Former Manhattan DA Robert Morganthau writes in the New York Times:
Our restrictive immigration laws are bad enough — separating families, sending refugees like Haitians back to devastated countries, denying jobs to foreign students — but how they are administered is even worse. Some immigrants languish in privately operated detention facilities for months, denied any civil rights, until they are deported. Immigration agents profile people improperly, based on their apparent race or religion, detaining them at will.
In 2006, complaining about the immigration raids at the Swift Company in Greeley, CO, I wrote: :
These employees are hard-working residents of our communities. Social security, federal, state and local income and unemployment taxes are withheld from their paychecks, whether they are in this country with or without proper documentation.
Many of them have children who were born in this country. These children are United States citizens with the same rights and privileges as all of our children.
Do we need immigration reform? Yes, but not the kind our politicians suggest. We need to:
- Provide the opportunity for undocumented immigrants to legalize their status
- Eliminate criminal sanctions for immigration violations
- Expand avenues for legal immigration and support family reunification
- Strengthen labor protections and their enforcement for all workers, both native and foreign born
- End border and immigration enforcement abuses.
How is it acceptable for a government to to round people up on buses, separate them from their children and take them to an undisclosed location? Immigrants to the U.S., even the documented, should be treated with respect and basic human rights.
Here's a view from the live-cam:
After today's 125th anniversary celebration, the Statue of Liberty will close for remodeling for up to a year. The park will remain open to visitors.
In 1887, Emma Lazarus died at age 38 from Hodgkin's disease. She never knew her poem would appear on the Statue of Liberty.