How hard is it to believe that people who are overtly committing criminal behaviors will be sent through our judicial system when they are caught in these criminal behaviors? A simple shoplifting or a complex money-laundering operation will end, ultimately, in the perp being sent to court, then to jail, or to pay a fine, or to be sent out on probation.
People who commit these crimes with their children along for the ride and end up in jail or in prison get to be separated from those children until their incarceration is over because the children weren’t the criminals and can’t be put in jail. They go to Child Protective instead.
How hard is that to understand? Not since the Old Testament have we put whole families into prisons for crimes. More recently, there were “debtors prisons” for non-payment that had family accommodations.
So it begs the question: Why would hundreds of people purposefully breaking federal laws, do so with their children in tow?
Well, its because some of them were told special considerations would be given to people with children. Special, yes, in that those hundreds of children will be warehoused in a different barn from the parents, grandparents, etc., until the illegalities of the adults get sorted out.
How do we know these adults are purposefully breaking the law? Because those foreign nationals who have legitimate fears of persecutions by gangs and cartels, or prosecutions by unstable governing bodies, enter at the PORTS of ENTRY! They don’t hide themselves by cover of night and sneak in under fences and around barricades. They go to the border line missions and help centers and churches and Puertas de Entrada, asking for aid and explaining their tales of woe and starvation and gangs along with all of the others who are already there. They get in line. I’ve known lots of people who have done this.
Is there an alternative? Yes. Two, actually. One, those parents can stop exposing their innocent babies to the grueling long, arduous, dangerous, hot, thirsty, sweaty, hungry, insecure trip through the frontera to our border. Or two, they can be put in prison with the parents.
I wonder how long the Democrats will stand for that?
Esther Ramos
1 thought on “LETTER: Children In Prison?”
According to 8 U.S.C. 1227 (a)(1)(C)(i) there is no civil or criminal penalty for overstay; someone who overstays a visa cannot be incarcerated or fined. The main “penalty” is forcible removal (deportation) from the United States. How can one commit “criminal behaviors” for something that isn’t considered a criminal act?
Unlawful Entry is a misdemeanor with all the seriousness of jaywalking. Think of it like international jaywalking if you must. In spite of popular belief, not everyone who commits unlawful entry is aware of it.
Keep in mind as well that the CPB policy is to stop asylum seekers from stepping foot onto U.S. soil, because one can;t claim asylum until they are on the U.S. side. No, you can’t go to an embassy and do it. It has to be on the U.S. side of the checkpoint, and hardly anyone gets there by design.