A betrayal of us & of Miss Liberty
Eight hundred thousand humans. We see large numbers every day related to tragedy, but it’s only when tragedy strikes the one you love does the magnitude of the situation seem comprehensible. Eight hundred thousand reduced to one.
I came here from St. Lucia when I was 3 — 19 years ago. There wouldn’t be going back for me, because I was never really there. I never learned my native language. I don’t understand the customs. I appreciate them, but I barely connect with my extended family there. This is my home.
As an immigrant organizer, I’ve seen firsthand the effects these past few months of uncertainty have done to youth under the DACA program and immigrants at large. Those who were vocal and were pushing for a more comprehensive immigration system have been rendered silent out of fear. Students who were just starting their fall semesters or finishing their winter courses have decided to drop out because of uncertainty for the future. People who were literally paying the government so they can travel out of state are locked in place, because what if they aren’t able to come back? Young people and their families are inundated with stress and stifled by fear.
It’s not only Trump’s infantile unpredictability that scaring us. It’s the fact that he has access to all 800,000 identities.
What’s to say that our rights won’t be immediately stripped of us and that ICE would not actually need a warrant to enter your house? Families will be ripped apart; young people will be left clueless in a foreign land all because from a young age they’ve had a vendetta set upon them unprovoked.
All of the DACA youth spent close to the entirety of their lives in America. They blend in brushing, past us on our commute and speaking to us in their code-switched American accents. They’ve contributed to the economy; they have built permanent fixtures in the U.S. landscape. Losing them means dimming America’s future, and also losing $460 billion in GDP over the next decade just to be empirical.
I talk to many interviewers and skeptics and I’ve always brought up the Statue of Liberty. I visited it this summer to see it upclose, to see what those on Ellis Island saw so long ago. The largest statue I’ve ever seen for certain, and more powerful than the Wall Street bull. She’s holding a torch and inviting those who are weary and downtrodden. And I sometimes mention how now we are aiming to do the exact opposite. When did we forget about who built this country? When did we forget about her?