Look, I love AOC, but what exactly is the ideal plan for unaccompanied kids? There is no good option, it’s tragic and depressing and awful no matter what.
I don’t know. How about some place with schools and Rec programs and a guardian ad litem(?) and maybe I don’t know a registry so that family members in the US could take them in easily?
This.
My wife and I have no interest in having a kid. Even we would host one for an extra $50k per year.
The idea that we need these goddamn ICE camps is absurd.
Pretty sure that’s called “Free Market Babyee!”
I think you mean Great and Glorious Market.
I DGAF about Tanden but Rob Portman is a sad excuse for a human.
https://twitter.com/sahilkapur/status/1364375507094147073?s=21
And here we are, still conflating two things. DHS and HHS are two separate cabinet-level agencies. I don’t know WHY caring for immigrant children is handled by separate agencies, they should all be under HHS, imho, but they are.
ICE (DHS) runs penitentiary camps. They separate families as a “punishment” for crossing the border, which is, of course, cruel and terrible bullshit. This is not the same as kids who cross by themselves (which is also cruel and terrible, but the causes are much higher up the chain than out-of-control border agents). The facility in the article is an HHS facility.
Can we at least discuss this with nuance? I know it’s emotional and we’re angry, but there are two separate, albeit related, things going on here. Maybe I’m too practical, but while being angry feels good and is addicting, what we need is real solutions. Despite the anger, these solutions might actually have to include facilities where multiple unaccompanied minors might need to live for a few months. So we move to make them transparent and the people who run them accountable for their actions.
I still say call your reps/senators/HHS and demand complete transparency and accountability. ICE is probably a lost cause, but DHS might listen, who knows.
Shutting down this HHS facility does nothing to clean up the backlog of these kids’ cases. Only rewriting our immigration laws and processes can do that, so until that happens, HHS is still going to be required to run these background checks and handle these cases, which takes time, which means the kids have to go somewhere for a a few weeks. Foster families are ideal, but like someone pointed out, there are already a shortage of those. Rerouting $$ to pay folks to foster them will also probably take legislative action (read: time).
Obviously the end goal is to close all of these down for good. But unilateral withdrawal has its own share of issues that must be addressed, as well. Hate me all you want for saying so, but I guess I’m just fulfilling my role as resident forum realist here.
For comparison purposes:
The state of California pays foster parents an average of $1000 to $2,609 per month to help with the expenses from taking care of the child. It is one of the highest-paying states in the nation in this regard. This figure is for each child you take into your home.
Would we need t stand up a federal foster system to handle this? I think part of the issue is that foster systems now are state-level, right?
which is why the entire immigration process needs rewriting.
Until that happens, the current laws say that the family waiting for these kids have to undergo background checks, etc.
So until the law is changed, what is your solution?
I wish I could just sit back and laugh at Sinema losing her seat due to voter suppression she refused to stop. What an imbecile. This is maskless Herman Cain level idiocy.
maybe i’m dense, but are you suggesting the social workers and others on staff at this HHS facility just…not do their jobs? break the law?
Can we get realistic potential solutions, please?
It may work for a while, until news breaks of a kid released early to their sponsor who turned out to be a pedophile or abuser, then things will be even worse than they are now.
It’s legit insane to be farming out these accommodations to the private sector. This should not be a for profit enterprise.
A lot of the fear of giving them to their family is centred around false child trafficking hysteria.
Can we get realistic potential solutions, please?
I’m curious how you classify realistic vs unrealistic solutions. Legitimately…no gotcha…trying to understand your perspective. IYO, is changing the the bad laws year(s) from now realistic? But simply not enforcing the bad laws right now is unrealistic?
It may work for a while, until news breaks of a kid released early to their sponsor who turned out to be a pedophile or abuser, then things will be even worse than they are now.
All of the kids in custody are undergoing various levels of trauma and abuse. So, I’m not sure how the possibility of a kid experiencing those things if released is a point against releasing them all. Hypothetically, if right now there are 100 kids locked up experiencing trauma and abuse. We release them all and 1 of them ends up experiencing abuse, how is that even worse than now?
Children separated at the border will become the next generation’s domestic terrorists in America.
It’s legit insane to be farming out these accommodations to the private sector. This should not be a for profit enterprise.
The search continues for a problem facing society that is best solved by free market capitalism rather than exacerbated by it.
We disagree on that point but can agree on it in relation to these kids jails.
She probably is. Her Twitter handlers are probably well aware there’s a thread solely for her.