure of the impact this episode has made was the July 2 edition of Time magazine, whose iconic covers have captured the country’s history since 1923. Headed “Welcome to America”, it featured Trump gazing indifferently down at a terrified two-year-old cropped from a Getty Images picture – an image which, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2018/06/18/i-wanted-to-stop-her-crying-the-image-of-a-migrant-child-that-broke-a-photographers-heart/?utm_term=.f4e938911748">as the Washington Post put it</a>, “has become a symbol of the Trump administration’s new ‘zero tolerance’ border policies”. Even after it was established that the child in the original photo hadn’t been separated from its family, the image’s power remained more or less intact.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1009765576020054017"}"></div></p>
<p>The narrative that the US government is actively inflicting suffering upon innocent children kept gaining traction. Soon, parallels between the country’s migrant detention facilities and concentration camps <a href="https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/d3kjma/wikipedia-us-detention-centers-concentration-camps-vgtrn?utm_campaign=sharebutton">started to appear</a> on popular sites such as Wikipedia.</p>
<p>In this case, the repetition of camera shots and sound that combine innocent children in distress being handled by men sporting handcuffs, boots and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jun/17/us-immigration-family-separations-beto-orourke-texas">guns strapped to their belts</a>, is still framing a political debate on family separation that, as <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/0573035a-73a9-11e8-b6ad-3823e4384287">FT columnist Janan Ganesh</a>, would be “unlosable for liberals”. The state, Ganesh writes, “cannot distress children and expect a hearing. ‘As a parent…’ has displaced ‘As a Christian…’ as the most pious overture to a modern American sentence.”</p>
<h2>Communication problems</h2>
<p>But the sheer potency of negative media coverage isn’t the whole story here. The Trump administration itself also failed dramatically to mount a strategic political communications operation. Most inept of all was its decision to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jun/17/separation-border-children-cages-south-texas-warehouse-holding-facility?CMP=fb_gu">give journalists access</a> to detention facilities, a move intended to <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/2b40efe8-739f-11e8-aa31-31da4279a601">show Trump’s supporters</a> just how tough it is on illegal immigration. But as Daniell Hallin cogently outlined in his 1986 book <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books/about/The_Uncensored_War.html?id=kmpYUSYLD8MC&redir_esc=y">The Uncensored War</a>, if the US government learned anything about public communications from the Vietnam War, it was that the news media is more likely than not to contradict the terms in which public officers frame a conflict.</p>
<p>While the family separation policy is far from a fully fledged war, the unequivocal innocence of its child victims – as well as various communication gaffes including the <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-the-bibles-romans-13-says-about-asylum-and-what-jeff-sessions-omitted-98483">selective use of religious rhetoric</a> – meant the administration’s move couldn’t help but backfire in the court of national and global public opinion.</p>
<p>More than that, the media public opinion can stem not just from a government’s actions, but also from its failure to act. Trump’s heavy-handed approach to undocumented immigrants has been compared to the slow and incompetent response of George W. Bush’s administration to hurricane Katrina in August 2005, when the 43rd president infamously <a href="https://www.usnews.com/news/the-report/articles/2015/08/28/hurricane-katrina-was-the-beginning-of-the-end-for-george-w-bush#close-modal">continued to holiday on his 1,600-acre Texas ranch</a> even as thousands of residents in New Orleans were left stranded on rooftops and in official shelters. A picture of him <a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/127865-bush-katrina-flyover-photo-a-huge-mistake">peering at the damage from the window of Air Force One</a> only damaged his reputation further. As political columnist <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jun/19/forced-separation-families-trump-katrina-moment">Jill Abramson</a> put it, Trump is repeating Bush’s “fatal mistake” by “showing heartlessness in a time of crisis”.</p>
<p>Trump has now issued an executive order to end the separation of families. That <a href="https://video.vice.com/en_us/video/heres-exactly-what-the-president-did-and-did-not-do-on-immigration/5b2af13dbe4077158e3e3d41">far from ends the ordeal</a> for the children and parents involved, and the president is still trafficking in caustic anti-immigrant rhetoric, painting undocumented immigrants as <a href="https://video.vice.com/en_us/video/heres-exactly-what-the-president-did-and-did-not-do-on-immigration/5b2af13dbe4077158e3e3d41">an infestation</a>. Nonetheless if this dismal incident proves anything, it’s that he and his administration are indeed susceptible to the mainstream news media they rail against – even to the point of quickly changing actual policy.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/98669/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gabriel Moreno Esparza does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The power of the mainstream media to put pressure US government policy should not be underrated.Gabriel Moreno Esparza, Senior Lecturer in Journalism, Northumbria University, NewcastleLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/989102018-06-27T14:30:40Z2018-06-27T14:30:40ZChildren are sometimes held in immigration detention in the UK too – this must stop<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/224898/original/file-20180626-112620-11g2o7v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/home">via shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The US policy of separating children from parents entering the country without permission was rightly met with global outrage. After weeks of heart-wrenching stories, images and audio recordings of children crying for their detained parents, Donald Trump finally bowed to pressure and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/20/us/politics/trump-immigration-children-executive-order.html">signed an executive order</a> to end family separations. </p>
<p>In the UK, while children of immigrant families are not routinely wrenched from parents nor held in <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-44518942">cages</a>, many aspects of their treatment are nevertheless inhumane and in breach of international children’s rights law.</p>
<p>The UK ended indefinite detention of immigrant families with children in 2010. But there remain what Nick Clegg, the former deputy prime minister who was a proponent of the change, described as <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/oct/29/proud-ending-child-detention">“exceptional cases and border cases”</a> where families are still detained. This might happen, for example, where their removal from the UK <a href="https://www.childrenslegalcentre.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Detention-May.2017.final_.pdf">is pending</a> and they have not agreed to leave voluntarily. </p>
<h2>When children are detained</h2>
<p>Child detention has decreased significantly, and is supposed to be short-term and a last resort after parents do not leave voluntarily, but it continues. Since the 2010 policy change, <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/child-detention_uk_5b2b5fb0e4b00295f159327d?utm_hp_ref=uk-homepage">1,649 children</a> have been detained with their families, 600 of whom were under 11-years-old. The Migration Observatory <a href="http://www.migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/immigration-detention-in-the-uk/">points out that</a> in 2016 alone, 71 children were placed in immigration detention with their families.</p>
<p>The conditions of children’s detention have also recently become much more prison-like. Children’s charity Barnardo’s previously provided services at Cedars, a dedicated facility managed by the private security company G4S to “hold” families before removal from the UK. The Home Office <a href="https://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/written-questions-answers-statements/written-statement/Commons/2016-07-21/HCWS114/">announced</a> in 2016 that <a href="https://www.wscountytimes.co.uk/news/6million-hardly-used-asylum-detention-centre-to-be-shut-down-1-7501567">Cedars would be closed</a>, with families housed instead in a unit at a general immigration removal centre, Tinsley House, near Gatwick – also run by G4S, but now without Barnardos. G4S has been <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/sep/22/head-of-g4s-detention-centre-quits-after-abuse-allegations">subject to claims</a> of abuse and neglect of those in its custody, <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-36210923">including children</a>. The environment at Tinsley House has been <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/feb/09/g4s-welfare-support-families-children-deportation-gatwick">described</a> by Clegg as “prison-style”. </p>
<p>The 2014 Immigration Act banned the detention of unaccompanied children who have arrived in the UK without a responsible adult for more than 24 hours at any one time, but there are still circumstances where unaccompanied children are detained. For example, they can be detained pending an age assessment where the Home Office believes them to be over 18. Over 900 such assessments <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/immigration-statistics-october-to-december-2016/asylum">were carried out in 2016</a>, despite the fact that age assessment tests are <a href="https://www.law.ox.ac.uk/research-subject-groups/centre-criminology/centreborder-criminologies/blog/2017/02/challenging">notoriously inexact</a>. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/questions-over-age-of-refugee-children-show-how-ugly-britain-has-become-67335">Questions over age of refugee children show how ugly Britain has become</a>
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<p>There are also extreme cases where children end up in state care because of the detention of their parents for immigration reasons. In March, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/mar/11/home-office-broke-own-rules-family-separations-children-taken-into-care-father-deportation">reports emerged</a> of three children aged eight and below who were taken into the care of the state because of the immigration detention of their father (their mother was overseas at a funeral). This is contrary to the Home Office’s own <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/666491/family_separations.pdf">guidance</a> which states that a child must not be separated from adults for immigration purposes if this means that a child will be taken into care. </p>
<h2>Psychological harm</h2>
<p>The outcry at Trump’s family separation policy has rightly focused on the <a href="http://www.apsa.org/content/apsaa-calls-policy-separate-immigrant-children-cruel-inhumane-and-harmful">profound psychological ramifications</a> for those children affected. If a child is taken into the care of the state because of immigration detention, this creates a disruption of the relationship with their carer with inevitable adverse effects on the child’s well-being. Research carried out in 2013 by the organisation Bail for Immigration Detainees, <a href="http://www.biduk.org/posts/122-first-uk-study-finds-200-children-split-from-parents-in-immigration-detention">found that</a> children who had ended up in care in the UK because of the detention of their parents for immigration reasons had “lost weight, had nightmares, suffered from insomnia, cried frequently and became extremely isolated during their parents’ detention”.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/224894/original/file-20180626-112604-15vlfk8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/224894/original/file-20180626-112604-15vlfk8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224894/original/file-20180626-112604-15vlfk8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224894/original/file-20180626-112604-15vlfk8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224894/original/file-20180626-112604-15vlfk8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224894/original/file-20180626-112604-15vlfk8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224894/original/file-20180626-112604-15vlfk8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">A protest against the Trump administration’s family separation policy in the US.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/philadelphia-pausa-june-19-2018-thousands-1118417930?src=5KWXtAY3xUKGHNq7jmvKAA-1-24">Jane Shea/via www.shutterstock.com</a></span>
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<p>Detention of children is also highly likely to be psychologically harmful. As <a href="https://www.childrenslegalcentre.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Detention-May.2017.final_.pdf">pointed out by</a> Coram Children’s Legal Centre, “(d)epriving a person of their liberty can have a serious and lasting effect on his or her mental health (particularly) in the case of children and young people, including age disputed children.” The Refugee Council therefore calls “for people whose age is in question to be given the benefit of the doubt” until their age has been appropriately verified. </p>
<p>The US holds the notorious title of being the <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com/b-shaw-drake/children-migrants-rights_b_8271874.html">only country</a> not to have ratified the <a href="https://www.unicef.org.uk/what-we-do/un-convention-child-rights/">UN Convention on the Rights of the Child</a>. It’s perhaps unsurprising then that the Trump administration’s separation and detention policy sat in stark contrast to the obligations contained in that treaty. The UK, however, is meant to be one of its leading proponents since ratifying the treaty in 1991. A growing body of domestic law, specifically in an <a href="https://www.supremecourt.uk/cases/docs/uksc-2010-0002-judgment.pdf">immigration context</a>, obliges UK immigration authorities to ensure that the best interest of the child should be “a primary consideration” in all matters affecting them, in accordance with the treaty. But children’s best interests are clearly not always given adequate consideration in the UK’s current immigration system.</p>
<p>The groundswell of opposition to Trump’s separation and detention policy is an opportunity to acknowledge where children’s rights are sidelined in the UK too. Children should never be detained nor separated from their parents for immigration purposes, even for a short period of time.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/98910/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Aoife Daly does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>While the UK does not indefinitely detain children, there are cases where minors are held – and in extreme cases, separated from their parents.Aoife Daly, Senior Lecturer in Law, University of LiverpoolLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/987902018-06-25T10:33:54Z2018-06-25T10:33:54ZWhy care about undocumented immigrants? For one thing, they’ve become vital to key sectors of the US economy<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/224568/original/file-20180624-26555-1luykq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Suzanne Mayes reacts to Melania Trump's jacket as she collects toys for detained families.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The nation’s <a href="http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/01/11/how-americans-see-illegal-immigration-the-border-wall-and-political-compromise/">attention</a> is once again focused on the southern border, where President Trump <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-44319094">claims</a> the U.S. is facing a “crisis” over illegal immigration</p>
<p>Immigrants play vital roles in the U.S. economy, erecting American buildings, picking American apples and grapes and taking care of American babies. Oh, and <a href="https://www.vox.com/2018/4/13/17229018/undocumented-immigrants-pay-taxes">paying American taxes</a>.</p>
<p>My work as the director of the <a href="https://farmworkers.cornell.edu">Cornell Farmworker Program</a> involves meeting with undocumented workers in New York, and the farmers who employ them. Here’s a snapshot of who they are, where they work – and why Americans should care about them.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/224562/original/file-20180624-26552-19rb5p4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/224562/original/file-20180624-26552-19rb5p4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224562/original/file-20180624-26552-19rb5p4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224562/original/file-20180624-26552-19rb5p4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224562/original/file-20180624-26552-19rb5p4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=527&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224562/original/file-20180624-26552-19rb5p4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=527&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224562/original/file-20180624-26552-19rb5p4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=527&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Many wondered whether Melania Trump was saying she didn’t care about undocumented children separated from their parents when she wore this coat on a trip to meet them.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Andrew Harnik</span></span>
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<h2>A snapshot of who they are</h2>
<p><a href="http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/05/03/key-findings-about-u-s-immigrants/">Pew Research Center</a> estimates that about 11.3 million people are currently living in the U.S. without authorization, down from a peak of 12.2 million in 2007. <a href="https://immigration.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=000845">More than half</a> come from Mexico, and about 15 percent come from other parts Latin America.</p>
<p><iframe id="dgnDt" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/dgnDt/1/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>About 8 million of them have jobs, <a href="http://www.pewhispanic.org/2016/11/03/size-of-u-s-unauthorized-immigrant-workforce-stable-after-the-great-recession/">making up 5 percent</a> of the U.S. workforce, figures that have remained more or less steady for the past decade. </p>
<p>Geographically, these unauthorized workers are spread throughout the U.S. but are unsurprisingly <a href="http://www.pewhispanic.org/2016/11/03/appendix-b-additional-charts-2/#among-states">most concentrated</a> in border states like California and Texas, where they make up about 9 percent of both states’ workforces, while in Nevada, their share is over 10 percent.</p>
<p><iframe id="gA0Rx" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/gA0Rx/1/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>Their representation in particular industries is even more pronounced, and the Department of Agriculture <a href="https://www.doleta.gov/agworker/report9/naws_rpt9.pdf">estimates</a> that about half of the nation’s farmworkers are unauthorized, <a href="http://www.pewhispanic.org/2016/11/03/size-of-u-s-unauthorized-immigrant-workforce-stable-after-the-great-recession/">while 15 percent of those in construction</a> lack papers – more than the share of legal immigrants in either industry. In the service sector, which would include jobs such as fast food and domestic help, the figure is about 9 percent.</p>
<p><iframe id="O6NFS" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/O6NFS/3/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>Further studies show that the importance of this population of workers will only grow in coming years. For example, in 2014, <a href="https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/immigration/news/2017/05/11/431974/immigrant-workers-important-filling-growing-occupations/">unauthorized immigrants</a> made up 24 percent of maids and cleaners, an occupation expected to need 112,000 more workers by 2024. In construction, the number of additional laborers needed is estimated at close to 150,000. And while only 4 percent of personal care and home health aides are undocumented, the U.S. will soon require more than 800,000 people to fill the jobs necessary to take care of retiring baby boomers.</p>
<h2>Vital to American farms</h2>
<p>Since <a href="https://www.vox.com/a/explain-food-america">agriculture</a> is the industry that’s <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/06/can-americas-farms-survive-the-threat-of-deportations/529008/">most reliant on undocumented workers</a> – and it’s my area of expertise and research – let’s zoom in on it.</p>
<p>Overall, the agricultural industry in the United States has been on the decline since 1950. Back then, farming was a family business that <a href="https://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/farm-economy/farm-labor/">employed more than 10 million workers</a>, 77 percent of whom were classified as “family.” As of 2000 – the latest such data available – only <a href="https://www.agcensus.usda.gov/Publications/2012/Online_Resources/Highlights/Farm_Demographics/">3 million work on farms</a>, and as noted earlier, an estimated half are undocumented.</p>
<p>Increasingly, dairy farms such as those in New York <a href="http://publications.dyson.cornell.edu/outreach/extensionpdf/2016/Cornell-Dyson-eb1612.pdf">rely on workers</a> from Mexico and Guatemala, many of whom are believed to be undocumented. Currently, there is no visa program for year-round workers on dairy farms, so the precarious status of these workers poses serious concerns for the economic viability of the dairy industry.</p>
<p>In 2017 research <a href="https://cardi.cals.cornell.edu/sites/cardi.cals.cornell.edu/files/shared/Creating%20Positive%20Workplaces%20Guidebook%20-%20Master%20%28GJR49-12-8-17%29.pdf">conducted</a> by the Cornell Farmworker Program, 30 New York dairy farmers told us they turned to undocumented workers because they were unable to find and keep reliable U.S. citizens to do the jobs. That’s in part because farm work can be physically demanding, dirty and socially denigrated work. More importantly, it is <a href="https://www.politico.com/agenda/story/2017/04/the-most-dangerous-jobs-in-america-000395">one the most dangerous occupations</a> in the U.S.</p>
<p>A <a href="http://www.nmpf.org/files/immigration-survey-090915.pdf">study</a> commissioned by the dairy industry suggested that if federal labor and immigration policies reduced the number of foreign-born workers by 50 percent, more than 3,500 dairy farms would close, leading to a big drop in milk production and a spike in prices of about 30 percent. Total elimination of immigrant labor would increase milk prices by 90 percent.</p>
<p>The U.S. fruit, vegetable and meat industries <a href="http://www.fb.org/newsroom/food-prices-ag-economy-tied-to-proper-labor-reform">are similarly at risk</a>, and without the help of unauthorized workers, production would drop and consumers would likely see higher prices.</p>
<p>This has become of <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/wisconsin-dairy-industry-undocumented-workers_us_59c3cfb7e4b06f93538cfd3f">particular concern</a> as immigration enforcement in agricultural communities <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/ice-deportation-arrests-soar-under-trump-administration-drop-border-arrests-n826596">intensifies</a>.</p>
<p>Although the focus is usually on the southern border, what happens in the north matters as well, in part because the <a href="https://www.citylab.com/equity/2018/05/who-lives-in-border-patrols-100-mile-zone-probably-you-mapped/558275/">Border Patrol’s 100-mile jurisdiction</a> means immigrants living in most of New England can be pursued anywhere. As such, the <a href="http://www.revistascisan.unam.mx/Voices/pdfs/10226.pdf">surge in immigration</a> enforcement along the border with Canada in recent years has resulted in <a href="http://digital.vpr.net/post/undocumented-workers-vermont-farms-2017-was-year-filled-anxiety#stream/0">more farmworkers</a> being deported. </p>
<p>It also has meant fresh produce has been gone unpicked, left to rot in fields. One New York apple grower told us that due to labor shortages and dwindling prices for his red delicious variety, he plans to let his 100-year-old orchard go, because any investments in production would result in significant economic loss. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/224567/original/file-20180624-26576-1w6rcn8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/224567/original/file-20180624-26576-1w6rcn8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=346&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224567/original/file-20180624-26576-1w6rcn8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=346&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224567/original/file-20180624-26576-1w6rcn8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=346&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224567/original/file-20180624-26576-1w6rcn8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=434&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224567/original/file-20180624-26576-1w6rcn8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=434&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224567/original/file-20180624-26576-1w6rcn8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=434&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">A Hispanic worker watches the milking operation at a farm in Fairfield, Vermont.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Toby Talbot</span></span>
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</figure>
<h2>Who cares? Most Americans</h2>
<p>Judging by the pronouncements from the White House, you might think most people don’t realize how integral undocumented immigrants are to the U.S. economy. But in fact, polls suggest that Americans do understand this, and also don’t believe that immigrants take their jobs.</p>
<p>In a poll Cornell conducted in 2017, we asked New Yorkers, “How do you believe undocumented farmworkers impact local communities?”</p>
<p>About 75 percent of those we polled said they have “generally positive impacts,” up from <a href="https://cardi.cals.cornell.edu/sites/cardi.cals.cornell.edu/files/shared/MJDudley_Farmworker-Impacts-on-Communities_NYS_2009.pdf">62 percent in 2008</a>. Of those who had a positive impression, most said it was because migrants fill jobs unwanted by citizens or provide essential farm help and keep prices low.</p>
<p>And national polling backs this up. A <a href="http://www.people-press.org/2016/08/25/on-immigration-policy-partisan-differences-but-also-some-common-ground/">2016 Pew poll found</a> that 76 percent believe undocumented immigrants are as honest and hard-working as U.S. citizens, while 71 percent said they mostly fill jobs that Americans aren’t willing to do.</p>
<p>Not only are there lots of reasons to care, the vast majority of Americans actually do.</p>
<p><em>This article has been updated from its original version.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/98790/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mary Jo Dudley receives funding from the New York Farm Viability Institute (NYFVI) to conduct research on "Improving Workplace Communications: Opportunities for Worker Training and Advancement". She previously received funding from NYFVI to conduct research and extension activities related to "Strategies for Improved Workplace Relations and Farmworker Retention in New York State."
</span></em></p>A researcher takes a closer look at the millions of unauthorized workers who play an essential role in the U.S. economy – and why they matter.Mary Jo Dudley, Director of Cornell Farmworker Program, Cornell UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/986842018-06-21T10:27:15Z2018-06-21T10:27:15ZCorporate CEOs’ political voice growing louder as they criticize Trump policies like separating migrant children<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/224135/original/file-20180621-137741-1d0kkco.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Children wait at a private charity after being released by Customs and Border Protection.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Eric Gay</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>America’s CEOs have become increasingly active on political issues that they would have shunned in prior years.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-06-20/american-asks-u-s-not-to-put-detained-children-on-its-flights">latest example</a> came in response to the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” border enforcement policy that led to the <a href="https://theconversation.com/breaking-up-families-america-looks-like-a-dickens-novel-98660">forced separation</a> of several thousand immigrant children from their <a href="https://theconversation.com/forced-migration-from-central-america-5-essential-reads-98600">detained parents</a>. United Continental CEO Oscar Munoz called the policy “in deep conflict with our company’s values.” </p>
<p>United and fellow airlines <a href="http://news.aa.com/news/news-details/2018/Statement-on-Recent-Reports-of-Separated-Families/default.aspx">American</a>, Southwest and <a href="https://twitter.com/FlyFrontier/status/1009488027985596416">Frontier</a> each indicated they didn’t want the government to use their planes to fly separated children. President Donald Trump hoped to quell the furor over the issue by signing an executive order <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/20/us/politics/trump-immigration-children-executive-order.html">ending the separations</a>.</p>
<p>It’s certainly not the first time corporate CEOs took a stand against a Trump policy or his words. After the president’s <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/15/us/politics/trump-press-conference-charlottesville.html">contentious response</a> to violent clashes in Charlottesville, Virginia, CEO resignations and <a href="http://fortune.com/2017/08/17/ceos-trump-charlottesville-criticized">denunciations</a> led to the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/on-leadership/wp/2017/08/16/after-wave-of-ceo-departures-trump-ends-business-and-manufacturing-councils/">dissolution</a> of two White House advisory councils.</p>
<p>While Trump’s actions likely sparked this increase in political activism by corporate CEOs, its roots run deeper and will survive beyond the end of the current administration.</p>
<h2>From custom abiders to bullies</h2>
<p>When I first began studying the interactions between social movements and corporations in the 1990s, it was rare to see business take a public stand on social issues. Yet today we see organizations ranging from General Electric to the NCAA <a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/major-corporations-join-fight-against-north-carolina-s-bathroom-bill-n605976">weighing in</a> on, for example, transgender rights, something hard to imagine even a decade ago.</p>
<p>Traditionally, corporations aimed to be scrupulously neutral on social issues. No one doubted that corporations exercised power, but it was over bread-and-butter economic issues like trade and taxes, not social issues. There seemed little to be gained by activism on potentially divisive issues, particularly for consumer brands. </p>
<p>A watershed of the civil rights movement, for example, was the <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/2095077">1960 sit-in protest by students that began at a segregated lunch counter</a> in a Woolworth store in Greensboro, North Carolina, and spread across the South. Woolworth’s corporate policy had been to “abide by local custom” and keep black and white patrons separated. By supporting the status quo, Woolworth and others like it stood in the way of progress.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/139327/original/image-20160926-31842-15nz195.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/139327/original/image-20160926-31842-15nz195.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=469&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139327/original/image-20160926-31842-15nz195.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=469&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139327/original/image-20160926-31842-15nz195.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=469&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139327/original/image-20160926-31842-15nz195.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=590&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139327/original/image-20160926-31842-15nz195.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=590&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/139327/original/image-20160926-31842-15nz195.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=590&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">When the Greensboro Four launched their sit-in protest, companies tended to stay neutral on social issues.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:A%26T_four_statue_2000.jpg">Cewatkin via Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But negative publicity led to substantial lost business, and Woolworth eventually relented. In July, four months after the protest started – and after the students had gone home for the summer – the manager of the <a href="http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/the-greensboro-sit-in">Greensboro store</a> quietly integrated his lunch counter.</p>
<p>In general, companies were more worried about the costs of taking a more liberal stand on such issues, a point basketball legend and Nike pitchman Michael Jordan made succinctly in 1990. Asked to support Democrat Harvey Gantt’s campaign to replace segregationist incumbent Jesse Helms as a North Carolina senator, Jordan declined, reportedly saying “<a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/sports/sports_nut/2016/07/did_michael_jordan_really_say_republicans_buy_sneakers_too.html">Republicans buy sneakers, too</a>.”</p>
<p>And companies presumed that taking controversial positions would lead to boycotts by those on the other side. That’s what happened to Walt Disney in 1996 as a result of its early support for gay rights, such as <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gay_Days_at_Walt_Disney_World">“Gay Day”</a> at its theme parks. Its stand prompted groups including America’s largest Protestant denomination, the Southern Baptists, to <a href="http://www.cnn.com/US/9706/18/baptists.disney/">launch a boycott</a>, calling Disney’s support for gay rights an “anti-Christian and anti-family direction.” The <a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/id/8318263/ns/us_news/t/southern-baptists-end--year-disney-boycott/">eight-year boycott</a>, however, was notably ineffective at changing Disney policy. It turns out that too few parents had the heart to deny their children Disney products to make a boycott effective. </p>
<p>Since then, some of the biggest U.S. companies have taken similar stands, in spite of the reaction from conservatives. For example, when the Arkansas legislature passed a bill in March 2015 that would have enabled LGBT discrimination on the grounds of “religious freedom,” <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-walmart-arkansas-analysis-idUSKBN0MT13E20150402">the CEO of Walmart urged the governor to veto the bill</a>. </p>
<p>Not surprisingly, given Walmart’s status in the state and the corporate backlash that accompanied a similar law in Indiana, the <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2015/04/01/govt-and-business-leaders-object-to-ark-religion-bill/70757942/">governor obliged</a> and eventually signed a <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2015/03/31/politics/arkansas-religious-freedom-anti-lgbt-bill/">modified bill</a>. That didn’t sit well with former Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, however, who <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/23/opinion/bobby-jindal-im-holding-firm-against-gay-marriage.html">argued in The New York Times</a> that companies in those states were joining “left-wing activists to bully elected officials into backing away from strong protections for religious liberty.” He warned companies against “bullying” Louisiana.</p>
<p>Why have corporations shifted from “abiding local custom” around segregation and other divisive social issues to “bullying elected officials” to support LGBT rights?</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/183830/original/file-20170829-6653-za65f9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/183830/original/file-20170829-6653-za65f9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/183830/original/file-20170829-6653-za65f9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/183830/original/file-20170829-6653-za65f9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/183830/original/file-20170829-6653-za65f9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/183830/original/file-20170829-6653-za65f9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/183830/original/file-20170829-6653-za65f9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Merck CEO Ken Frazier, seated next to Trump, was the first to resign from a manufacturing council after Charlottesville.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Evan Vucci</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Changing environment</h2>
<p>In my view, there are two broad changes responsible for this increased corporate social activism.</p>
<p>First, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Changing-Your-Company-Inside-Intrapreneurs/dp/1422185095/ref=asap_bc">social media and the web have changed the environment for business</a> by making it cheaper and easier for activists to join together to voice their opinions and by making corporate activities more transparent. </p>
<p>The rapid spread of the Occupy movement in the fall of 2011, from Zuccotti Park in New York to encampments across the country, <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/06/occupy-wall-street-social-media_n_999178.html">illustrates</a> how social media can enable groups with a compelling message to scale up quickly. Sometimes even online-only movements can be highly effective.</p>
<p>When the Susan G. Komen Foundation cut off funds to Planned Parenthood that were aimed at supporting breast cancer screenings for low-income women, a pop-up social movement arose: Facebook and Twitter exploded with <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/03/us/komen-foundation-urged-to-restore-planned-parenthood-funds.html">millions of posts and tweets voicing opposition</a>. Within days the policy was walked back.</p>
<p><a href="http://blogs.hbr.org/2014/04/what-matters-about-mozilla-employees-led-the-coup/">Mozilla’s appointment of a new CEO</a> who had supported a California ballot proposal banning same-sex marriage also generated outrage online, both inside and outside the organization. He was gone within two weeks. </p>
<p>In each case, social media allowed like-minded “clicktivists” to draw attention to an issue and demonstrate their support for change, quickly and at very little cost. It’s never been cheaper to assemble a virtual protest group, and sometimes (as in the massive <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/21/us/womens-march.html?mcubz=1&_r=0">Women’s March</a> that took place in cities around the world the day after Trump’s inauguration) online tools enable real-world protest. As such, activism is likely to be a constant for corporations in the future.</p>
<h2>Millennials don’t like puffery</h2>
<p>A second change is that millennials, as consumers and workers, <a href="http://ssir.org/articles/entry/the_new_face_of_corporate_activism">are highly attuned</a> to a company’s “social value proposition.” </p>
<p>Companies targeting the sensibilities of the young often tout their social missions. <a href="http://www.toms.com/improving-lives">Tom’s Shoes</a> and <a href="https://www.warbyparker.com/buy-a-pair-give-a-pair">Warby Parker</a> both have “buy a pair, give a pair” programs. Chipotle highlights its <a href="https://chipotle.com/food-with-integrity">sustainability efforts</a>. And Starbucks has promoted fair trade coffee, marriage equality and racial justice <a href="https://www.fastcompany.com/3046890/the-inside-story-of-starbuckss-race-together-campaign-no-foam">more or less successfully</a>. In each case, transparency about corporate practices serves as a check on puffery. </p>
<p>Social mission is even more important when it comes to recruiting. At business school recruiting events, it is almost obligatory that <a href="http://ssir.org/articles/entry/the_new_face_of_corporate_activism">companies describe</a> their LEED-certified workplaces, LGBT-friendly human resource practices and community outreach efforts. </p>
<p>Moreover, our employer signals something about our identity. Value alignment is part of why people stay at their job, and among many millennials, socially progressive values – particularly around LGBT issues – are almost a given.</p>
<p>In this situation, corporate activism may be the sensible course of action, at least when it comes to LGBT issues. According to the <a href="http://www.pewforum.org/2016/05/12/changing-attitudes-on-gay-marriage/">Pew Research Center</a>, for example, support for same-sex marriage has doubled from 31 percent in 2004 to 62 percent in 2017, and there is little reason to expect a reversal. </p>
<h2>Red and blue companies?</h2>
<p>While prominent companies like Starbucks and Target have taken stances associated with liberal causes, some businesses have gone the other direction. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-mo-chick-fil-a-gay-20120718-story.html">Chick-fil-A aimed to implement</a> “biblical values” and supported anti-gay groups in the 2000s. Those groups returned the favor by encouraging like-minded people to dine there on “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/us-news-blog/2012/aug/01/chick-fil-a-appreciation-day">Chick-fil-A appreciation day</a>.”</p>
<p>Hobby Lobby <a href="http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2015/07/10/after-hobby-lobby-ruling-hhs-announces-birth-control-workaround">famously sought to abstain</a> from providing funding for birth control for employees on religious grounds. Koch Industries, overseen by the famous Koch brothers, <a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/4/1/1288957/-Sign-the-pledge-Don-t-buy-these-Koch-products">has long been a lightning rod</a> for boycotts due to the right-wing proclivities of its dominant owners. And small businesses across the country are not always shy in advertising their conservative political orientations. </p>
<p>As <a href="http://press.princeton.edu/titles/9030.html">states have seemingly divided</a> into red (for conservative) and blue (for liberal), might we expect the same thing from corporations, as consumers and employees drift toward the brands that best represent their views – red companies and blue companies? </p>
<p><a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/list.php">It is already easy to look up</a> political contributions by companies and their employees. For example, Bloomberg, Alphabet and the Pritzker Group lean Democratic; Oracle, Chevron and AT&T tend Republican. </p>
<p>In the current electoral climate, it is not hard to imagine this continuing. </p>
<p><em>This is an updated version of an <a href="https://theconversation.com/when-did-che-guevara-become-ceo-the-roots-of-the-new-corporate-activism-64203">article originally published</a> on Sept. 27, 2016.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/98684/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jerry Davis does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>United’s CEO called the Trump policy ‘in deep conflict’ with his company’s values, the latest example of a corporate leader speaking out on a political issue, something almost unheard of a few decades ago.Jerry Davis, Professor of Management and Sociology, Ross School of Business, University of MichiganLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/985872018-06-21T10:04:31Z2018-06-21T10:04:31ZChildren have been separated from their families for generations – why Trump’s policy was different<p>After weeks of mounting pressure, Donald Trump signed an <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/20/us/politics/trump-immigration-children-executive-order.html">executive order</a> on June 20 to stop his administration’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/trump-and-sessions-can-end-immigrant-family-separations-without-congress-help-98599">policy of separating migrant children</a> from their parents at the southern border of the US. Putting the policy into a wider historical context of state-sanctioned policies of child separation helps to understand why some aspects of it were remarkably distinctive – and caused such international outrage. </p>
<p>From the closing decades of the 19th century, <a href="https://www.academia.edu/36691325/Saving_the_child_for_the_sake_of_the_nation_moral_framing_and_the_civic_moral_and_religious_redemption_of_children">an array of policies emerged</a> across the Anglophone world which challenged assumptions about parents’ inalienable rights to their children. A transnational child protection movement led to the formation of child protection societies, beginning with the <a href="https://www.nyspcc.org/about-the-new-york-society-for-the-prevention-of-cruelty-to-children/history/">New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children</a> in 1875. New legislation followed in the UK, Canada and Australia allowing the removal of children from parents on grounds of cruelty or neglect. </p>
<p>Alongside this, various forms of welfare intervention developed which removed children from their families, with varying degrees of parental consent. This was done on the basis that children would be placed in new environments better suited to their moral, religious and civic development. </p>
<p>These included policies that sought to place children from indigenous communities in institutions in which they could be “Christianised and civilised”. This led to “Indian” residential schools <a href="http://nctr.ca/map.php">in Canada</a> and <a href="https://www.pbs.org/video/unspoken-americas-native-american-boarding-schools-oobt1r/">the United States</a>. It also sparked programmes which moved unaccompanied children around within their own country, such as the <a href="http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/O/bo3630532.html">American “orphan trains”</a>, or to other countries, such as the <a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/remembering-child-migration-9781472591128/">UK child migration schemes</a> where children were sent to Canada or Australia. Other forms of residential incarceration were also introduced, such as <a href="http://www.childabusecommission.ie/rpt/ExecSummary.php">the industrial school system in Ireland</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/224176/original/file-20180621-137741-atk60h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/224176/original/file-20180621-137741-atk60h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=459&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224176/original/file-20180621-137741-atk60h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=459&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224176/original/file-20180621-137741-atk60h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=459&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224176/original/file-20180621-137741-atk60h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=576&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224176/original/file-20180621-137741-atk60h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=576&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/224176/original/file-20180621-137741-atk60h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=576&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">An ‘Indian’ residential school in Saskatchewan, Canada in 1908.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_Indian_residential_school_system#/media/File:Indian_school.jpg">Library and Archives Canada via Wikimedia Commons</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Sacred bonds broken</h2>
<p>These initiatives continued just as ideas of the sacred emotional ties between parent and child were becoming <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/titles/5452.html">more pervasive in society</a>. However, state-sanctioned policies of family separation, usually delivered by leading charities and religious organisations, operated on the basis that such sacred bonds need not be respected for certain types of parents. These extended far beyond cases of child cruelty to judgements made about the suitability of a parent based on their ethnicity, class, lifestyle or marital status.</p>
<p>While the history of these welfare initiatives is complex and diverse, two common characteristics stand out. First, moral justifications were made for them with claims that the child’s social background – including the relationship with their parents – was a harmful influence and that removal of the child was necessary for saving them as a future citizen. <a href="http://www.manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk/9780719078941/">Moral symbolism</a> of the polluting home and the rescue of the child from darkness to light proliferated in publicity materials and public statements of support for their work. </p>
<p>Second, in almost all cases – apart from in the US – such welfare initiatives have become a focus of national shame and regret, expressed through <a href="https://www.iicsa.org.uk/news/inquiry-publishes-child-migration-programmes-report">inquiries</a> and <a href="http://www.trc.ca/websites/trcinstitution/index.php?p=905">truth commissions</a>, <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8531664.stm">public apologies</a> and, in some cases, <a href="http://www.rirb.ie/">financial compensation</a>.</p>
<p>In some respects the current policy by the Trump administration reflects aspects of this history. Similar dehumanising moral language about parents used to justify child separation in the past has been reflected in statements made by US officials that describe migrants as criminals. As Trump put it in one tweet, they <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1009071403918864385">threaten to “infest” American society</a>. </p>
<h2>Scale and harm</h2>
<p>In other respects, there are striking differences. The sheer scale of reported separations – <a href="https://apnews.com/dc0c9a5134d14862ba7c7ad9a811160e">2,300 migrant children</a> are said to have been removed from parents in six weeks – is extraordinary compared to previous state-sanctioned policies of separation. If rates of removal had continued at this level, the policy would have led to numbers of separations of children from parents in five years that other historical policies took several decades to realise. </p>
<p>Compared to historical welfare interventions, this US policy also lacked any moral claim that the separations were for the good of the child. It functioned simply as a punitive measure against immigration, ignoring evidence of the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/what-separation-from-parents-does-to-children-the-effect-is-catastrophic/2018/06/18/c00c30ec-732c-11e8-805c-4b67019fcfe4_story.html?utm_term=.7ea30788ab50">traumatic effects of separation</a> from parents for children. This may help to explain why it has received much greater public censure than previous policies which received varying degrees of public toleration or support on the basis of claims that they benefited the children involved.</p>
<p>Another contrast concerns the speed and extent to which public opposition to the policy grew. Historically, state-sanctioned policies of child separation have often faced public criticisms and periodic scandals. But despite evidence of their harmful effects the policies usually persisted for decades, in part because public opinion has too readily deferred to the positive moral intent that governments and voluntary organisations claimed had driven the separations. </p>
<p>An example of this was the finding of the <a href="https://canadianhistory.ca/natives/timeline/1900s/1907-the-bryce-report-on-health-conditions-in-residential-schools">Bryce Report of 1907</a> which revealed that in the Indian residential schools in Canada, the mortality rate of indigenous children from tuberculosis was 24% – double that of the wider indigenous population. Support for the missionary aims of this work meant, however, that <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10767-013-9132-0">far from being closed down</a> the residential school system subsequently expanded and did not undergo any significant reforms until the 1960s.</p>
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<p>By comparison, public opposition to the Trump administration’s family separation policy has grown rapidly through print and broadcast media no longer characterised by such deference. <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1008953199963746304">Social media</a> has also played an integral part in this process. Visual records of previous state-sanctioned policies of child separation were usually made by those supporting them, such as publicity photographs of British child migrants smiling and waving <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/celebrity/stolen-childhoods-20110610-1fwru.html">into the camera</a> before setting off overseas. </p>
<p>By contrast, the widespread circulation of images and <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/children-separated-from-parents-border-patrol-cbp-trump-immigration-policy">audio files</a> capturing the distress of migrant children has played an <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10767-013-9132-0">important role in mobilising public opinion</a> against the moral symbolism that dehumanises migrants and legitimises such separations. </p>
<p>Judged in this historical context, if Trump’s policy proves shortlived, it is because its exceptional scale and brutality lacked sufficient moral legitimacy in American public opinion to outweigh the powerful images of children’s suffering circulated in the media. For those children who have already been separated from parents – uncertain how they will be reunified – this will come as little consolation.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/98587/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gordon Lynch receives funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council. </span></em></p>The scale and brutality of Trump’s family separation policy was like nothing that has gone before.Gordon Lynch, Michael Ramsey Professor of Modern Theology, University of KentLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/986002018-06-19T20:32:44Z2018-06-19T20:32:44ZForced migration from Central America: 5 essential reads<p>Since President Donald Trump ordered <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/16/us/politics/family-separation-trump.html">border officials to criminally prosecute all people caught trying to cross the U.S.-Mexico border</a> in May, approximately <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2018/06/15/politics/dhs-family-separation-numbers/index.html">2,000 children of Central American migrants</a> have been forcibly separated from their parents. </p>
<p>Video footage of distraught children isolated <a href="http://thehill.com/latino/392861-audio-shows-children-sobbing-for-mami-and-papa-at-detention-center">in detention centers</a> has provoked outrage worldwide. The <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/un-rights-chief-blasts-donald-trumps-unconscionable-child-separation-policy/">United Nations’ human rights chief called the policy</a> child “abuse,” and Mexico says the U.S. is <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/mexico-rebukes-u-s-over-policy-removing-immigrant-children-from-parents-1529432369">violating human rights</a>.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/06/stephen-miller-family-separation/563132/">grim logic</a> behind Trump’s <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/first-read/trump-says-separation-isn-t-his-policy-here-are-all-n884616">family separation policy</a>: If would-be migrants know that the U.S. will take away their children, they may <a href="https://twitter.com/rvawonk/status/1008025120135434240">decide it’s safer to stay home</a>. </p>
<p>Such thinking ignores some inescapable dangers that each year <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/13/world/americas/fleeing-gangs-central-american-families-surge-toward-us.html">compel hundreds of thousands of Central Americans to flee</a> their jobs, homes and families and cross Mexico by foot to reach the U.S. </p>
<p>Why make this perilous journey? Here, immigration experts explain that many Central American migrants are what’s called <a href="http://www.forcedmigration.org/about/whatisfm">forced migrants</a>. They are escaping conflict, generalized violence and targeted persecution – not traveling by choice.</p>
<h2>1. Record-high homicide rates</h2>
<p>“An increasing number of individuals are now arriving at the U.S. southwest border because of crime, violence and insecurity in Central America,” says <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-face-of-latin-american-migration-is-rapidly-changing-us-policy-isnt-keeping-up-74959">Jonathan Hiskey</a> of Vanderbilt University. </p>
<p>Hiskey’s research shows that pure fear drives many migrants to leave home. </p>
<p>With 60 murders per 100,000 people in 2017, El Salvador was the deadliest place in the world that was not at war. Almost 4,000 people were killed there last year.</p>
<p>Honduras’ murder rate has dropped markedly in recent years, but with 42.8 murders per 100,000 people in 2017, it is still one of the world’s most dangerous places.</p>
<p>People who’ve been victims of crime multiple times are most likely to emigrate, Hiskey says.</p>
<h2>2. Sexual and domestic abuse</h2>
<p>Such migrants would typically surrender at the border and request asylum, <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-domestic-abuse-and-anti-gay-violence-qualify-as-persecution-in-asylum-law-98354">explains immigation lawyer Sabi Ardalan</a>. They are now being arrested before they can surrender.</p>
<p>“International refugee law, which the U.S. has incorporated into domestic law, requires signatory countries to offer protection to people who demonstrate a well-founded fear of certain kinds of severe harm in their home countries,” she says. </p>
<p>Their persecution must be related to race, religion, nationality, political opinion or their particular social group.</p>
<p>Under international law, women who experience severe sexual or physical violence at home and who live in countries that – like El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras – cannot or will not protect them may qualify as members of a “particular social group” that warrants protection, Ardalan explains. </p>
<p>So might people who are persecuted for their sexual orientation or gender identity.</p>
<p>Today, many countries recognize the “unique torments” that many women face worldwide,“ says Ardalan. </p>
<p>The U.S. used to. On June 11, Attorney General Jeff Sessions upended decades of legal precedent by asserting that women escaping domestic abuse are not eligible for asylum. </p>
<h2>3. Gang violence</h2>
<p>Other Central Americans flee home because of unbridled gang violence. </p>
<p>The gang MS-13 first appeared <a href="https://theconversation.com/central-american-gangs-like-ms-13-were-born-out-of-failed-anti-crime-policies-76554">in Los Angeles during the 1980s</a>, says Florida International University professor José Miguel Cruz. In the early 2000s, the group expanded into Central America. As rival Salvadoran gangs from LA did likewise, crime across Central American cities increased. </p>
<p>Police in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras began to crack down. </p>
<p>"In El Salvador, the spiritual homeland of MS-13, the police arrested nearly 31,000 young people from 2003 to 2005,” Cruz writes. </p>
<p>As Central American gangs grew stronger, in part by recruiting members from jail, they began fighting to expand their territorial control. Beginning in 2010, these turf wars contributed to an astronomical rise in violence across the region.</p>
<p>“El Salvador went from a homicide rate of 36.9 murders per 100,000 inhabitants in 2000 to 64.4 in 2006 and 70.9 in 2009,” writes Cruz. “The same thing happened in Honduras and Guatemala, where the rivalry between MS-13 and the Eighteenth Street Gang descended into a succession of local street wars.”</p>
<h2>4. Why can’t their own governments protect them?</h2>
<p>In many ways, Cruz says, Central America’s uncontrolled gang violence is just “a symptom of a far more critical issue plaguing the region – namely, corruption.” </p>
<p>Prosecutors in Honduras and El Salvador have <a href="https://theconversation.com/in-central-america-gangs-like-ms-13-are-bad-but-corrupt-politicians-may-be-worse-86113">discovered numerous financial links between MS-13 and high-ranking government officials</a>. </p>
<p>“They shield criminal organizations in exchange for economic support and political backing in gang-controlled barrios,” writes Cruz. These illicit relationships have “shattered most efforts to build the kinds of criminal justice institutions necessary to support a democratic society.” </p>
<p>Indictments for government corruption and murder are both rare in Central America. As a result, criminals can extort, threaten and kill with impunity. In 2014, 99 percent of all murders in Honduras went unsolved.</p>
<p>President Trump has frequently justified his administration’s crackdown on immigrants by asserting that migrants are “criminals.” In fact, in many cases, they are the criminals’ victims. </p>
<h2>5. Do immigrants hurt the US economy?</h2>
<p>Trump has also claimed that most people crossing the U.S.-Mexico border are “unskilled” economic migrants intent on “taking [Americans’] manufacturing jobs” or “taking our money.” </p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/debunking-3-myths-behind-chain-migration-and-low-skilled-immigrants-90787">That’s false</a>, says Raquel Aldana, a law professor at the University of California, Davis.</p>
<p>“Most studies on the fiscal impact of U.S. immigration conclude that immigrant contributions have been positive to the overall U.S. economy,” Aldana says. </p>
<p>That includes the kind of low-wage workers who typically arrive from Central America. Such immigrants “do the difficult work of picking our fruit, cleaning our houses, cutting our lawns and caring for our children and elderly,” Aldana says.</p>
<p>She believes Trump’s perspective that certain migrants are “undeserving” of entry to the United States “distorts the facts.”</p>
<p>“Nearly all U.S. citizens would likely be undeserving of U.S. immigration” if the Trump administration’s harsh new rules applied to them.</p>
<p><em>Editor’s note: This article is a roundup of stories from The Conversation’s archive.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/98600/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
Trump hopes migrants won’t come if they know their children will be taken away. That grim logic ignores the inescapable dangers that drive thousands of Central Americans to flee their homes each year.Catesby Holmes, International Editor | Politics Editor, The Conversation USLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/984832018-06-19T08:52:36Z2018-06-19T08:52:36ZWhat the Bible’s Romans 13 says about asylum – and what Jeff Sessions omitted<p>The US attorney general, Jeff Sessions, kicked up a storm when he invoked a line from the Bible to defend the Trump administration’s policy of separating thousands of parents and children during immigration investigations. </p>
<p>Sessions quoted a line written by the apostle Paul to a small community of Christians living in Rome around 55AD to defend the Department of Justice’s approach. He <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2018/06/14/jeff-sessions-points-to-the-bible-in-defense-of-separating-immigrant-families/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.e5e598811d31">said</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I would cite you to the Apostle Paul and his clear and wise command in Romans 13, to obey the laws of the government because God has ordained them for the purpose of order.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Sessions used the Bible because one of the most vocal opponents of the crackdown on asylum cases <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2018/06/13/catholic-bishops-call-trumps-new-asylum-rules-immoral-with-one-suggesting-canonical-penalties-for-those-involved/?utm_term=.424c1e5750c1">has been the Catholic Church</a>. It’s no surprise that Sessions appealed to Romans chapter 13 verse 1 in response: not only did he hope to undermine Catholic authority by using the Bible against them, he cited a statement so broad that one might use it to defend anything a government does, good or bad.</p>
<p>The problem for Sessions is that the historical situation in which Paul wrote his <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+1&version=NRSV">letter to the Romans</a> does far more to undermine his policy than to support it.</p>
<h2>The origins of Paul’s letter</h2>
<p>The actual date and origin of the letter is not totally certain, but <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books/about/The_New_Interpreter_s_Bible_Acts_Introdu.html?id=2i0OAQAAMAAJ&redir_esc=y">scholars think</a> it was sent to the Christian community in Rome around 55AD. This was a few years after the Roman Emperor Claudius exiled Rome’s Jewish community in 49AD. That Jewish community included many people who had become Christians and were connected to other Christians in Rome. Paul himself was a Jew who had become a Christian. After his conversion he began travelling around the Mediterranean, starting Christian communities, and instructing them how to live.</p>
<p>Shortly before Paul wrote his letter to the Christians in Rome, many of the Jewish people who had been forced to leave Rome began to return, the city now safe for them again after the death of Claudius. Paul wrote the letter in part because he was worried that things would go badly when these Jewish Christians tried to integrate back in with the non-Jewish Christians in Rome. Paul feared their earlier exile by the emperor would keep them from being welcomed back.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/223622/original/file-20180618-85840-1ptm1p5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/223622/original/file-20180618-85840-1ptm1p5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=446&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/223622/original/file-20180618-85840-1ptm1p5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=446&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/223622/original/file-20180618-85840-1ptm1p5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=446&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/223622/original/file-20180618-85840-1ptm1p5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=560&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/223622/original/file-20180618-85840-1ptm1p5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=560&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/223622/original/file-20180618-85840-1ptm1p5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=560&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">St Paul writing his epistles.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:File%22-Saint_Paul_Writing_His_Epistles%22_by_Valentin_de_Boulogne.jpg">By Valentin de Boulogne, via Wikimedia Commons.</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It is for this reason that Paul spends so much time in his letter discussing the way Jews and non-Jews should live with one another (see, for example, chapters 2–4, 9–11 and 14). Paul argues that the Romans should openly welcome those Jewish members who had been forcibly removed some time ago; the church should return them to their places within the community and honour them. Perhaps these Jewish people were not completely unknown to the Christians left in Rome, but they were returning after a long absence. They were, for all intents and purposes, immigrants entering a host community that wasn’t sure it could trust them and probably didn’t want them around.</p>
<p>Paul is vehement about one thing that those who remained in Rome should not do: conclude they were any better or different than these Jewish migrants. That is why Paul famously says that “all” – Romans and Jews – “have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Paul <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+14&version=NRSV">marvels that</a> anyone would “pass judgement on your brother or sister” (14.10), for “each of us will be accountable to God” (14.12). </p>
<h2>Love a foreigner</h2>
<p>In the 21st century American context, Paul’s statements serve to emphasise the similarities between immigrants and non-immigrants, not any differences between them.</p>
<p>Sessions argued that the current approach “<a href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/speech/attorney-general-sessions-addresses-recent-criticisms-zero-tolerance-church-leaders">protects the lawful</a>”. He also suggested the policy was an extension of the revocation of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) policy, which had suspended immigration enforcement against undocumented migrants brought to the US as children. Defending the end of DACA in September 2017, <a href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/speech/attorney-general-sessions-delivers-remarks-daca">Sessions said a failure</a> to enforce immigration laws strictly had “put our nation at risk of crime, violence and even terrorism”.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/post-daca-how-congress-can-replace-obamas-program-and-make-it-even-better-83547">Post-DACA: How Congress can replace Obama's program and make it even better</a>
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<p>This particular point makes Romans an even worse defence of the policy Sessions is pursuing. Just before the line Sessions recently quoted from Romans 13, Paul wrote that: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>If your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink; for by doing this you will heap burning coals on their heads.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>And just a few lines after requiring respect for the government, Paul sums up his point by encouraging the audience to: “Love your neighbour as yourself. Love does no wrong to a neighbour; therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law.”</p>
<p>Paul’s familiar language about loving one’s neighbour – like Jesus of Nazareth before him – alludes to <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Leviticus+19&version=NRSV">Leviticus 19</a>, verse 18. While few people today know the content of Leviticus 19, Christian and Jewish audiences in the first century AD would have known it. That texts also commands people to create a system of economic care for migrants from potentially dangerous foreign countries at their own financial expense:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap to the very edges of your field … Do not go over your vineyard a second time or pick up the grapes that have fallen. Leave them for the poor and the foreigner.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The command to love a foreigner and to let them freely gather food that belongs to you puts us a long, long way from Sessions’ arguments about obeying governments to ensure safety for Americans.</p>
<p>The logic of Paul’s words might have sounded helpful to Sessions in isolation, but the letter they come from undermines nearly everything Sessions wants them to support.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/98483/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Casey Strine does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The US attorney general cited Paul’s letter to the Romans to justify the Trump administration family separation policy. Here’s why that’s a misreading of the Bible.Casey Strine, Lectuter in Ancient Near Eastern History and Literature, University of SheffieldLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.