We were promised shock and awe on January 20. We are now on our southern border and the situation down here is not only shocking and awful, but it is heartbreaking. The women and children in the shelters where we volunteer as teachers in northern Mexico are left with no hope of reuniting with their family or getting their kids to a better place. They can’t return to their homes that they fled, and it is difficult to find work in a border town that is now overwhelmed with more desperate deportees, many whom left voluntarily for fear of being separated from their family. Even those who have waited 10 months to finally be scheduled for an appointment to enter the United States legally were told yesterday that their appointments are canceled … indefinitely. These are mostly families from Haiti, Cuba, and Venezuela. The NGOs here (both American and Mexican) are scurrying to heal the deep wounds, but there are not nearly enough bandages nor avenues of hope.
Could the next act of shock and awe include dismantling our revered Statue of Liberty who promises “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free”?
Linda de Kort
Kalispell