Punishing children
Re “Yes, this is who we are,” Opinion, July 30
Yes, this is who we are, as Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) writes in his op-ed article on the cruelty of the Trump administration’s separation of immigrant families. But it is not who I want to be.
Where are all the “family values” Republicans? I only feel shame over the fact that I am, as an American, implicated by President Trump’s policies.
I wonder how evangelical Christians apply the words of Jesus regarding children — as written in the Gospel of Mark, Chapter 9 — to the forced separation of children from parents: “Taking a child he placed it in their midst, and putting his arms around it he said to them, ‘Whoever welcomes one of these little children in my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me does not welcome me but the one who sent me.’” Doris Isolini Nelson Los Angeles
Schatz may be correct in thinking President Reagan would have been aghast at separating minor immigrants from their parents.
However, I think Reagan would have been even more appalled by the fact that Congress didn’t follow through on its promise to secure the border as part of the 1986 amnesty program, thereby allowing 12 million more illegal immigrants to enter the country.
Shame on members of Congress for doing nothing but fight for power and fill their own coffers. Jan MacMichael
South Pasadena
On a recent visit to Budapest, I was moved by a public art memorial honoring the lives of Jews who were shot at the edge of the Danube River by the Nazis. Their shoes were first removed and collected to be used by German soldiers for the war effort.
Imagine my horror to see the photo accompanying the article about intentional separation of families here in my country. The systematic inventory of items, specifically shoes, highlighted in Schatz’s article resonated with me.
His point of intentional harm with regard to the separation of children from their families could not be more clear. Michele Britton Bass
Santa Barbara