Update from this post about Roger Wang, local business owner and community volunteer who was taken into ICE custody on the way to get his green card: Roger has been detained at a New York State ICE detention facility for over two months; he has a local immigration lawyer assisting him, whom you can help fund through this link.
This sobering update brought to you as part of Linda’s One-Liner Wednesday series. Find out more here: https://lindaghill.com/2025/08/27/one-liner-wednesday-its-official/
Vote for Democracy #43
(Photo by Lucas Sankey on Unsplash)
There are so many horrors happening every day in the United States under the Trump regime that it’s difficult to write posts because I feel like I’m not able to do justice to the topic when there are so many illegal, immoral, unconstitutional, and/or unconscionable actions and statements perpetrated in an ongoing basis.
Today, though, I decided to lift up the threats to immigrants and refugees beginning with a local story. Roger Wang, the owner of a local Chinese restaurant who fled political persecution in China, was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) as he arrived for his green card hearing. For those who may not be familiar, a green card is a document that means an immigrant can live and work permanently in the US. Roger had been in the legal process for twelve years and had fulfilled all the requirements that ICE set out to earn his green card, but he was arrested anyway. There is a fundraiser for legal costs and to try to offset the losses to his business. As I write this, I haven’t heard any updates about where Roger is and when or whether he might be able to be released.
Stories like Roger’s are being repeated around the country. Immigrants are being detained by ICE, even when they do have legal status. The Trump administration has shamefully rescinded the legal status of many refugees, including those who served alongside the US in Afghanistan, and who face danger if they return to their home countries. Government agents, sometimes without identifying insignia and with their faces covered, have snatched people from their workplaces, cars, or even the streets and detained them. Sometimes, people with citizenship are detained, too. Appallingly, agents have injured people they are taking into custody They also have taken parents away, leaving their young children behind; sometimes, they take the children into custody, too, and have deported them with their parent, even if the children are United States citizens. Trump tried to take away birthright citizenship from children if both of their parents are undocumented, but this order is on hold while the courts hear arguments about it, although the 14th Amendment, Section 1 is very clear that being born in the United States confers citizenship.
It’s become more difficult to travel into the United States, even for people who are citizens or have permanent status. This month, Wilmer Chavarria, the school superintendent in Winooski, Vermont and a naturalized citizen originally from Central America, was questioned for five hours at the Houston airport as he returned from visiting family in Nicaragua. This risk causes a chilling effect on international travel for both US citizens and for tourists from other countries, especially those who aren’t White, as people of color are disproportionately subjected to being hassled by government border agents. Some countries are warning against travel to the US and tourism is down significantly. This is especially true for Canadians, due to Trump’s threats to their sovereignty and damage to their economy. This is particularly sad because Canada has been such a good neighbor for so long; my spouse B has Canadian ancestry with one of his great-grandfathers immigrating to the US in the late-19th century.
The majority of Americans are upset about the cruelty and disregard for US and international law that the Trump administration is exhibiting. They have sent people to detention camps and dangerous foreign countries and prisons without hearings or formal charges. They have disrespected judges and skirted/defied court orders when cases are brought. Many people, including lawyers, local/state government officials, faith leaders, charitable organizations, schools, and local community members are doing all they can to speak up for the rights of our immigrant neighbors, but it’s difficult when unidentified federal officials snatch people without notice and take them to undisclosed locations, sometimes even deporting them to their country of origin or an unrelated country before their families or lawyers can speak to them.
It’s part of the authoritarian nightmare we are living.
We will keep speaking out and doing what we can, despite the grim reality.
I don’t know how long it will take but we have to get our democracy back on track and always, always, always respect human rights.
Vote for Democracy #40
(Photo by Lucas Sankey on Unsplash)
Conditions in the United States are deteriorating in terms of the legal rights of individuals and the rule of law.
The most obvious examples right now are in the state of California. As the Trump administration escalates its deportation campaign, it is arresting people as they appear for scheduled meetings regarding their immigration status, at workplaces, and, sometimes, grabbing them out of cars or on the street. The agents doing these things are often masked and not wearing identifying badges, making it look as though they are criminal kidnappers. It’s terrifying for the immigrant community and for mixed-status families where some members are US citizens and others are not. It’s also heart-breaking that Trump has rescinded the legal status of hundreds of thousands of people who are refugees or who had been on temporary protected status.
While these things are happening throughout the country, there had been a concentration of workplace raids in Los Angeles, resulting in demonstrations at a facility where it seems that arrested migrants were being held without the ability to contact their families. A small number of protesters clashed with police, resulting in some arrests. Even though, the protests were confined to a small area of the city and were being handled by the Los Angeles police, Trump signed an order saying he could take over control of the National Guard, even though governors are in charge of National Guard deployments in their states, and could use federal troops within the United States, which is forbidden except in circumstances such as armed insurrection.
Trump ordered 2,000 California National Guard troops and 700 US Marines to Los Angeles, adding almost 3,000 National Guard troops a few days later. Governor Gavin Newsom sued to return the National Guard to his control, and, last night, Senior District Judge Charles R. Breyer ruled that Trump’s move was illegal. Unfortunately, the Trump Justice Department immediately appealed and the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has put a stay on the order until they can hear the case on Tuesday.
This is scary for several reasons. While the Trump administration is using this first in California, the executive order applies everywhere in the country, so Trump could call out the military anywhere in the US in the meantime. While these federalized National Guard or other troops are supposed to only act in a support role to protect federal property and personnel, they have already been shown to detain people while waiting for police to arrive to make arrests. On Saturday, Trump has scheduled a large military parade in Washington, DC, ostensibly to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the formation of the Army although June 14th is also his 79th birthday (and Flag Day). In reaction to this show of force by the President, there are about 2,000 protests being organized throughout the country – and even in a few international locations – as No Kings Day, also termed as No Tyrants Day in places that do have a monarch. The flagship protest is in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; there is no event planned for Washington, DC in order to steer clear of Trump’s military parade. The No Kings Day events are peaceful marches and rallies, but I am afraid that Trump will send troops or federalized National Guard after protesters, especially in big, majority-Democratic cities.
Tensions are ratcheted even higher because, yesterday, California Senator Alex Padilla was detained while trying to ask a question at a press conference that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem was giving at a federal building in Los Angeles. Sen. Padilla was forced from the room onto the floor and handcuffed, even though he announced that he was a senator and was accompanied by an FBI agent and security guard. If that can happen to a United States senator, what could happen to someone who is an immigrant or vulnerable or a member of a minority group?
While my health prevents me from attending in person, I offer my support to all those who will be at the No Kings protests tomorrow. I’m praying for their safety and hoping that police and other authorities have the good sense to honor the attendees as they exercise their First Amendment rights of free speech, freedom to peaceably assemble, and freedom to petition the government.
I hope that the Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court will uphold Judge Breyer’s ruling in the coming days and that the Trump administration will abide by it. We must not militarize the country and disregard our Constitutional rights. The Republicans in Congress need to wake up and honor their oaths and demand resignations or impeach any officials who are breaking the law and undermining our democracy.
In less than a month, we will observe the 249th anniversary of the United States. We must do it as a free people with our full rights intact.
Trump and the f-word
(Photo by Lucas Sankey on Unsplash)
Donald Trump’s rhetoric has become even more and more extreme, to the point that some in the media and politics have moved from characterizing it as authoritarian to calling it fascist. Historians, such as Ruth Ben-Ghiat and Heather Cox Richardson, have written columns and done interviews about this, as well as economist, professor, and former Cabinet secretary Robert Reich and many others.
They aren’t wrong.
While Trump has long demonized immigrants, he is now vowing to deport not only undocumented immigrants but also some immigrants who have legal status, such as temporary protected status or pending asylum claims, and even naturalized citizens and children of immigrants born in the United States who are citizens under the Fourteenth Amendment of our Constitution. He plans to round up millions of immigrants, place them in detention camps, and send them to other countries. Not only would this devastate these individuals and families, it would also tear apart many communities and devastate certain employment sectors with large numbers of immigrant-workers, such as agriculture, hospitality, construction, and food processing.
Trump is threatening to imprison law-abiding political opponents and members of the independent media, solely on the basis of their opposing viewpoints and truthful reporting. He repeatedly refers to them as “the enemy within.” This is chilling not only for public officials but also for lowly bloggers like me and people with Harris-Walz signs on their lawns. Will Trump-inspired vigillantes come after people like me?
Trump is threatening to use the military inside the United States to squelch protests and arrest people. It is illegal for the US military to operate in this way within the borders of the US, though they can help with things like disaster relief when cleared by state governors. He has even threatened to try civilians before military tribunals rather than in the courts, which is also unconstitutional.
Besides demonizing immigrants, especially people of color, Trump has scapegoated people of certain faiths, such as Muslims and Jews. He has a long history of denigrating Black people, dating from his early days in New York CIty real estate. His mistreatment of women is well-known from his decades of philandering and sexual abuse to his disregard for women’s right to bodily autonomy in the aftermath of the overturning of Roe v. Wade which he made possible. White male superiority is seen as the center of power, which gives those with fascist ideas cover to demean women, people of color, the LGBTQ+ community, religious minorities, immigrants, or anyone they feel does not fit the strongman mold.
Fascism is not democratic. The United States is. It’s time for all eligible voters to stand up for democracy on Election Day, Tuesday, November 5th, or before if early voting or vote-by-mail are available in your state. If you value our democracy, do not vote for Donald Trump or for any Republican who is not publicly opposing his hateful, fascist policies. Do not write in the name of your spouse or next-door neighbor. Do vote for Kamala Harris and the Democrats who value democracy and want to govern for the common good, not just those who voted for them.
Many Republican and former Republican elected officials and staff members have endorsed Vice President Harris because our democractic principles and the rule of law are much more important than particular policy disagreements. They know that, if Trump is elected, he will expand executive power and carry out the violent, fascistic threats he has been making.
Join them and all those who value our freedoms to Vote for Democracy!
the consequences of lying about the Haitian migrants in Springfield, Ohio
(Photo by Lucas Sankey on Unsplash)
When I wrote my short post after the debate between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, I mentioned that Trump had made an outlandish claim about immigrants eating their neighbors’ pets in a certain city.
The city was Springfield, Ohio. The immigrants who were implicated were from Haiti. Most of the recent Haitian immigrants are there with temporary protected status, which gives them legal standing to live and work in the US for a period of time. They fled Haiti due to the aftermath of an earthquake, damaging storms, and the collapse of the government, leading to gang violence and lawlessness.
Springfield, like many industrial cities, had lost a lot of its population when factories closed decades ago. They have been welcoming immigrants to the area to take jobs that they no longer had the local workers to fill. While there were some tensions locally, for example, about needing more teachers to help new students learn English and better instruction in teaching adults how to drive safely in the US, the Haitian immigrants were accepted as hard-working, good neighbors.
By the way, Trump’s vice-presidential running mate, JD Vance, is a US senator representing Ohio, elected in 2022. Before the presidential debate, Vance started telling this lie about what he termed as “illegal” Haitian migrants eating pets in Springfield. It has since come to light that he and Trump knew this was a lie before they started spreading it. Apparently, the lie started from a social media post from a Springfield woman whose cat had gone missing and who suggested that her Haitian neighbors might have eaten it; the cat was found trapped in her own basement a few days later. Government officials and police had debunked the claim publicly before Trump’s debate, but he spread the lie anyway.
The consequences have been serious. There have been dozens of bomb threats and other threats of violence, causing evacuations, lockdowns, closures, and cancellations at municipal buildings, schools, colleges, and community events. The immigrant community and other Black residents are living in fear. There have been white-supremacist and neo-Nazi marches in Springfield. All based on a lie spread by the Republican presidential and vice-presidential nominees.
It is especially upsetting that Vance has been so egregious in promulgating this lie against immigrants in a city that he represents because it flies in the face of the teachings of the Catholic Church, to which he converted a few years ago. As I was reminded in the homily at my church this weekend, Sunday, September 29th was observed as the 110th World Day of Migrants and Refugees. This reflects the first tenet of Catholic social justice doctrine, to uphold and respect the dignity of each person. In the United States, National Migration Week was observed September 23-29th and the Catholic bishops of Ohio have spoken out in support of the Haitians and other immigrants in their state. The rights of migrants are also reflected in US and international law.
Tomorrow, JD Vance will debate the Democratic candidate for vice president, Gov. Tim Walz. It will give him yet another opportunity to admit his lies about the Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio which have proven to be so dangerous.
Will he?
I’ll be listening.
Donald Trump has pledged to end birthright citizenship for the children of immigrants by executive order, if he is elected, which would be a clear violation of the 14th Amendment of the US Constitution.
This fact is brought to you as my post in Linda’s One-Liner Wednesdays series. Find out how to join us here: https://lindaghill.com/2024/09/25/one-liner-wednesday-flowers/
People living in the United States, whatever your immigration status, please safely and confidentially complete the census form here: https://my2020census.gov/ if you have not already done so.
This US public service announcement is brought to you through Linda’s One-Liner Wednesday. Join us! Find out how here: https://lindaghill.com/2020/08/05/one-liner-wednesday-august-5th-do-you-ever/
Some years stand out in memory as more difficult than others.
For me, 2005 was one of those years. Within a few months that year, I lost a close friend and my father-in-law to cancer. At the same time, our long-time parish disintegrated, just at the time when we needed spiritual comfort the most.
2019 has also been one of those years.
We dealt with the final months of my mom’s struggle with congestive heart failure and her death in May. Then, there were the many facets of dealing with her death for me and our family, the practical things like funeral arrangements and mounds of paperwork and the personal things, learning to navigate in a world without her.
This year also saw the bittersweet re-location of daughter E and granddaughter ABC to the UK after E’s spousal visa finally came through. We love that they are finally able to live together full-time as a family, but miss having them here on this side of the pond. It was a privilege being here to watch ABC grow from a tiny newborn into a rambunctious, talkative two-year-old. We appreciate being able to visit London in person and to videochat, but it is still a big re-adjustment.
With the losses, celebrating the holidays has been difficult for me. We made lasagna for Christmas using a recipe from Nana and used one of her relish dishes for serving olives. There are ornaments that came from both sides of our family on the tree, as well as some baby’s first Christmas ornaments commemorating ABC’s birth in 2017. We appreciate our memories of Christmas celebrations with Nana and Paco (my parents) and Grandma and Grandpa (B’s parents). I smile thinking about the year that L proposed to E on Christmas morning while visiting here. I remember how, last year, the lower half of our tree was all unbreakable ornaments in deference to ABC who was then 18 months old. Now, there are fragile ornaments scattered throughout all the branches. Christmas this year was very quiet, with just Paco, B, T, and I here for the lasagna and Christmas cookies, which has been our tradition since the years when E and T were young and participating in Christmas morning liturgy for children and families at church. Lasagna was great because you could prep it the night before and bake after church to have dinner at midday.
Of course, all of the personal struggles come at a time of great upheaval, socially and politically, in both the US and the UK. We are all living in a world struggling to deal with present and future climate change and trying to marshall personal and political will to make the changes needed to addresses the causes and effects as best we can.
I know that some people feel a lot of positive energy when we enter a new year and a new decade. I admit that I am not generally one of those people, seeing January first as the day that follows December 31st and not as some shiny new beginning. I don’t know if this change of year will feel different or not. I certainly am feeling the need now to try to take stock and re-arrange the way I use my days, perhaps managing to be more deliberate, now that there are not quite so many factors in my life that require changes of plan and quick reactions to shifting circumstances and priorities.
Perhaps, what I really need is time to rest and take stock, like a sabbatical or a year of Jubilee as it is described in the Hebrew Scriptures. Or maybe not a whole year, but a few months. I will have to ponder…
Sometimes, writing stream of consciousness stays in its own little stories. Today, though, it feels more like travelling.
As we draw close to the beginning of 2020, I wish that the year will take each of you where you most need to go.
*****
Linda’s prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday this week is “year.” Please join us! Find out how here: https://lindaghill.com/2019/12/27/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-dec-28-19
2019-2020 SoCS Badge by Shelley! https://www.quaintrevival.com/
The fourth Thursday of November is celebrated as Thanksgiving Day in the United States.
With so many changes in our family in the past few months, our Thanksgiving was quiet, with just spouse B, daughter T, and my dad Paco here for dinner. B did all the cooking – turkey, two kinds of dressing, mashed potatoes, rutabaga, acorn squash wedges, baked onions, and cranberry orange relish, with apple and pumpkin pies for dessert. It was a lot of food for four people, but we all enjoy having the leftovers. We are in the process of making turkey stock with the carcass and vegetables, something I learned from Nana growing up which has recently come back into food-fashion.
We ate midday here and, at almost the same time, daughter E was eating a Thanksgiving dinner, five time zones away, in London. She had made turkey and trimmings and pies for her daughter ABC, spouse L, and his parents with whom they are making their home. It’s nice that E and L want to keep some United States traditions to pass on to ABC, along with British ones. She is a dual citizen, at least until adulthood. It will depend on the rules in place when she turns 18, whether she will have to renounce her US citizenship to remain in the UK.
Still, she will always be able to celebrate Thanksgiving and remember the Thanksgiving celebrations of her childhood.
There are some silver linings of not having a 2-year-old in the house.
Of course, I would trade it all in a moment, if I could, although I know ABC is where she needs to be, settling in with her mom and dad and London grandparents and enjoying the amenities that only a big, historic city can provide. We had a chance to videochat with E and ABC over the weekend and to make arrangements to visit in December. It will be exciting to see everyone and all the places they go! It might be a bit too exciting, though, as we will be there for the election on the 12th…
Joanne Corey 