We’re at the point in the United States where children need to carry proof of citizenship papers, and even then, their proof will be disbelieved
Julia Isabel Amparo Medina, a 9 year old U.S. citizen was just detained by CPB for 32 hours, because they didn’t believe she was a U.S. citizen. She was carrying her passport card. She was carrying her papers, and they were the right papers. She was arrested anyway. She’s terrified.
You can read her story on the Huffington Post.
For every one of these stories that makes the news, there’s a high probability that there are other, similar stories that don’t.
If 32 hours is the threshold for what makes this story newsworthy, what if a child is held for “only” 8 hours? Is the newsworthy thing still the detention of children? Probably not, given how many children are in ICE detention as I type this. Is the newsworthy thing the detention of American children? Maybe, and THAT fact is troubling. Because it means we’ve come to accept the idea of jailing immigrant children. How long will it take for us to accept the Trumpian idea that some U.S. citizens, like Julia Medina, aren’t ‘legitimate’ U.S. citizens? A shocking number of Republicans already believe these ideas, and represent them with editorials like, “Why we should end Birthright Citizenship.” How much have…