Child abuse or child maltreatment is physical, sexual, and/or psychological maltreatment or neglect of a child or children, especially by a parent or a caregiver. Child abuse may include any act or failure to act by a parent or a caregiver that results in actual or potential harm to a child... (Wikipedia).
The following is an excerpt from the 7/3/2019 airing of the Thom Hartmann Program. Thom and former Republican congressman Bob Ney (in his capacity as a correspondent for Talk Media News) discuss the tRump administration concentration camps that are holding (and abusing) Christian refugees from South of the border.
Thom Hartmann: Let's check in with Talk Media News ... on the line with us is Bob Ney, the author of Sideswiped, former congressman from Ohio. Bob, what's going on in the world?
Bob Ney: Good afternoon Thom. Well, we're looking at the federal judge who has blocked the Trump Administration policy denying bond hearings. That's the federal judge in Seattle.
Thom Hartmann: This is bond hearings for refugees on the southern border.
Bob Ney: Yes, sir. For the refugees on the southern border. He [the judge] blocked the policy. This came up because Attorney General William Barr, in April, issued that order, which would prevent immigration judges from granting bail to asylum seakers. And that was the vow by president Trump to end "catch and release". In the sense that they'd be released [into the United States] and later come back for their hearing.
Thom Hartmann: Right. And over 96 or 97 percent of these folks come back for their hearings. Which Trump and the Republicans were lying through their teeth about. Saying these people would just go away and never come back. And that's absolutely not true. They want to have their hearing. They believe they have a case.
Bob Ney: Yes. They do come back. Attorney General Barr (in April) issued this order because - you know how word gets back through communities - and, if people thought they'd have to sit in a detention camp for a year or two - then the Trump Administration hoped they wouldn't come in the first place.
That was the objective. The judge said this is unconstitutional. This will, most likely, continue to the Supreme Court.
Thom Hartmann: Does that mean that, in the meantime, refugees who are in these facilities can have bail posted for them and they can get out?
Bob Ney: They should be able to. Except the Trump Administration may file an emergency appeal. That I don't know. You asked the right question. The Attorney General can, however, make another rule. Not the same rule, but some other rule that they could devise to legally to [keep refugees in detention].
Thom Hartmann: In the meantime we're continuing to pay $750 prt child per day to private companies to keep child [and adult] refugees in, essentially, dog kennels.
Bob Ney: Exactly. Just because the Administration has lost temporarily doesn't mean it's over with. New rules can be put on immediately.
Thom Hartmann: And, if they deny them bail, then these for-profit corporations continue to get their $750 per person per day fee. So they've got to be lobbying the Trump Administration to say, don't give them bail. You guys keep paying us.
It's an abomination. This should not be happening in the United States of America.
Bob Ney: It is.
[End Thom Hartmann Program 7/3/2019 Excerpt]
So, here we have a former republican congressperson AGREEING that holding refugees (and their children) in concentration camps in deplorable conditions is "an abomination". An assessment that we should all agree with. All of us except hate-filled trumpers, of course. That the tRump administration is abusing children in an effort curtail illegal immigration should be a prosecutable crime, IMO.
For the record, I do not believe in "open borders". But these are people fleeing poverty, oppressive governments, crime and drought. They should be treated with compassion and not cruelty. But cruelty is the point. The administration thinks that by CREATING a crisis on the border they can blackmail the Democratically-controlled House into funding the Orange Turd's idiotic wall. It's despicable, but it's (at least partially) working.
I refer to the funding bill recently passed by the House. Money that the tRump administration most assuredly will NOT use to improve conditions in it's concentration camps. Because (like I said) cruelty is the point. And really, $750 per person per day isn't enough? Yikes! Yet trumpers defend this obvious corruption. As they defend ALL the tRump administration corruption. How ridiculous.
What follows is a 2nd excerpt from the 7/3/2019 airing of the THP in which Thom shares his thoughts on the tRump administration's treatment of refugee children.
Thom Hartmann: The president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, Doctor Sarah Goza - and what she had to say is just devastating. Quote, "when they opened the door, the first thing that hit us was a smell. It was the smell of sweat, urine and feces. And I heard crinkling to my left, and I looked over there and there was a sea of silver. There were young children in there. Unaccompanied boys. And they had no expressions on their faces. It was a room full of silent children. There was no laughing, there was no joking. There was no talking. All I could hear was the rustling of the silver Mylar blankets. ... the silence was hard to watch. Hard to see".
We have broken these children. The way you break a prisoner of war. Kids who don't laugh? Kids who don't talk?
Footnote
Poltifact reports that "a 2000 U.S. government-commissioned study that found an 83 percent rate of compliance with court proceedings among asylum seekers who were found to have a credible fear in the expedited removal process. It also showed an 84 percent compliance rate among asylees under minimal supervision, and 78 percent among those who were unsupervised". A program under the Obama Administration program [ended by tRump], the Family Case Management Program, had 630 enrolled families and a "100 percent attendance record at court hearings".
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