Subject: Re: Government deported a U.S. citizen with no process
That's not the law. She came here illegally and is subject to removal for that reason.

You're arguing for amnesty without actually stating so. If that's what you want, then you need to change the law.

No - I'm arguing for the government to do what it always does, in every law enforcement circumstance: allocate their finite resources to prioritize actions that will do the most good with the least harm, and provide those who are being subject to law enforcement with the opportunity to argue the specifics of their own cases.

That last bit is the key. You're trying to argue that if someone argues that any specific individual case should be treated a certain way, it means every individual has to be treated that way. But that's not true. We don't have to do that, and we don't do that. It's why we don't have mass trials where we convict (or deport) thousands and thousands of people collectively. People get the change to have the specifics of their own situation reviewed.

We do this easily and routinely in the criminal justice system. For example, in typical cases, when someone is found guilty of a crime and sentenced, they go through a standard process of when they have to begin their sentence. But they get a chance to tell the judge it there are special circumstances - and especially in cases where the interests of minor children will be affected. And the judges will take into account the fact that there are minor children involved, and use that to modify their sentences.

There's absolutely no reason why this woman couldn't and shouldn't have been afforded some time to confer with her husband and a lawyer about what was best for their daughter, rather than being given barely a few minutes and thereafter being cut off from all communication. It was unnecessary, cruel, and contrary to a bare minimum of due process.

Again, there's a reason why Trump's approval rating on immigration is dropping, even though he has been inarguably successful at cutting down border crossings. It's because of the way they're handling the immigration of people internal to the country. They're not making "hard choices" - they're taking the easy way out. They're taking the easiest way to get to the high deportation numbers they promised, and that means not making any material effort to narrow their focus on just the horrid people. Instead, they're sweeping up as many of the upright and harmless folks as they can, because that's where the easy pickings are. And people are upset when they see the treatment of people who aren't the baddies that they imagined when they thought of who Trump wanted to get rid of. "Surely not that nice Sra. Lopez who runs the food truck! Or the mom of my daughter's classmate! Those aren't bad people!"