Today the president’s “border czar,” Tom Homan announced withdrawal of ICE from Minneapolis. Why? We can only assume the massive objections on the part of American citizens played a part. It was the same when ICE ended its Operation Midway Blitz in Chicago just 3 months ago.
In Chicago my son observed masked ICE agents grabbing pedestrians and children off Chicago’s streets. Many days, when he commuted to and from work there would be yet another incident to drive past. Although that was the least of ICE aggressions, my son represented maybe a hundred thousand first-hand observers in a city of millions.
Our news feeds provided the rest of us with visuals. Among them were stunning views of downtown Minneapolis where tens of thousands of citizens objected day after day.
Our country has a tradition of objecting. It works. When I hear comparisons between the current president’s autocratic strategies and the rise of Hitler’s Reich, I can’t help but think of moral wrongs that were reversed by protesters in the course of US history. Ending slavery was a long slog. Ending its aftermath, the idea of separating people by skin color, is another long slog. In each case, the will of the people rose like an ocean wave gathering energy as it grew. Each wave crested when the government wrote new, humane laws.
In our country the voice of the people is where our moral compass finds its direction. The deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti at the hands of ICE agents have made a lasting impression on all of us. Some may still declare on social media that the two somehow asked for it, but we all know the difference between humane police work and acts of terror.
I am proud to be an American even when the teeter-totter of morality goes out of balance, because the people will be heard. The human tide will eventually put us back on a just and ethical track.
“The arc of the moral universe is long,” said Dr. King, “but it bends toward justice.
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