In 1883, Emma Lazarus wrote the sonnet “The New Colossus” to raise money for the construction of a pedestal for the Statue of Liberty. In it she wrote:
“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
“The New Colossus” reinvented the Statue of Liberty’s purpose, turning Liberty into a welcoming mother, a symbol of hope to the outcasts and downtrodden of the world. In 2019, during the Trump administration, Ken Cuccinelli, who Trump appointed as acting director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, revised this section of the poem in support of the administration’s “public charge rule” to reject applicants for visas or green cards on the basis of income and education. Cuccinelli added the caveat:
“Give me your tired and your poor
who can stand on their own two feet,
and who will not become a public charge.”
He later suggested that the “huddled masses” were European, and downplayed the poem as it was “not actually part of the original Statue of Liberty.” Cuccinelli’s remark prompted criticism. The Trump administration rule was later blocked by a federal appeals court.
If you are not an indigenous person, you are a descendant of an immigrant. Your ancestors came to the United States seeking a better life and the American Dream. Throughout US history, immigration has changed; sometimes for good and sometimes not. One thing that has not changed is the reason why people leave their homes, friends, and families to come to the United States: to find a better life. The Republican Party and their presidential candidate have repeatedly said that illegal immigrants are criminals. This is the idea that prompted family separation during the Trump administration. Over 5,000 children were separated from their parents with no records that would enable parents and children to be reunited. For a year and a half, Trump administration officials denied that family separation even existed. Then they said separation wasn’t the goal. It was just an unfortunate result of prosecuting parents who crossed the border illegally. Even crossing at legal checkpoints resulted in family separation in many cases.
While it is forbidden to cross the border illegally, don’t we as a nation founded on immigration at least owe it to the person who is seeking a better life to be treated like a fellow human first rather than a criminal? The time it takes to process a visa application can vary widely, from under a month to almost five years. The cost to immigrate to the U.S. can also vary, ranging from $1,200 to $8,000, depending on the immigration program. Desperate people do desperate things – like trying to cross the border illegally. Without sensible Immigration Reform, more people running from horrible things will try to cross the border. Recently the Senate attempted to pass a bipartisan border bill to start this reform. It was killed by Senate Republicans seemingly in a show of support for Trump.
Trump has repeatedly talked falsely about the spike in violent crime caused by immigrants. Trump says Biden’s policies are overly permissive and has branded crimes committed by immigrants in the country illegally as “Biden migrant crime.” One of the 20 pledges in Agenda 47 is “Stop the migrant crime epidemic, demolish the foreign drug cartels, crush gang violence, and lock up violent offenders.” This rhetoric is used to further divide the country and to incite fear.
A range of studies by academics and think tanks have shown that immigrants do not commit crimes at a higher rate than native-born Americans. A more limited universe of studies specifically examines criminality among immigrants in the U.S. illegally but also finds that they do not commit crimes at a higher rate. There is no factual evidence of a migrant crime wave (fun fact: they don’t eat cats, or dogs, either).
When it comes to immigration and the people who are trying to get into the United States, Trump once again is relying on fear mongering and misinformation to cover the lack of ideas for policy, reforms, or legislation that could actually fix the issues on hand. Kamala Harris has a track record of helping immigration and protecting our Nation at the same time. The choice is clear.
