Animals or Humans
Some would say that if you were born in the United States that you won the birth lottery because, through no action of your own, you were born under a government meant to help protect your basic human rights.
Most of the 342 million people currently living in the U.S. are here because their parents, grandparents, great or great-great or great-great-great grandparents immigrated (many as undocumented immigrants) to the country from Europe, Africa, India, Asia, the Middle East, Central and South America, etc. People in the U.S. who aren’t of immigrant descendants have either descended from Indigenous peoples that were native to the land, or they are first-generation or current immigrants (3% of which currently do not have official documentation).
In July of 1776, the first-generation, newly immigrated people of this country formed the United Colonies to fight for independence from tyrannical rule under the British crown and write a Declaration of Independence that said, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of happiness.”
Later, the Constitution was ratified to protect equal rights and then 100 years later, the Statue of Liberty was given to the USA by France to commemorate this countries triumph over both tyranny and slavery. A plaque on the statue sums up what the USA was built upon, “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free . . . “.
One of the privileges in the Constitution includes the right to due process, Habeas Corpus, which means that if you are charged with a crime, you have a right to a hearing in court to determine if your detention or imprisonment is lawful because “no state can deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny equal protection of the laws”.
Due process is a privilege for all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof. These words have been further clarified by the Supreme court to mean “Every person born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, becomes at once a citizen of the United States, and needs no naturalization”.
Courts have held that Habeus Corpus also applies to non-U.S. citizens who are detained within the U.S. Habeus Corpus cannot be suspended, unless in wartime or other cases of emergent National Security. The last time Habeus Corpus was suspended in the U.S. was to intern Japanese Americans after the bombing of Pearl Harbour.
In March of 2025, President Trump invoked the Alien Enemies Act, calling the Venezuelan gang of Tren de Aragua (formed in a Venezuelan prison) a terrorist organization attempting to invade the USA. According to this administration, this invocation allows suspension of Habeus Corpus for people in the U.S. that are from Venezuela, ages 14 and older, that are (somehow known) gang members of Tren de Aragua.
The courts have not found merit under the constitution for this suspension of due process. And the administration’s own intelligence officials reported that the Venezuelan government was not directing an invasion of U.S. soil (the authors of this report were fired by Tulsi Gabbard, director of national intelligence).
While it is true that Venezuelan gang members have crossed the border into the USA, actual numbers are much lower than the president cites. Overexaggerating and misrepresenting facts is routine in the current administration. President Trump has also exaggerated Venezuela’s decline in violent crime to prove to his believers that the Venezuelan government is sending gang members to the USA, contrary to factual information widely available.
Though lying in order to create hate, separation and suffering (primarily affecting people of color) would seem at odds with Trump’s MAGA base’s Christian ideals, it thus far appears to be overlooked by millions of people.
Habeus Corpus (Due Process) Violations
In keeping with feigned or real ignorance, President Trump and his cabinet exhibit confusion as to what Habeus Corpus is. For example, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem says it is “a constitutional right that the president has to be able to remove people from this country and suspend their rights.” President Trump, in an interview on NBC asked, “Do you get due process when you’re here illegally?" DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin denies need for Habeus Corpus as she knows even if these people haven’t committed crimes, they are still terrorists. When the Supreme Court ruled that removal notice was required sufficient to file petitions in certain charged cases, Stephen Miller, the deputy chief of staff, complained "these radical, rogue judges” are at war with the executive branch (an odd statement given the executive and judicial branch both take an oath to support and defend the constitution).
President Trump takes his exaggerations and falsities to the media for traction, condemning unauthorized immigrants as “Illegal monsters and killers” and “snakes that bite” who are coming “from jails and mental institutions” to “take government benefits and steal your jobs” and “poison our country” in “the largest invasion in the history of our country.”
According to the Trump administration, hearings to determine if individuals are animals instead of humans cannot be allowed if we are to save our country from a hostile takeover. This rhetoric has been used before to elevate gross abuses of power and mass suffering of humanity.
Under the Trump administration, many people have been denied their right to Habeus Corpus. Kilmar Abrego Garcia was living and working as a construction worker in Maryland, married to a U.S. citizen with three U.S. citizen children. He also had a US court order that prevented him from being deported to El Salvador, yet he was deported to CECOT in El Salvador and remains there, even though an ICE official admitted in a court filing that sending him to CECOT was an “administrative error” (this official was also fired by DHS).
Documents used by DHS to wrongfully deport Garcia to El Salvador, the only country the US courts said he couldn’t be deported to due to “a risk of harm (that) shocks the conscience”, included an intake form filled out by a detective that was dismissed by the PGPD for misconduct in 2022. The Trump administration has painted him as a monster that beats women based upon a restraining order his wife filed in 2021 but never pursued because in her words, the action was “out of caution after a disagreement due to her previous experience surviving domestic violence”. Trump has also asked El Salvador’s president to make room for U.S. citizens in CECOT.
If domestic disputes that didn’t result in charges are adequate rationale to send men to an El Salvador terrorist prison, CECOT could never become large enough to house men over the age of 14 years old from anywhere Hometown USA that would meet that criteria.
Another man sent to CECOT is a gay Venezuelan make-up artist seeking asylum in the US for protection from anti-LGBTQ+ violence in Venezuela, Andry Hernández Romero. Romero followed legal procedures to request refuge in the U.S. and showed up for his legal process CBP One appointment on August 29, 2024, when he was detained over his tattoos which sparked a lengthy investigation into links to Tren De Aragua. Though ICE has used tattoos to assess points against people for gang affiliation, experts on the gang have stated unequivocally that the tattoo system of identification is unreliable (and 35% of Hispanic men have tattoos).
During Romero’s detention, family members provided documentation that previous President Biden’s administration had requested, Romero passed the credible fear test, and Romero was told by ICE authorities that his case was resulting favorably. However, the Trump administration sent him to CECOT. Congress and advocates for Romero have asked DHS for proof of life as being in CECOT is a "death sentence" for Andry, who at his in-processing at CECOT was pictured and heard by reporters “praying and calling out, literally crying for his mother”.
Another man sent to CECOT by the Trump administration is Maikol Gabriel López Lizano, whose crime is riding his bike on a sidewalk while drinking a can of beer. It is unclear what, if any legal resident status Lizano had in the U.S., but if he was in the U.S. illegally, he would have been deported to his home country, not to the CECOT terrorist prison. However, the Trump administration insists that he is also a monster without offering any evidence.
According to many reliable sources within the U.S. and outside of the U.S., including ProPublica, at least 50 Venezuelan men who were sent to a notorious Salvadoran prison by the Trump administration had immigrated to the U.S. legally and over 130 of the 238 men had no criminal record. If a human being enters the USA for a better life and is found to not have legal status and has not been convicted of violent crimes, that person could be deported. But the current administration instead sent humans just like this to a prison for terrorists. On the contrary however, President Trump has welcomed Sinaloa cartel members to enter the USA and pardoned violent criminals (including murder and hundreds with convictions of using a weapon against police officers) to release them from jail into the general U.S. population.
No person of integrity can defend sending men who are not proven to be violent criminals to a terrorist prison without family contact or access to lawyers or clergy, let alone citizens of the United States guided by our founding father’s constitution written to protect people from these very atrocities. So contrary to White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson, more American people do NOT support the president’s immigration agenda than do.
This administration has condemned immigrants primarily because they were born in a certain country through no choice of their own. While the men mentioned here are likely being tortured to death for being born in Venezuela, this atrocity is heavy on the minds of many Americans of integrity and will forever be remembered as an obvious demonstration of failed humanity and justice by those that made it happen and those that looked the other way.
Who are the Foreigners in the U.S.?
President Donald Trump’s campaign promises included mass deportations of what Trump cited as 21 million foreigners “that came into our country (under the Biden administration) invading our communities . . . and destroying our country”. President Trump’s exaggerations also prove false by several million. However, his lies about easily identifiable facts are nothing new. In fact, there is far more evidence of Donald Trump’s lies than there is evidence of his integrity.
Trump also told his voters that he would expedite normal procedures for deportations of “criminals”. White House press secretary Leavitt further defined the term criminal as immigrants who are in the country illegally. However, being in the country without valid documents is a civil violation, not a criminal one, and most of the people arrested, detained (many for months) and then deported (often separating the mixed legal status of 4.5 million U.S. families) have not been convicted of a crime.
The number of foreign-born people in the U.S. was 47.8 million in 2023 (14.3% of the population), a number made possible primarily Congress’s actions regarding immigration laws in 1965. A majority of immigrants (77%) have legal documentation to the be in the U.S.
As of 2022, almost half of the foreign-born people in the U.S. were naturalized citizens, almost a quarter were lawful permanent residents, 4% were here on temporary visas, and 23% were unauthorized immigrants (the majority of which are performing farming, construction and restaurant work). Many reports show that out of the 11 million foreign-born people without legal documentation in the U.S., those that commit actual criminal crimes is a very small percentage.
The Biden administration (2021-2024) used programs for immigration in attempts to create more efficient and reliable processes to evaluate entrance permission for those eligible (these are what Trump refers to as “open borders”. Some of these programs and their results are:
CBP One, a phone app that allowed migrants to stay in their country of origin to provide screening documentation that once achieved made eligible people capable of making custom’s appointments in the U.S. (a reported 936,500 people).
Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for eligible Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans with financial sponsors in the U.S. (a reported 531,690 people).
Refugee programs for Afghans (a reported 11,000 people) who helped the U.S. in Iraq.
Refugee programs for Ukrainians (a reported 271.000 people) sponsored by U.S. citizens after Russia's invasion.
Other lawful pathways or temporary visa programs previously approved by congress and in use in the USA for approximately 20 years or longer are:
H1B, used by U.S. companies to hire foreign employees to do highly specialized work. H1B’s caps are 85,000 total visas per year and each visa is typically for 3 years. Employers of H1B employees are found here.
H2A, used by U.S. companies to hire temporary/seasonal agricultural workers. H2A’s caps varies depending upon need (there were 310,000 in 2023) and each visa is typically up to 1 year or to a maximum of 3 years. Employers of H2A in the U.S. are found here.
H2B, used by U.S. companies to hire non-agricultural seasonal workers. H2B’s caps are 66,000 people per year and each visa is a on a one-time, seasonal, peakload or intermittent basis. Employers of H2B are found here.
Green Card, lawful permanent residents (LPR) can stay in the U.S. indefinitely (but not vote in elections). Deportation of green card holders requires a notice to appear on charges and for the U.S. government to prove through "clear and convincing evidence" that the person can be deported. In 2024, there were 12.8 million LPRs in the U.S. The number of new applications per year has been stable since 2015 except for a decrease at the start of the Covid pandemic.
U.S. citizenship - LPRs can apply for citizenship after living in the U.S. as an LPR for 5 years (an expeditated 3-year process is possible due to marriage or other factors). After paying for the application, meeting eligibility criteria, and then passing a criminal record search and medical exam), the legal pathway for U.S. citizenship typically takes about 10 years and costs an immigrant about $5000. Immigrants who have naturalized to U.S. citizens cannot be deported unless they are de-naturalized.
In addition to being “monsters” and “animals”, Trump also claims immigrants drain the U.S. welfare system. While undocumented children receive public education and all undocumented people can receive emergent medical services from hospitals that offer Medicare (part of both of which are federally funded), many undocumented people pay state and federal taxes via an ITIN (individual taxpayer ID). Other federal welfare benefits are available to undocumented people, such as WIC for baby formula or child tax credits, however many don’t apply for these for fear of being targeted for deportation. And although undocumented people pay state and local taxes, they cannot receive Social Security benefits.
Misconceptions regarding undocumented people receiving welfare may arise from state programs wherein certain states offer additional welfare benefits for immigrants such as Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) like state-funded Medicaid, temporary housing, and food nutrition assistance. Many states that offer such benefits do so to further improve their economy and communities, not to degrade them.
Illegal immigrants (23% of the immigrant population) come to the U.S. typically to earn a better quality of life. They take on physically challenging jobs with low pay that many U.S. citizens shun (such as low wage earner laborers in meat production, cleaning, construction and renovation, and agriculture). These undocumented workers make up 4.6% of the U.S. workforce and improve life for U.S. citizens. And a study by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, found that “undocumented immigrants paid nearly $100 billion in 2022 in federal, state and local taxes” and “an immigrant who arrive(s) in the US at age 25 . . . will pay net $200,000 more in taxes than what she will receive in government benefits”. So, the truth is that undocumented workers typically consume less in government welfare than they pay for it.
Open Season on Hard-Working Humans
Strengthening U.S. borders, implementing more efficient legal entrances and reducing asylum seeker caps can better fortify the U.S. border, so President Biden introduced a bipartisan border security bill to reduce the number of migrants eligible for border asylum and increase funds for Customs and Border Protection officials, asylum officers, immigration judges and scanning technology at the border. However, presidential candidate “Trump effectively killed the proposal by labeling it "meaningless" and a "gift" for Biden's reelection chances”.
Candidate Donald Trump then vowed to carry out “the largest mass deportation in U.S. history” and said the administration would target those with criminal records to cleanse the country of murderers allowed in by VP Kamala Harris. While there were indeed 13,099 noncitizens (including green-card holders) convicted of murder as of July 2024 not being detained by DHS, most came into the U.S. prior to 2021, and many were incarcerated in prisons. In fact, according to the Cato Institute, the Biden administration “removed a higher percentage of arrested border crossers in its first two years than the Trump DHS did over its last two years. Moreover, migrants were more likely to be released after a border arrest under President Trump than under President Biden.”
In fact, a partial explanation for Trump receiving more votes from Latino voters in the 2024 election than in the 2016 or 2020 election is that many did not take him seriously on a harsh immigration agenda due to his words not meeting actions in the past. One Latino said, “Everyone knows he is just talk, more people got into the U.S. under Trump because he is a businessman who needs migrant work to help the economy”.
President Trump in his 2nd term has shut down the CBP One app and cancelled all existing CBP appointments, shut down the Afghan refugee program and stranded many Afghan refugees in dangerous situations, suspended asylum (for those with well-founded fear of persecution), terminated previously approved asylum travel to the U.S., and stripped humanitarian parole for more than 500,000 migrants in the U.S. from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela. However, in a bizarre twist, President Trump initiated an immigrant program to allow thousands of Afrikaners (white skinned only) into the U.S.
Even given all the current immigration policies have done to stain what the USA stands for, Trump is still losing on his 2024 campaign promises according to TRAC, “President Trump’s removal record is growing worse with time rather than improving”, then other tactics must be employed so he can please his voters. So, now it appears this administration’s answer to this problem is sending ICE officers and other helpers out to use extreme measures to try to meet his campaign promise of deporting more people than ever in history.
An immigration attorney Charles Kuck says, “They are having to go to workplaces and courthouses where immigrants are at legally . . . to arrest easy cases (those with any past charges including minor offenses occurring many years ago) . . . to help ICE meet its quotas”. This tactic includes green card holders if they’ve committed a crime (whether adjudicated or not), or those that with pending green card status.
One person Kuck used as an example is a man that was brought to the U.S. as a 2-year-old who, 30 years later, is a well-known an upstanding member of his community and local barber, who is now in detention facing deportation. This man’s crime - burglary at age 16 for which he is was pardoned by the state of Georgia.
Another recent detention is Marcelo Gomes, an honors high school student who was on his way to volleyball practice and had no criminal record. Marcelo was brought to the U.S. legally on a student visa when he was 5 years old, but at some point, his legal status had lapsed. Now this 18-year-old is in an ICE detention with adult men without contact with his family. “ICE detainee locator website lists Gomes da Silva as being in custody but does not list where he is being held”. Unless the courts intervene successfully, Marcelo will be deported - maybe to Brazil, where he was born, but that cannot be certain with this administration.
Another high school student, originally from Venezuela, called Dylan, arrived for his regularly scheduled immigration appointment and was arrested at the courthouse. ICE simply cited that his arrest is due to President Trump’s recent revocation of humanitarian parole. Dylan came into the U.S. legally under the 2024 humanitarian parole program, but he has now been in detention for weeks without knowing what will come of his future.
Elsy Noemi Berrios is another human in danger of being erased in this administration’s efforts. Elsy, from El Salvador, illegally crossed the Mexican-U.S. border in January 2017 but was then released from custody pending immigration proceedings. When Elsy’s removal proceedings were dismissed, she applied for asylum and received a work authorization (an authorization that was current at the time of her recent ICE arrest in Maryland in March of 2024). Elsy has no criminal history, but she is accused of being a member of MS-13 without any evidence of that provided to her, the public or her attorney. “She does everything right,” her daughter said, “She is a good mom because she raised me and my other three siblings by herself”.
Another woman currently in ICE detention is Carol Mayorgas, a 45-year-old soccer mom with 3 U.S. citizen children (ages 7, 12 and 14) from a small town in Missouri where she is called as a “model citizen” by her community. Carol was arrested at a scheduled appointment to renew her employment authorization document (valid through January 2026). Over the years, Carol had attended regular authorization appointments as required, but at her appointment in April, she was placed in shackles and sent to ICE detention where she remains pending deportation. Carol’s crime? . . . coming from Hong Kong 20 years ago on a visa, unsuccessfully seeking asylum and then dutifully showing up for legal immigration status appointments.
There are more stories, many more stories that are beyond a reasonable person’s comprehension, and many of them involve young children. And the preceding examples do not even include numerous other cases of ICE detention endured by U.S. citizens and legal Green Card holders with no criminal offenses. For example,
What is currently unfolding and devastating good people, their children and their communities as President Trump attempts to meet his campaign promises is shocking. This Open Season on humans not only hurts the conscious of people of integrity of this country, it also will hurt our economy for years to come and likely puts someone we all know at risk of cruelty and/or danger.
A Better Future
Most people agree, regardless of political affiliation, that people convicted in a court of law of a violent crime who have yet to pay their restitution should be in jail and/or deported if they are immigrants without legal status in the U.S. Most people also agree that strong, but humane, immigration and border enforcement policies positively impact the U.S. and everyone with integrity involved.
In order to actually carry on the dream of our ancestors, we must stop political propaganda lies that will never make the United States a better country. After facts are valued more than lies, we the people can prioritize a bipartisan plan to support our nation’s security, constitutional integrity and prosperity.
We have decades of data, important lessons learned, and old and/or new potential immigration programs to analyze that would make it impossible to NOT succeed.
But erasing humans can never be acceptable in this country. We have to stop it.
