Letter to the Editor: U.S. needs immigration plan, not wall

To the Times:

In the past I have been outspoken about focusing on the humanity of those facing addiction because of the direct impact it has had on my family, and I am proud of the public dialogue that is finally happening around the opioid crisis.

I am disappointed, however, in the lack of humane dialogue around our DACAmented neighbors and immigration system at large. Mitch McConnell has been repeatedly referring to the Dreamers, people who were brought here as children, as “illegal immigrants.” It may be true, but it was not their choice to come here. Many have been here since infancy and know no other home than the U.S. Their parents, who brought them, were possibly facing a terrible danger in their own country and sought asylum here in the U.S.

Although this is a feeling I’ve held for a while, things sank to a despicable low with President Trump’s ignorant comments last week about Haiti and other African countries, calling them “(expletive)holes.” His comments prove his racism, his refusal to fulfill the basic tenets of his position, and his perverted belief that some people are more valuable than others. The people struggling are the same people we should be most concerned with uplifting. Haiti, for example, faced an atrocity none of us could begin to imagine: more than 150,000 dead from the devastating earthquake in 2010. Millions displaced.

Any lawmaker who slows the process of a clean Dream Act and supports reactionary policies that curtail immigration, like a revocation of temporary protective status for people in the countries Trump has verbally attacked, is as evil as President Trump. We don’t need a wall. We need reform of the immigration law so that people can legally enter this country and stay without fear of being torn from their families with no warning. I call on the legislators in Washington to pass a clean Dream act and say no to funding for President Trump’s border wall!

Ruth Ann Davidson de Muniz, Ridley