The Problem of Family Separation in The United States

The idea of separating a mother from her child is terrible. Children cannot grow up healthy and happy without love and support that often comes from family. This is what the United States government has done for centuries, first to Native Americans, then to African slaves, and now to Central and South American immigrants simply seeking a better life for themselves and their families. This practice is causing stress and fear in immigrant communities and destroying the very thing that makes America great again: the promise of the American dream. When people consider moving to the United States for a better life, they have to think about facing problems such as separation from their children. Families can move here and see unjust criminalization and deportation. This can split up children from their parents and cause stress for the kids. People have to struggle every day to change their situation. Society has to think about how this can affect, not only the folks who are having problems moving to the United States with their kids but also their kids who one day will might decide to move somewhere and they might face problems such as family separation.

Since Trump became president, things got harder for immigrant families. From Trump's administrative policies, over 2,654 immigrant kids were separated from their families, and this probably not the whole number of children who cannot see their parents. This is called “zero tolerance” when The Department of Justice began to search for people, who crossed the border braking the law. But this law did not really help to lead to prosecutions of big amount of adults crossing the border. Trump's administration thinks that this policy can prevent people from entering the United States illegally because they would think about what this can lead to. Also, they began to separate people who were legally here, and this is not the first time when the US government has made up criminal prosecution of immigrants. For example, “Illegal entry is a federal misdemeanor, punishable by up to six months in prison, with a subsequent conviction for illegal entry punishable by up to two years”. Back in 2005, “zero-tolerance” had a different name. Operation Streamline resulted in serious harm to families, long before a new administration began. The older version of “zero-tolerance” caused a lot of problems to the criminal prosecution of people who are asking for asylum seekers. This situation affects people who are long-term United States residents, while they are trying to return to the US, where they have citizenship after deportation. People have to wait 154 days, which is more than five months to see their family members, and some have been waiting as long as a year. Most of those people are from Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, etc. Patrols at the border are lying to these people about why and how they being separated. Seventeen different states sued the US government for it. This practice of separation of families is a direct insult to the interests of states whose policies are made to care for kids. By taking their children away from their parents and sending them thousands of miles away, the Trump administration has already affected kids and violated the basic principles professed by many states with regard to protecting health and safety.

When people illegally immigrate to the United States, they get arrested and separated from their families, causing problems for said families. Instead of sending people to prison, the government can set up probation or community service specifically for immigrants. That way they can see justice for the crime and still be with their families. All kids have a right to be with their parents and live a happy life, feel safe.