After reading the news, you have to wonder what is really going on in Texas. The big news, obviously, is that some 57,000 immigrants have crossed the Rio Grande since last fall. Now the question is what to do with the children, some unaccompanies, who now are in the hands of our government.
Governor Rick Perry said he is going to stop crime and protect the children from the squalor that they are facing here. In his political rhetoric, he is sending 1,000 members of the Texas National Guard to the border. Since the National Guard troops do not have the authority to arrest or detain anyone, the question is what are they going to do?
When national television correspondent Bret Hume asked him exactly that, his answer? They would be “visual,” said Perry. While being “visual,” the cost to the taxpayers of Texas is forecast to be about $12 million dollars a month. According to Perry, he is “hoping the Federal government will reimburse Texas for the expenditure.”
But what’s he doing about the “squalor,” as he calls it. Perry is doing nothing to help the Federal government agents alleviate the housing conditions for the children. He has not put any pressure on the Texas congressional delegation to pass legislation that President Obama has requested. Those funds would help fund housing and also speed the judicial process that is guaranteed by a law passed in 2008.
What, in essence, the Governor is doing is playing politics with the lives of children who have made a very dangerous journey to the U.S. While the Governor and other Republicans say the President’s “amnesty” is causing the problem, nothing in the executive order Obama issued would allow these children amnesty.
At the same time we send children back to Central American countries, we allow Cuban children and adults sanctuary as soon as they touch American soil. No one is sending troops to the border between the United States and Canada, even though some of the terrorists of 9/11 came through Canada, not Mexico.
It seems Republicans are using a crisis on the border to thwart an attempt by the President to solve, or attempt to solve, the problem. President Obama is following the law as passed, yet Republicans are accusing him of granting amnesty. It is time that Congress quit playing politics and solve a humanitarian problem.
What do the Republicans want done with the children? Are they willing to provide some protection for the children in their native country? Are we willing to send children back to the possibility of torture in order to get money from relatives? Are we willing to make young girls sex slaves? We need answers, not political verbiage.
Are Texans willing to pay $12 million a month for “visuals”? Perhaps it would be better if we used that money for humanitarian purposes and not for the advancement of a politician.
Jack Linden is a retired history professor and a local volunteer.
jlinden@satx.rr.com
