The woman pinned my mother and me outside a Florida grocery store and began to talk. She told us all about the three children she’d fostered to adopt, the husband who was 10 years her senior, and every medical diagnosis each one had ever had.
The one-sided conversation with this person we never met before made me wildly uncomfortable. When she finally took a break to ask if we lived in Florida, my mom mentioned that she spends her winters there.
“I don’t like ice,” my mom said.
The woman wrinkled her nose and walked away.
The abrupt end to that endless conversation relieved us both, and I laughed as we walked away.
“You know, that woman thought you were talking about a different kind of ICE,” I told my mom.
My mom looked at me as it dawned on her what that woman had thought.
“I meant I worry about falling on the ice,” my mom said. “But, I don’t like what that other ICE is doing either.”
Honestly, who does?
Who thinks it’s a good idea to terrorize and detain people based on the color of their skin? The party of Abraham Lincoln?
Who thinks it’s sound policy to barge into homes, schools, vehicles and private businesses without a warrant? The party of small government?
Who think it makes sense to authorize billions of dollars to hastily inflate a single agency? The party of fiscal responsibility?
I, like most Americans, believe in a strong vetting process at our borders. I support law enforcement efforts to apprehend and, where appropriate, to deport violent offenders.
But that’s not what’s happening in Minnesota.
My heart breaks for our immigrant community right now and for our country as a whole. We’re better than this.
We’re a country founded on due process. We have inalienable rights here and it is incumbent on those of us who move freely through this country to stand up for them.
So, in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr. and his eloquent legacy, I stand in opposition to the unprecedented ICE actions in Minneapolis and throughout this beautiful country.
May we all see better days ahead.
