Treatment of immigrant children is immoral

As a child protective services worker, the worst part of my job by far was having to take children away from their parents due to abuse or neglect. I had to get custody of a 7-year-old because of severe physical abuse by his step-mother. He cried all the way to the foster home, pleading with me to take him home. At one point, he said, “It didn’t hurt that bad,” referring to a beating with a belt that left bruises all over him.

Even in cases of severe maltreatment, children seldom wanted to be taken away from their parents, and having to do it was more painful than you can imagine. I don’t have children myself, but having worked in a system that sometimes found it necessary to take children from their parents has given me some insight into how traumatizing it is, no matter how bad their home environment may have been. And when it happens only because their parents are trying to make a better life for them by coming to America, that is outrageous. Add to it the fact they are not receiving adequate care, and that makes it even worse.

I don’t care what your politics are, the way the children of undocumented immigrants are being treated is immoral, and every citizen should speak out against it. Please contact the White House, your senators and representatives and demand that this brutal policy be stopped.

Name withheld by request