We let ICE kill a U.S. citizen, and drag another from his home. What’s next? | Opinion
As an American, I believe in peaceful protest. Today, we are getting our fill — both peaceful and violent protests.
Take Renee Macklin Good, a 37-year-old mother of three who was shot to death in her car by ICE agent Jonathan Ross in Minneapolis on Jan. 7. It was supposed to be a peaceful protest but turned violent.
Good died senselessly because somebody thought she was using her vehicle as a weapon against ICE at the protest. Minneapolis officials said she was a legal observer at the protest. Trump administration officials, including DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, claimed Good was engaged in “an act of domestic terrorism,” although her actions don’t fit the legal definition of domestic terrorism spelled out in U.S. federal law, legal scholars point out.
Then, last Sunday, people cried out when ICE agents, without a warrant, broke into the home of Chongly “Scott“ Thao, a Hmong immigrant and naturalized U.S. citizen. Thao was taken into custody in sub-freezing weather wearing only his boxer shorts, Crocs and a light blanket draped around his shoulders.
ICE agents said they were looking for two sex offenders. They disregarded the cries of his family telling them he was innocent and was a citizen of this country. The ICE agents didn’t listen. They thought they had their man. Thao was released about an hour later and returned home without an apology.
We hadn’t digested that incident before news broke of a Cuban migrant dying at an immigration detention facility in Texas after guards held him down and he stopped breathing, according to his autopsy report, which classified his death as a homicide, according to news reports. (ICE had said he was attempting suicide and they were trying to save him.)
I understand that our government wants to make our borders safe. I understand wanting to rid the country of any illegal immigrants who are also criminals.
What I don’t understand is the dehumanizing way ICE agents treat people. Whatever happened to being innocent until proven guilty?
I just can’t wrap my mind around the way federal agents pounce on people, people who too often are American citizens. That was the case of an 85-pound woman who was dragged out of her Toyota in a traffic stop in Key Largo in December. A medical professional on her way to work, she was wrestled to the ground, handcuffed and put in the back of an SUV before being released. (The agents confirmed she was a U.S. citizen.)
READ MORE: Body cam footage shows feds threatening U.S. citizen detained in Key Largo
ICE’s prey includes innocent children and teenagers, who are rounded up like herds of cattle and placed in cage-like facilities. It breaks my heart to think that some of these children will never see their parents again.
I was 7 when World II ended. I remember growing up hearing the gruesome stories about the gas chambers and Jews who died in them. As I grew up, I heard my Jewish friends say countless times, “Never again.“
My friends, if we aren’t careful, what happened over 80 years ago to the Jews can happen again today, to any people. If we are not watchful, history will repeat itself.
We are living at a time when simple human kindness seems to be at risk. The dignity of our fellow human beings is being threatened. Not everyone picked up by ICE is a “hardened“ criminal or an illegal immigrant.
Some of the people they have arrested have been living and working peacefully in this country for decades. Their children and grandchildren were born here. And they have contributed to our economy.
I’m just saying ... there must be a better way to do this.
What is happening in this country is that neighbors are now turning against their neighbors. It reminds me of the days during World War II when longtime friends became enemies and spies, turning their Jewish friends over to the Nazis.
Somehow, someway, we as a nation of freedom-loving people must come up with a better way to make our country better. Right now, we are failing fast. And because we are failing, hate and meanness are poking their ugly head up.
Renee Good, a U.S. citizen, should not have died. But because there seems to be no rules for ICE to follow, somebody fired off shots before thinking. From the videos and pictures I have seen of the incident, it did not appear that Good was using her vehicle as a weapon to hurt ICE agents.
Perhaps she was in a hurry to pick up her children and was driving away too fast. I don’t know. Perhaps we will never know. But, to me, her death just seemed wrong. As wrong as detaining a naturalized American citizen, taking him from his home without a warrant.
I know I am just one small voice crying in the wilderness, crying out for our government to take a serious look at the way ICE is operating. But I am not alone.
I want our lawmakers — some of whom are parents and grandparents — to imagine themselves in the place of the people who are being snatched away from their children. I want them to imagine how they would feel if they thought they would never see their children again.
People are protesting throughout America because ICE is using despicable tactics to grab suspected illegal immigrants — and U.S. citizens.
Meanwhile, no matter what faith you happen to be, we can all learn from the peaceful and purposeful walk that the Buddhist monks from the Huong Dao Vipassana Bhavana Center in Fort Worth, Texas, are on.
These men took it upon themselves to set out on a 120-day, 2,300-mile walk to show us what peace looks like. When done, their Walk for Peace will have taken them from Fort Worth to Washington.
Although their voices are silent as they walk, their message is loud and clear — to spread peace, compassion and unity along the way. It’s something America is in dire need of today.
To borrow a phrase from my late mom, “It’s praying time, ya’ll.”
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