In a July 1 letter “Non-enforcement anarchy” the writer, in an attempt to sway opinion, discusses the recent debate concerning minors at the southern border.
The writer points out how there seemed to be no concern for those minors that were detained during the Obama administration and held in temporary “cages” at border control facilities.
What the writer conveniently forgot to mention was that those minors were unaccompanied and arrived at the border alone or with other unaccompanied minors. (Congressional Research Service: “Unaccompanied Alien Children: An Overview,” Jan. 18, 2017).
They were not forcefully separated from their parents.
They were not toddlers and infants.
They knew they would be detained upon arrival.
At no time during the Obama and Bush administrations were children separated from their parents except in situations of suspected human trafficking or fraud, according to media reports.
Families were processed as a unit.
Also, the figure of 32 percent of federal inmates being illegal aliens is correct, according to the Department of Homeland Security “Alien Incarceration Report.”
But this is not the number of alien inmates in federal prisons.
It is the number in federal custody.
Each of those separated children that are locked up in the cages, and their parents wherever they are, that we see on the nightly news are part of that 32 percent.
That is why the percentage is so high.
The writer would have us think that the 32 percent are hardened criminals.
When trying to deflect criticism away from President Donald Trump, please tell the whole story so we can compare apples to apples and not oranges.
Lance Pinkerton,
Sequim