Against the advice of top Republicans and business leaders, and dismissing previous words he had uttered, America’s brave president took out his wrath on young adults who are functioning and contributing members of the nation’s society. With a six month delay to allow Congress to possibly come up with a program to allow them to stay, Trump expelled these children from America and forced them to return to homelands most of them do not remember. In fact, many of them only know English and do not speak the language of the country where they may be headed.
Not only was this a brutally mean assault on innocent young people who have integrated into America’s society, it is also an attack on our economy which will lower our long term GDP significantly. These are not criminals or the “bad hombres” that Trump talked about in the past. They are workers and students who are doing their best to “Make America Great.” They are not on welfare or takers, and not drug addicts or alcoholics, which could describe many members of Trump’s white base in the nation’s heartland. Instead of considering what the Dreamers are contributing to society, Trump was willing to banish them from America because of promises he had made to his base. And this was another Obama programs that he could destroy and cross off his list.
The DACA initiative instituted by Obama shielded about 800,000 young people who came to America as children from deportation to their native country. The immigration was done illegally by Careerstheir parents, but Trump is punishing innocents for the sins of their parents to assuage his base. Trump said after his election that he was going to expel immigrants who were criminals and addicts and that those who were good and clean would be safe. But he went back on his word to one group to placate another.
What he is literally doing is taking Americans who are productive workers or students and sending them to an alien land where they have no friends and no roots. Some of them served or serve in the American military, protecting people like Trump who was able to dodge the draft during the Vietnam War. He had promised the Dreamers that he would treat them with great heart and last week had stated that “We love the Dreamers.” So this is what Trump does to people he loves? The Dreamers now are fearful of losing their livelihoods and their homes, and everything they have accumulated over the years. Some of them have had children here who are very young American citizens who they will have to take with them or leave them behind.
Many of the Dreamers are workers who are paying taxes and important cogs in industries across the United States. That is why leading businessmen implored Trump not to end the DACA program. More than 400 of them sent a message to Trump and members of Congress asking them to save the Dreamers, saying that they were critical for the economy. Much of their economic output and consumption will be lost if they are deported. Some of them work in the tech industry but also in different jobs across the nation. With unemployment so low, businesses will have difficulty replacing them. 65 percent of Dreamers have bought their own cars and 16 percent their own homes. One economist has predicted that five years after DACA is repealed, the nation’s GDP will be less $105 billion annually that would have been made with the Dreamers here.
Immigrants are not taking jobs away from Americans. They perform jobs (meat packing industry) that Americans don’t want or haven’t been trained for. Trump doesn’t seem to understand the effects this will have on the American economy or just doesn’t care. He doesn’t understand the pain and stress he is causing for innocent young Americans who have done nothing wrong. Trump’s smallminded, cruel move was bad for the Dreamers and bad for America. Hopefully, Congress will come up with legislation that will save the Dreamers, though past efforts have not been successful. With Jeff Sessions applauding what Trump has done along with Republican members of the Freedom Caucus, legislative protection of the Dreamers is far from a done deal. This is in spite of the fact that about 80 percent of Americans favor having the Dreamers remain here.
Resurrecting Democracy
www.robertlevinebooks.com
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Political junkie, Vietnam vet, neurologist- three books on aging and dementia. Book on health care reform in 2009- Shock Therapy for the American Health Care System. Book on the need for a centrist third party- Resurrecting Democracy- A Citizen’s Call for a Centrist Third Party published in 2011. Aging Wisely, published in August 2014 by Rowman and Littlefield. Latest book- The Uninformed Voter published May 2020