SALINAS, CA — This winter has been especially cold. And, when it comes to the immigrants who put food on our table, build our homes and care for our children, it has also been particularly cruel.
I’m sure I’m not the only U.S. citizen thinking: What has become of our country? I honestly don’t recognize it. Empathy, compassion and humanity are scarce.
As a Mexican American who was born in a small farm town in Central California, as well as someone who entered the medical profession a half century ago to help people, it breaks my heart to see what is happening on the frozen streets of Minneapolis — as well as in other U.S. cities that are arbitrarily targeted for harassment by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Scores of people are being rounded up based on the color of their skin or their accent or how they make a living. There’s no due process under the Fifth Amendment. There’s no protection against unreasonable searches of peoples’ homes under the Fourth Amendment. There is no right to protest under the First Amendment. Given all that, it’s obvious that many of the apprehensions being racked up by ICE are not just illegitimate. They’re illegal.
Children are literally being kidnapped and being taken across state lines. That is not hyperbole. That is reality.
At this moment, a five-year-old boy named Liam Ramos is, along with his father, being held run in an ICE detention facility in Texas. The boy is lethargic, and he hasn’t been eating. He obviously needs immediate medical attention, and it doesn’t appear he’s getting it.
As a physician, I look at photos of that precious little boy, and I don’t see what President Trump called the “worst of the worst.” All I see is the U.S. government at its worst.
Maximiliano Cuevas, MD is the CEO of Clinica de Salud del Valle de Salinas, a collective of non-profit community health care centers that serve patients in Monterey County.