So for anyone who thinks the claims of child trafficking with kids separated from their families at the border are melodramatic and baseless, here’s some stuff you should look at.
For an example, let’s take a look at one of the places a number of these children were sent to: Bethany Christian Services, a global nonprofit organization based out of Michigan, who have federal contracts with the government for finding placement for refugee and immigrant children, which is why they were one of the first places these children were sent. Per their own website, they’re a faith-based organization that provides foster care, adoption, resettlement services and other assistance, and their only priority is the well-being of the children they care for.
Sounds good, right? Defenders of this organization have claimed that BCS is against the separation policy and have called for an end to it, but despite searching, I haven’t actually been able to find any such comments from any official spokesperson for the agency.
However, I did find this:
“Right now, we have 99 foster care beds at Bethany across the country, and we’re at capacity,” Dona Abbott, branch director of refugee services at Bethany Christian Services, said. “We’re now recruiting new homes and we’re approaching our government with the offer to provide more beds.”
Now, here’s where some eyebrows should start to be raised.
BCS is not simply a nonprofit charity organization that looks after children in need as best they can in accordance with existing laws. They also are extremely aggressive lobbyists who push for legislation in accordance with their personal religious views….views which most people would consider Christian fundamentalist.
As previously reported by PRA, this past summer Michigan passed a statewide religious exemption law that gives adoption agencies the right to claim a religious exemption from having to serve LGBTQ couples. The DeVos family donated $300,000 in 2013 alone to Bethany Christian Services, Michigan’s leading adoption agency and the main group that lobbied for the religious exemption bill.
So to make sure we’re still on the same page here, let’s be clear about that…..one of the first agencies the government relocated these children to due to existing federal contracts just so happens to be a primary beneficiary of a member of the Trump administration’s charitable givings….and also just so happens to be in the habit of using said funds in the lobbying of religious fundamentalist based laws that have successfully barred potential parents in at least one state from adopting children if they happen to be of a demographic that Bethany Christian Services (and the DeVos family) deem unfit to parent children.
But remember….these people are still clearly, definitely JUST in it to help kids in need.
Now keep going back further. Here’s a book that was written in 2013, called
When Jessie Hawkins’ adopted daughter told her she had another mom back in Ethiopia, Jessie didn’t, at first, know what to think. She’d wanted her adoption to be great story about a child who needed a home and got one, and a family led by God to adopt. Instead, she felt like she’d done something wrong.
Adoption has long been enmeshed in the politics of reproductive rights, pitched as a “win-win” compromise in the never-ending abortion debate. But as Kathryn Joyce makes clear in The Child Catchers, adoption has lately become even more entangled in the conservative Christian agenda.
So this book apparently is an investigative look into Evangelical missionary adoption and the links to illegal adoptions and literal human trafficking. Crimes committed by faith-based adoption and foster care agencies and parents who believe its their mission to ‘save’ children from third-world countries by taking them away from parents who they deem unable to properly care for them (and who are unlikely to raise them according to the Christian fundamentalist views these organizations and parents view it as their mission to spread, just like missionaries of past centuries).
I haven’t had a chance to read the book in full myself yet, so I can’t attest to everything in it, just various excerpts I’ve found online. Yes, it is biased – the author takes a clear stance against these groups and their views and actions, but she does not claim to be impartial, nor is she trying to be. The book is her research into proving why her beliefs these people have committed criminal acts are not unfounded. I mention this because this unapologetic bias is what the 20% of reviews on this book that gave it 1-star have focused on to discredit the author and her conclusions here, in the name of defending these various organizations. However, the 48% of reviews that gave it 5-stars frequently express how regardless of any conclusions made within the book, one thing that stood out for most of them is how exhaustively researched and detailed the book was.
And why did I come across this book specifically, and link it here?
Because Bethany Christian Services is one of the organizations the author investigated based on suspicions of child trafficking and illegal adoptions.
Please note….even if you personally do not draw the same conclusions as the author from her research into them, it should at the very least be deemed significant that this organization, one of those that the Trump administration has prioritized sending these children to due to previously established contracts, is
a) Ready and looking to recruit more homes and supply more beds for children the administration sends them, despite already being stretched to the capacity of their ability to care for the children they’re already responsible for.
b) Has an existing relationship with The DeVos family, many of whom (not just Betsy) are part of the administration’s inner circle, and this existing relationship includes lobbying for the advancement of legislation born of their religious fundamentalist views and the prioritization of child care that’s in accordance to what they think a good conservative upbringing should look like
c) has been under scrutiny due to rumors of child trafficking, illegal adoptions and crimes against children in the name of their personal religious convictions stretching back at least five years before these current events
And this is just ONE of the places where we KNOW some of these kids taken from their parents have ended up. It doesn’t even address the hundreds, potentially thousands of kids who’ve already mysteriously ‘slipped through the cracks’ with no official accounting of their whereabouts.
Also something to consider is what happens AFTER these ‘good Christian families’ open up their homes to these poor, disenfranchised refugee children who are just so desperately in need of their enlightened priorities when raising children to be good conservatives.
It shouldn’t shock anyone but people who don’t actually have the well-being of children in mind when they adopt, but rather are just playing into self-serving white savior bullshit and some religious fervor to replicate the missionary work they feel its a Christian mandate to spread……shockingly, many of these people end up ‘regretting’ these adoptions when the children traumatized by being ripped away from families who actually do love them and want them aren’t appropriately grateful. Who have attitude problems or behavioral issues or just aren’t receptive to the ideas and values these people try and drill into them.
That’s a link to a Reuters investigative article that delved into the practice of ‘rehoming’. Or when fucking pieces of shit who adopt children from other countries through legal or illegal means change their minds once the novelty of the living human being they vowed to guard and protect but really just view as a shiny new toy wears off…..literally just….give these kids away to whomever will take them.
Warning, the article can be triggering as hell not just because of what it describes, but how it describes it, frequently referencing these parents in much more generous language than what I just used and acting like there’s something worth empathizing with in their behavior. I think it’s worth the read if you can stomach it, however, because of the facts it does lay down about this downright EVIL practice.
An excerpt from the article:
Part 1: When a Liberian girl proves too much for her parents, they advertise her online and give her to a couple they’ve never met. Days later, she goes missing.
KIEL, Wisconsin – Todd and Melissa Puchalla struggled for more than two years to raise Quita, the troubled teenager they’d adopted from Liberia. When they decided to give her up, they found new parents to take her in less than two days – by posting an ad on the Internet.
Also….three guesses what kind of people go looking online for ads about troubled kids people are looking to unload without any kind of paper trail.
Go ahead. Guess what kind of people those kids end up with.
So in conclusion…..fuck Bethany Christian Services, fuck the DeVos family, fuck the Trump administration, and fuck whomever defends any of this vile, despicable shit by harping on about how people are just being melodramatic and exaggerating and that nobody’s actually trafficking immigrant children here.
I would never suggest putting those links in a reply so they can be accessed from tumblr.
[Images: Tweets by ALT-Immigration ( @ALT_uscis ), and one by Arianrhod7 ( @Arianrhod_777 ); transcripts and links follow]
ALT-Immigration: Contrary to the rumors, I am not organizing the biggest protest outside every ICE detention center including private detention centers nationwide on July First. Falsehood.
One person can not organize civil protests at all of these immigration detention centers. [Attached is a map of the US with immigration detention centers marked.]
I mean, the idea of having over a million people drive up to the nearest ICETAPO DETENTION CENTER and make a day out of it is just ridiculous. Even if chances are there is a detention center within an hour drive of where most live
One last correction: I definitely did not come up with the idea of bringing diapers, baby formula, children books and toys to throw over immigration detention fences.
FYI June 30th is the anniversary of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 signed by President Lyndon Johnson at the foot of the Statue of Liberty. I would have picked June 30th and not July 1st if i were part of this. [Pic of the Statue of Liberty attached.]
No one volunteered to create a google doc with the list of all the ICE detention centers per state from that link and make it available to everyone to see and organize locally, carpool etc.
to end this thread. I was asked on a date by the Goons who do this. I do not feel like giving them a second date at the moment until at least after the World Cup is over. Busy. [In response to/attached link/pic of two people on their phones in front of the Twitter logo; caption reads, “Twitter sues federal government to keep anti-Trump user @ALT_uscis anonymous…”]
Oh dear, I seem to have fallen on my keyboard and transcribed all of the above tweets, with full links included! How clumsy of me!
And it didn’t even end there: I was so uncoordinated, I happened to stumble upon a google doc for arranging carpools, as was absolutely not suggested by ALT-Immigration. I only hope I’m not so clumsy as to accidentally include a link to it in this post.
While outraged Americans across the country are calling their elected representatives and taking to the streets to protest the Trump administration’s forcible separation of parents and children at the U.S.-Mexico border, intelligence and defense contractors are raking in millions thanks to the cruel practice.
According to reporting by the Daily Beast, the intelligence contractor MVM, Inc. won an $8 million five-year contract to “provide assistance” in detention centers for unaccompanied children, and has made $42.9 million in less than a year, transporting minors to centers in Texas.
“It is mind-blowing that those types of industries would be even considered with respect to the care of children.” —Matthew Kolken, immigration attorney
Such facilities have become crowded with children in recent months, especially following the administration’s unveiling of its new “zero tolerance” policy for undocumented immigrants who cross the southern border seeking asylum—under which adults are imprisoned while they await immigration trials and any children traveling with them are sent off to detention centers, sometimes thousands of miles away.
Previously, MVM worked with the CIA in the Iraq War, during which its employees were accused of “procuring and possessing unauthorized weapons and explosives.” The company has also faced accusations of discrimination against employees who were Muslim and African-born.
“I’m guessing that in [MVM’s] mission statement, one of the central components isn’t the care of refugee children,” immigration attorney Matthew Kolken told the Daily Beast. “It is mind-blowing that those types of industries would be even considered with respect to the care of children. They’re not equipped to be able to do it. Would you want your child to be dropped off in their hands? I know I wouldn’t.”
Still, MVM as well as the defense contractor General Dynamics are rapidly hiring new employees to oversee the dozens of detention centers for children who have been taken from their parents or guardians after crossing the border.
Recently-advertised positions include compliance coordinators tasked with overseeing detention centers, youth care workers, and bilingual transport specialists.
Our government is responsible for child trafficking.
Fuck. Trump. Fuck your congress. Your flag. Your government. Everything about it.
When news anchors can’t deliver news because it’s too horrible, we have a problem. News anchors see Some Shit, but this is too fucking much.
I have not seen this many reporters choke up, tear up, or outright break down on air since the first days after the September 11th attacks. Dear God, please let this be the turning point. Internment camps for children…where else is there lower than this?
Hey everyone? This is not okay. In May, the US government officially adopted a policy separating children from their parents when they crossed the border. It was meant to act as a deterrent to anyone seeking to immigrate to this country. Don’t come with your kids, or we’ll arrest you and take your children away. Children should never be used as political pawns like this. It’s inhuman and cruel.
Parents, after being separated from their children, are being tried as criminals. According to Attorney General Jeff Sessions, “If you cross the Southwest border unlawful, then we will prosecute you. It’s that simple” So not only are families being torn apart, parents are being sent to jail. It’s really hard to be reunited with your child if you are in federal prison.
Please pay attention to what is happening at our southern border. Please care about these people. I know there is a lot gong on in the world, and it’s hard to care about everything all the time, but please don’t forget about the immigrant families. Call you representatives. Vote the people who support this policy out of office in November. Find a local rally/protest. Donate to a charity. Don’t let the people in power get away with this.
Sources are from The New York Times, the Boston Globe, and a video interview with Jess Session found on NBC news. Jacob Soboroff is a reporter for NBC news and MSNBC. 13 June 2018
[Caption; A series of tweets by josie duffy rice/ @jduffyrice
Now that we’re all on twitter because of this game, I am making a public service announcement: PLEASE STOP SHARING THAT STORY ABOUT 1500 KIDS MISSING. The outrage I’ve seen is the result of a total misinterpretation and could SERIOUSLY threaten the children you want to save.
Before I get to it, I’ll answer the question that 99 million ppl will inevitably ask: I know this because I’m a lawyer, i works on criminal justice issues (sometimes incl immigration), and 4 of my closest friends are immigration attorneys dealing with this EXACT THING.
There are two things going on. 1) HHS doesn’t know where 1500 unaccompanied minors are. 2) we are separating parents and children at the border.
These are different. The kids in 1) were not separated from their parents at the border. They crossed the border alone* or arrived here without a parent.
That’s not really the point I want to make, though it is important.
These kids were dealt with by ORR, the office of refugee resettlement. They were released into the care of people that almost always fit within one of these three categories:
1) immediate family 2) extended family 3) other people that the child has a pre-existing relationship with. If none of these categories apply, then the kids normally stay in a shelter.
(After a number of children were trafficked in 2014, these restrictions got tighter.)
So those kids are released and then they are no longer ORRs responsibility or problem. THIS IS A GOOD THING.
One analogy I heard from my dear friend who I won’t tag without her permission, is that ORR is basically a jailer. Do you want the jail keeping track of where every former inmate is?
Now I have more to say about that but before we do that, let’s talk about the word missing. Basically by all accounts HHS did a cursory reach out to check on these kids, and couldn’t find out where they were exactly.
When I say cursory I mean cursory. We’re talking about phone calls. Phone calls! Like, no door knocks. No checking school records. They called. They didn’t find answers.
There are so many reasons why people wouldn’t answer. Maybe these kids are living with someone undocumented. Maybe they aren’t but their sponsor is (legitimately) completely scared of immigration authorities in trumps America.
They aren’t missing! They are almost certainly living with family members who almost certainly don’t want to interact with the government and WE SHOULDN’T ASK THEM TO
ORR’s job is NOT to track and monitor these kids, and it shouldn’t be. As my friend said, if there were an issue- abuse, or other wrongdoing- it should go through the appropriate agency: children’s services or what have you. It SHOULDN’T GO THROUGH HHS/ORR or DHS/ICE
When your school loans provider can’t reach you, are you missing? No. When your boss can’t find you on a Friday night, are you missing? No. They aren’t missing. Some unanswered phone calls does not a missing child make.
Now, I started out identifying two things that were happening. The second- the separation of children and their parents at the border- is goddamn unconscionable and sickening.
But DO NOT confuse the two. The potential for it backfiring is real. What we’re demanding is that ORR, which works hand in hand with ICE, “keep better track” of kids they basically would like to deport if giving the chance. We don’t want that!!!
You’re asking immigration authorities IN TRUMP’S AMERICA to BETTER MONITOR UNDOCUMENTED CHILDREN AND THEIR FAMILIES. You don’t want this. I promise you don’t.
I get it. It sounds awful. But at WORST it’s benign. At best, it’s a GOOD thing that ORR doesn’t know where these kids are. There’s a reason. We actually now have pretty strict requirements before we release these kids. They aren’t all being trafficked. They aren’t dead.
It doesn’t mean life is easy, but life won’t be easier if ORR starts tracking them. Trust me. And trust my brilliant friends who know about this shit and have warned me and are now warning you. DONT conflate the two things.
AND because some people are obviously taking this as an opportunity to exonerate the president- NO. Trumps immigration policy is disgusting. His separation of kids and parents at the border is SICKENING. He’s a tyrant. Just don’t conflate them.
Man oh man I forget that at least 50 percent of people on twitter refuse to learn basic reading comprehension. Tonight should be fun!
] *[Also it says “alien” up there where it should say “alone”, cool, autocorrect.]
*corrected autocorrect/typo in my transcription for the sake of being less confusing, especially for anyone listening to the text rather than reading it visually.
Since I reblogged a post about this issue, here is a correction.
We all know the pro life movement is full of shit. They only care abt controlling wm. They don’t care abt the children. Because if u were a real prolife advocate u would b completely disgusted
wupacing 