I have to agree with Jessica in saying this is one of the saddest stories I’ve ever read. I felt like crying (and maybe did a little bit…) through almost the whole thing. However, this story also made me wonder if this kind of thing was still happening today. My first thought was certainly not, we are enlightened now and in America that kind of thing doesn’t happen to people anymore. Then I thought better of it and did a Google search. Here is what I came up with:
You should read it, but here are the basics: A Guatemalan woman, here illegally, was taken from her legal husband and children and deported a year and a half ago. The same thing happened in a Palestinian family in New York 2010. The mother, here illegally, was deported after more than 20 years of being in the US (if I read it right) with her legal husband and children. According to the article, “Nearly 45,000 such parents were removed in the first six months of this year, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).” And it gets worse: “At least 5,100 U.S. citizen children in 22 states live in foster care (…) an unknown number of those children are being put up for adoption against the wishes of their parents, who, once deported, are often helpless to fight when a U.S. judge decides that their children are better off here.”
Uhm. What?
So, I guess my question is two-fold. First, I would like to know if other people knew about this, or if I’m the only one stuck in the dark ages? Second, ideas on how to fix this? These people are here illegally, but surely there should be some provision for illegal mothers of legal children – and at the very least something against these children being put up for adoption.
Oh, p.s.:
Just for kicks I did a search for “citizen children deported immigrants” on the regular Fox News website. Nothing even close to this issue came up. I did this search on the Fox News Latino website, and of course this article, and others like it, were at the very top of the list. Unless, as I said before, I’m just stuck in the dark ages and everybody else knew this was happening, it looks like the fairytale stories Jessica mentions in her post might not just be for the kids.
These are very good ideas and insights. Yet, I have to ask--just have to: Why fox news of all news channels/websites?
ReplyDeleteIt was one of the links that came up when I was searching on Google, which I thought was too interesting to pass up. I generally assume that Fox wouldn't paint this issue in a sympathetic light, which was why it caught my eye. It also just got more interesting when I figured out that FoxLatino is separate from Fox, and that the stories so prevalent on one seem to be nonexistent on the other.
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