OPINION:
Laura Bush, say it ain’t so.
The former first lady is the latest to jump on the anti-President Donald Trump train to slam this White House over largely fabricated, media-frenzied stories of child separations at the border.
In a piece for The Washington Post, she wrote: “I live in a border state. I appreciate the need to enforce and protect our international boundaries, but this zero-tolerance policy is cruel. It is immoral. And it breaks my heart.”
What is it about establishment-type politicos that they just can’t seem to step themselves from trashing all-things-Trump?
Bush went on: “Our government should not be in the business of warehousing children in converted box stores or making plans to place them in tent cities in the desert outside of El Paso. These images are eerily reminiscent of the Japanese American internment camps of World War II, now considered to have been one of the most shameful episodes in U.S. history.”
Well, here’s a thought to consider: If these families didn’t try to cross borders illegally, then their children wouldn’t face any type of separation at all.
But an even better point has already been made by one journalist from Breitbart, Joel Pollak, who actually took the trip to these shelter places for illegal children who’ve been separated from their parents and found — wow, things there are pretty dang good.
“Democrats and the mainstream media have accused the administration of separating the children of ’immigrants’ from their parents and imprisoning them in ’cages,’ ” Pollak wrote. “The facility at El Cajon, however, is not a ’cage.’ It is a comfortable facility providing lodging, meals, clothing, medical care, education, recreation, counseling and other services.”
On Fox News’ “Fox & Friends,” Pollak went on to say that the concern of those working at the facilities for the children was top-notch.
Oh, and one more thing: Under the catch-and-release days of Barack Obama, adults detained at the border would be released, allowed to drift off and mingle with the citizen population. But now, with ’zero tolerance’ in effect, adults are detained — but the children they sometimes bring cannot be thrown in the same spot. They are separated for their safety, until the backgrounds of the adults can be verified. This is only sound policy; what if the children, for example, were being trafficked by those adults?
The media and the left have no time for such truths, however. The media and the left and now, Laura Bush.
“Americans pride ourselves on being a moral nation,” she wrote. “If we are truly that country, then it is our obligation to reunite these detained children with their parents — and to stop separating parents and children in the first place.”
Of course, a case could be made that this government has a moral obligation to uphold border laws for the safety and security of its citizens, too. But then again, making that case might put this White House in a positive light. Anti-Trumpism at all costs, it seems.
• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com or on Twitter, @ckchumley.
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