86 Comments
User's avatar
Adrienne Kaga's avatar

Let’s hope that the nation is shamed for these camps, just as it was for Granada/Amache and Minidoka, where my grandfather and father were detained without due process and with a heavy dose of racial/ethnic bias.

Expand full comment
Al Bellenchia's avatar

Those who have fought for human rights and basic freedoms are weeping today.

We must honor them by not giving up on this seemingly eternal fight for justice for all.

https://albellenchia.substack.com/p/declarations?r=7wk5d

Expand full comment
Judy Steiner's avatar

It is only a matter of time before the UN calls out on it.

Expand full comment
Annie D Stratton's avatar

Have they not already, if not this, then other atrocities which we as a nation choose to ignore. We should not expect other nations to "call us out" when it is open to view by everyone. It is up to us to change what is going on. Start with your own community if you can. Do some small thing. Find someone else to join you. START somewhere. Indivisible.org can help.

Expand full comment
Susan B's avatar

I hope you are right!

Expand full comment
Leakie's avatar

Follow the money. The private prison company, GEO, is a huge contributor to Trump and Republicans, and spends millions lobbying. Who will benefit from operating these facilities?

Expand full comment
Steven Beschloss's avatar

Good point.

Expand full comment
Ann Sharon's avatar

We’ve seen this before. Once the $$ is invested in prisons they must keep the prisoners coming. Who becomes ‘eligible’ for detention changes. We saw it when the private prison lobby pushed for longer sentences & 3 strikes laws.

Expand full comment
Martha Franklin's avatar

I never thought I'd see members of our government laughing over the potential, anticipated deaths of their own citizens. Kristi Noem fits right in with her audition for her job, detailing the horrible, depraved story of the killing of her puppy and her goat. And Stephen Miller is a sadistic zombie.

These people have no souls. None of us are safe.

Expand full comment
Ann Sharon's avatar

These facilities are supposed to be for immigrant detainees who will be held until deported.

Expand full comment
Diane Battista's avatar

More like political opponents will go there in his mind

Expand full comment
Ann Sharon's avatar

Yes, it could morph into that. No, it was not what they making the target of their laughter or going to admit out loud on TV. Weirdly, after the made for TV antics, DeSantis emphasized how it had all the necessities including access to clergy; how it met all the requirements. Maybe not so weirdly since there are allegations that it does not - and a second is planned for 30 miles outside Jacksonville.

Expand full comment
maryhh45's avatar

Remember she cold-bloodedly shot her puppy....

Expand full comment
Homi Hormasji's avatar

"Enough is enough.

May it be soon."

If never soon enough.

Expand full comment
Mary Greenwald's avatar

The Supreme Court of the United States: Roberts, Alito, Thomas, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Barrett CONSENTED to this Concentration Camp when They gave Trump Dictator Powers and They denied Due Process to Immigrants. Those Six Justices allowed and encouraged the Trump Administration to continue Human Rights Abuses.

Expand full comment
Adrienne Kaga's avatar

Let’s hope that the nation is shamed for these camps

Expand full comment
Annie D Stratton's avatar

We are the nation. You think we are not shamed?

Expand full comment
Yvonne Madsen's avatar

These people in positions of leadership are horribly damaged. How on earth did they come into power? I wonder, are all their supporters equally mentally deranged?

Expand full comment
Martha Franklin's avatar

Yes. Unfortunately. I didn't want to believe it for a long time, but I do now. It's frightening because it's a third of this country.

Expand full comment
Helen Stajninger's avatar

Yes- MAGA loves this.

Expand full comment
Diane Battista's avatar

Yes, they are

Expand full comment
kdsherpa's avatar

AMUSED?????!!!!! This is an American version of Auschwitz. The orange sadist LAUGHS about how people who try to escape will be eaten by "unpaid" cops, the alligators, and their bodies thrown into the swamps to feed the alligators. He LAUGHS at the hell that awaits the 1,000 people entering Hell tomorrow and the 4,000 -- probably many more that that -- yet to come. The canvas tents, and the concrete on which they stand will cause countless deaths from heatstroke. The mosquitos which carry malaria will bite, and people will die. People will die because they don't receive their medication, or they are starving. And this is "funny". Homan says, "People die all the time in prisons" -- no big deal. Jodi Ernst shrugged and said (in another context), "People die." Our country is no longer what it once was. When we can leave, we will. My husband, a naturalized citizen ("big deal" say the monsters) is Tibetan and has dark skin. His English is not perfect. I am worried about what could be done to him. The Jews who were able to leave Germany were fortunate. Our house of 35 years is for sale. I'm liquidating all of our assets so that we can leave quickly, if this nightmare becomes worse.

Expand full comment
Diane Battista's avatar

The cruelty and the sadistic demented distorted evil thinking is unprecedented coming from a president and other human beings around him.

All of them charged and tried by the international court for violations against human rights

Crimes against humanity ??????????

Expand full comment
kdsherpa's avatar

As in Nazi Germany, will this take years, and suffering beyond words, to occur before anyone steps in? I fear that no action will occur until there is wholesale death.

Expand full comment
Diane Battista's avatar

There is some deep character defect

Most likely was a long-term untreated depression

Expand full comment
kdsherpa's avatar

Who has depression?

Expand full comment
Diane Battista's avatar

Well, the people that are engaging in this behavior for one

But it’s gone way beyond untreated depression

Expand full comment
kdsherpa's avatar

Do you mean the Nazis?

Expand full comment
Mian Fisher's avatar

Anyone for the BBB from grandma to your neighbors, to your representative, to your Senators, to your spouse just approved building our first concentration camp. Congratulations on telling us what you would have been doing in Nazi Germany. I am so disappointed in and disgusted with you

Expand full comment
Mary Greenwald's avatar

But VP Vance and Office Boy Miller love the Nazis. They would have been proud of being in Germany in the 30's and 40's.

Expand full comment
Christa Slaton's avatar

Shameful! This one prison will cost $450 million per year to run. Trump will be given $40 million to erect his gaudy statue garden. Meanwhile, we are ripping health care and food benefits from millions of Americans. What warped priorities.

Expand full comment
Annie D Stratton's avatar

Some of "the most vicious people on the planet" are the people shown in the photos touring this facility. I would like to write that they are on the wrong side of the fence, but I wouldn't wish even them that kind of experience. I am sickened that these are the people who currently make decisions in our name. I am disgusted that we have enough people in Congress who are unfit for their jobs to the degree they will not stand up against this. And I am appalled that we have a Supreme Court with a majority that is unable to grasp either the legal or the moral failures of their decisions. I do not blame the people whose own fears and uncerrtainties are being exploited by this group of privileged and unprincipled people. I accuse those who look away, who could do something but choose not to.

Expand full comment
Diane Battista's avatar

Very well said

Expand full comment
Annie D Stratton's avatar

Steven. thank you for laying it all out straight, and not analyzing it, trying to make it make sense. I am tired of all that analyzing. I am not in a very good place right now, and for me that means I need to look at it all straight on until it is so real I must look away so that I can use what energy I have to act, to reach out to others, both for support and to give support. Somehow we have to keep reaching out to each other, until we cumulatively have the strength to somehow turn around. These people are sick, and they are making our country sick.

Expand full comment
Steven Beschloss's avatar

Thank you, Annie.

Expand full comment
Susan B's avatar

The "sadist-in-chief" is perfect. Why do they hate immigrants SOOO much??

Expand full comment
Karen Horwitz's avatar

Get on school boards on a democracy platform. Run in

groups so you can control the fascists who took over our schools decades ago and cleared the way for Trump. Become educated about this at WhiteChalkCrime.com and EndTeacherAbuse.org. You don’t need a child in school to do this. We need all ages on these boards.

Expand full comment
Susan Linehan's avatar

Yep, the worst of the worst. Of course, they have stopped going AFTER the actual criminals in favor of those in Home Depot parking lots or coming as required to their immigration court hearings.

I do hope members of Congress will say "up yours" to the "notice" requirements of Noem and do their inspections, during which they should point to each individual and ask whoever is escorting them "what crime has s/he committed." This will be particularly true of children.

Because one of the ADVANTAGES of a concentration camp all set up with cages (as opposed to sleeping enmasse on floors) is that those held will be in a place where that delegation can actually ASK that question.

Expand full comment
Ann Sharon's avatar

DOJ now has a focus on denaturalization for ‘criminals’ and people who obtained citizenship via ‘fraud.’ Considering how they tend to define those things this is not a good thing. It has a list of 10 criteria. The 10th is any other cases the Civil Division considers sufficiently important to pursue. (I realize it maybe typical bureaucratic language but with this administration it’s a heart stopper.)

https://natlawreview.com/article/doj-civil-division-prioritizes-denaturalization-new-enforcement-memo

Expand full comment
Susan Linehan's avatar

I've seen that: Joyce Vance has a good post on it. Of course, criminal acts are defined by STATUTE: if it's not in the criminal code, it's not a crime. And "fraud" is actually quite hard to prove. I suspect that they won't be going after low profile naturalized citizens --it's more a fear-inducer, an attempt to make naturalized citizens stay silent. Higher profile ones will fight. We need more pro bono firms for the poorer ones, but as with a lot of other Bondi threats it is depending more on inconvenience than any actual results. Going to be a LOT of litigation on this.

Expand full comment
Ann Sharon's avatar

I mostly agree. It is impractical on a broad scale like when this was done in the 1940s. The detention centers had instructions on getting detainees to agree to denaturalization so they could be deported. Very much like now when immigrants are given a choice to ‘self deport’ or …

Not everything on the list is a specific. As for fraud, they look for flaws in paperwork and omissions. In his 1st term the WH said they had amassed a list of 700,000 naturalized citizens to investigate for denaturalization.

In this administration rules were made to be broken. They’ve crossed every line that was supposed to stop them. As soon as he took office there was a flurry of reports from Navajo tribal members that a few were detained; quite a few stopped and held for questioning without their phones.

So yes, mostly scare tactics, but being high profile doesn’t stop the devastation of their lives.

Expand full comment