Thread: Trump's border wall won't help migrant children. All his immigration policies do is h

Trump's border wall won't help migrant children. All his immigration policies do is harm them.

A president that was serious about improving the situation would end policies that experts say amount to violence against children.

Jan. 13, 2019, 6:15 AM EST
By Cristina Novoa, policy analyst, Center for American Progress

The president lamented a “growing humanitarian and security crisis” in a misleading speech delivered from the Oval Office on Tuesday. But as divisive as his speech was, one point of widespread agreement was his characterization of women and children as the biggest victims in this “crisis of the soul,” even if he never acknowledged that he had anything to do with that crisis.

As the daughter of immigrants and a trained developmental psychologist, my reaction was simply to wonder where that compassion for women and children was last year when his administration was separating families, or last month when two children died in Border Patrol custody.

Broadly speaking, the Trump administration’s actions over the last two years tell a far different story — one that should cause a crisis of the soul for its architects. We have watched a seemingly endless parade of policies that would harm children: Separating children from their parents, family incarceration and cruel treatment by border security.

Trump's caravan problem isn't which people are coming, but what kind of country America will choose to be.

Meanwhile, research shows children need safe, nurturing, and predictable environments, which these policies undermine at every turn. In 2018, the Trump administration’s “zero-tolerance” policy separated children — including infants and toddlers — from their parents. Some remain separated to this day. Children have been incarcerated with their families in detention centers that lack necessary resources to serve them.

Many have journeyed thousands of miles to seek asylum, only to face tear gas and the threat of “lethal force.” In the last month, at least two have tragically died in U.S. custody.

At a time when children make up more than half of the world’s refugee population, the U.S. plans to further cut refugee admissions, to ever-more-historic lows.

Trump's border wall was never just about security. It's meant to remind all Latinos that we're unwelcome.

We know these kinds of policies are particularly damaging to children: Research shows that a child’s brain forms more than one million new neural connections every second in the first years of life. Responsive interactions with adults strengthen these connections, laying the groundwork for later emotional and cognitive skills. But toxic stress — periods of intense or prolonged adversity — floods children’s brains with stress hormones that disrupt how these neural connections form.

When a parent is forcibly separated from her child at the border, or stripped of her ability to comfort him in a detention center, the child sees the world as a place of perpetual danger. Importantly, many of these children have already experienced fear, hunger, and intense stress before arriving at the border, where the Trump administration's policies are intended to deter others. Being separated from a loving and caring adult only confirms the child’s belief in a threatening and cruel world.

This kind of psychological and emotional stress leads to physical brain trauma. Studies of children in institutionalized care — a form of toxic stress to which the administration has already subjected an estimated 13,000 children, with expansion plans in the works — show that prolonged exposure to harsh conditions changes the physical structure of the brain.

As experts in medicine, psychology, and public health argue, toxic stress from events like institutionalization and being separated from their parent can also lead to long-term consequences for physical and mental health. These include trouble with emotional regulation and cognitive skills (think: Poor impulse control and less effective problem solving), and negative impacts on the immune system, the cardiovascular system and metabolic systems (think: Chronic illness, heart disease and diabetes.)

Highlighting the extensive impact of early childhood trauma on public health, epidemiological research suggests that up to 30 percent of mental health disorders are related to childhood adversity.

If the human toll of these policies on individual children is not enough, consider the broader costs to society of inflicting trauma on hundreds of thousands.

Trump claims his wall will keep women safe. But he's just using female pain for political gain (again).

Instead of paying lip service to the plight of women and children, a president that was serious about improving their situation would cease implementing policies that experts contend amount to violence against children. Instead of demanding billions for a border wall, that money should be invested in communities or used to ensure adequate medical care for those seeking asylum at our borders.

Trump, of course, has refused to consider any course of action.

I could argue that current polices counter to American ideals. I could argue that they undermine the country’s future by punishing some of the strongest contributors to the economy. But as a researcher and a child of immigrants, I can also cite scientific evidence to argue for what many Americans already believe: Treating all families with dignity and investing in children is the right thing to do. Period.

https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinio...all-ncna957876

You're absolutely right! That humanitarian stuff is all Pelosi and the DemoQuacks. They wanted all that "humanitarian aid" in the funding bill.

Trump doesn't care about these foreign children being dragged up here by whoever these adults are hauling them in here. He's sorry they're being put through that, which is why he wants the wall to shut this migration down. Trump cares about American Kids, American Families, American Workers, American Taxpayers.

He could give 2 hoots about some other country's "children" and "families".

So CAP, you and all your other taxpayer sucking orgies need to haul them back where they came from and make sure they don't ever try to come here again.

GRRRRRR!!!

We do not want to help their children.

Send them back! Their President needs to help their own children and citizens. WE are not their baby daddy or their ATM machine.

NO DACA EITHER! THEIR COUNTRIES NEED TO WELCOME THEM HOME, THEY NEED TO TAKE WHAT THEY LEARNED HERE AND APPLY THEMSELVES IN THEIR COUNTRIES.