Personal responsibility?

Thank you Olivia! If I may share a personal story... Years ago dear friends of ours escaped deaths squads in El Salvador, at first landing in Canada where they were granted asylum and then coming to the United States where they were, for many years, going through the long process of becoming citizens. The parents had just gotten their citizenship but one daughter's paperwork got messed up and her status suddenly fell into limbo. She was married to a man who was abusive and one evening, after a terrible fight, the police arrived. One of the officers turned out to be a friend of the husband's and decided to teach the wife, who had been slugged by the husband, a lesson and arrested her. She was taken to the Redwood City jail where ICE was allowed to do evening sweeps. They took her to a Yuba jail where ICE rented beds (providing nearly half of that sheriff's income per month). Her parents and siblings had no idea what had happened to her. A week later, while a nurse at the jail was examining her, she told the nurse what had happened and, breaking the rules, the nurse allowed her to call her parents. As part of an interfaith justice organization they called us and we got a lawyer and got her out of the jail. A few months later, she was a citizen. For all anyone might have known, here she was, an "undocumented" immigrant who had, according to her husband and a crooked cop, "broken the law." Why should anyone have compassion for her?

Our organization soon began investigating ICE bed rentals and the Yuba Jail in particular. The conditions were terrible. We worked with ICE and members of Congress to try to make things better.

I'm proud of our sheriff for deciding NOT to cooperate with ICE. Our county has also NEVER rented beds to ICE, despite the profitability of doing so.

Thank you again for taking on the callous nature of that letter and standing up for decency.

Well Olivia and Craig - I am not callous and I am married to a Salvadoran immigrant. My wife never ran into an issue with the law, came here legally and picked a husband, me, who is not abusive. Your stories are selective and in Craig's case quite anecdotal. Why would we have to make up for poor decisions by others? The partner that was mentioned in the original letter was already a criminal for coming here illegally. He then committed a crime that was severe enough to send him for detention and as a result became subject to deportation. While there are likely some abuses by ICE, those seem to pale in the context of the abuses by spouses who are here illegally. We have enough criminal characters in this country already, no need to add to the pile. And yes, who is responsible for poor decisions?

Ms. Murphy, perhaps you could opine about cold and callous acts perpetrated by folks who should not be in America in the first place. Acts perpetrated against law-abiding Americans. There are plenty of folks who agree with Mr. van Ulden. I wonder whether citizens can take the initiative and report jail releases to ICE.