Detention center in McAllen, Texas. Photo: Center for Border Protection
Social media and news reports have been flooding in due to the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” immigration policy resulting in children being separated from family members attempting to enter the United States. The Mexican Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray has highlighted the case of a 10-year old girl with Down syndrome being separated from her mom, despite her father, a U.S. citizen, residing just 60 miles from where she was detained. This case illustrates injustice.
There is a building consensus across partisan lines that a “fix” is needed for the current way in which the U.S. government is detaining individuals seeking to enter the country illegally. When these adults are detained with children, the children are separated and taken into the custody of the Department for Health & Human Services (“HHS”). Horrible images hearkening back to the worst of the 20th Century show rows and rows of mats on warehouse floors where children are lying in chain link cages.
Since being reported, partisans on both sides have been quick to speak out. Trump supporters note some of the images actually come from when the Obama administration similarly detained children. Trump critics express fear for the soul of the nation, likening the separation process to Japanese internment and worse historical examples.
But, partisans on all sides say the current process is inhumane and needs to be fixed and fixed fast.
The case of the 10-year old girl with Down syndrome is the latest to demonstrate most clearly the inhumaneness of it all. Her case does so because it validates the truth in the adage that a country is judged by how it takes care of the neediest.
Judging a country by how well it cares for the most well off is absurd and an incredibly low bar if that is the measure of civilization: “ah, like all of history, the kings and wealthiest ate well, lived in the finest of castles and hotel suites, and had the best of everything.” This is hardly the measure for how to judge any society.
Instead, the adage is true that countries are judged by how they care for the neediest: are they cast off into slums, dying premature deaths when treatments are available but simply not provided because those in power view those least well-off as not worth caring for? Are there standards set that are to apply to all, but only actually apply to those with access, abilities, or to certain ethnicities, races, or religions?
This is why the case of the 10-year old girl with Down syndrome demonstrates the injustice of the current policy: she represents the neediest of the children who will undoubtedly suffer trauma from what must be a terrifying, inexplicable rending of her away from her mother, her primary caregiver, and being kept in a literal cage. Her case shows why a nation as great as the United States is needs to fix its policy and provide a more humane process for dealing with families attempting to cross the border.
But, the use of this 10-year old girl with Down syndrome by partisans further demonstrates injustice.
Were this 10-year old girl with Down syndrome to ultimately gain entry into the United States, would these same critics be highlighting the disparate treatment she would receive in public education, as most children with special needs still do? Federal and state laws set the standard that children are to have free, appropriate public education provided in the least restrictive environment. They are to be provided accommodations to give them access to the general curriculum. The exception should be segregation versus the norm of inclusion. But, that is not what she would likely receive if enrolled in most school systems in the United States.
As she grew up and entered the work force, there are federal programs to provide community-based, occupational training and opportunities. But these programs are woefully underfunded and participating employers are at an even lower rate. This results in the expression of standards that all should be included in the community and have the opportunity for meaningful, gainful employment but the unjust reality being that most often individuals with disabilities are unemployed for most of their adult lives.
And, had her mother entered 10 years ago, pregnant with this girl with Down syndrome, the standard expressed is that, out of respect for the mother’s autonomy, she should be offered prenatal testing along with genetic counseling and up-to-date, balanced information about Down syndrome and contact with her local parent support organization in order for the mom to make an informed decision about whether to continue her pregnancy. But, as detailed in multiple posts on this blog this is so far from reality as to be a fantasy, with expectant mothers too often improperly counseled about prenatal testing and about Down syndrome and not receiving the supportive resources.
To make this injustice worse, the decisions made that would treat this young girl (and do treat young boys and girls with Down syndrome) differently, and worse, than their peers are driven oftentimes by the simple dollar.
- A new football stadium for the high school is funded and given priority over additional training for teachers on inclusive teaching techniques;
- A budgetary decision is made that it is cheaper to simply pay SSI disability and possibly unemployment benefits because those cost less than paying a job coach’s salary to train an individual to have a fulfilling occupation; and,
- State bureaucrats rely on faulty, biased, incomplete cost-effectiveness studies to make the crass, eugenic decision that it ends up being cheaper to pay millions for prenatal tests for women who are not carrying a child with Down syndrome because “catching” that one pregnancy, like of this girl with Down syndrome, will cost the public healthcare system less by avoiding caring for her if she were to be born.
So, the case of the 10-year old girl with Down syndrome demonstrates the injustice of the current child separation-immigration policy. But, if you’re only going to exploit the case of the 10-year old girl with Down syndrome to score political points, then you’re not really concerned about justice for those in our society who are the neediest. Instead, hopefully the case of the 10-year old girl with Down syndrome will go on to result in calls for fixes to the injustice of how public programs promise equality, but, in practice, preserve segregation, discrimination, and elimination.
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