Separating kids and parents is human rights violation, not punishment

Re “Down on the border, a new trail of tears’’ by Liz Goodwin (Page A1, June 10): Screaming children are being pulled from the arms of their weeping mothers and fathers every day. Many of the Central American families being broken at the border are seeking asylum, fleeing from deadly violence. Crossing the border without a visa is a misdemeanor, and seeking asylum is enshrined in our laws. Separating a child from a parent is not a legal punishment for any offense — it is a human rights violation.

Pediatricians around the country are speaking out against families being broken in the name of immigration enforcement. We know that children’s brain architecture and even epigenetic states passed to following generations are permanently altered by toxic stress, from which only the constant comforting presence of loving adults protects.

If we allow children to be turned into political weapons, and allow their health and future to be destroyed so cruelly, what does that say about us all? What can all our children, US citizens or noncitizens, expect from us, if we permit our government to inflict these lifelong wounds on some children in such a calculated manner? We call on our elected officials to pass the HELP Separated Children Act. We ask them to put an end to the current administration’s child-hostile policies.

Dr. Julia Koehler

Jamaica Plain

The writer is a pediatrician and the chair of the Immigrant Health Committee of the Massachusetts chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Heartbreaking injustice dispensed by our so-called leaders

I look at my young granddaughter, how beautiful she is and how beloved by her family. All children are just as precious, and parents everywhere love and wish to protect and support their children. I am heartbroken that hundreds of precious children, after grueling treks, finally arrive with their parents at what they hope is a place of promise, and are torn from their parents and taken away. What fear and sadness must those children feel? Parents and children find themselves in a traumatic, cruel nightmare, paid for by our taxes, and forcibly carried out by our so-called leaders.

I ask the Globe to keep this tragic situation on the front page every day, because every day more innocent children are taken away. Help us to learn the true horror of this misguided, hateful policy. Our government acts as if those seeking asylum and safety for their children are criminals. The only criminal activity at the border right now is taking children from their parents.

Sharlene Voogd Cochrane

Jamaica Plain

This is an unpardonable offense

Donald Trump grants pardons to a parade of liars, cheats, and swindlers. Meanwhile, he sends to prison desperate poor people drawn to this country in search of a better life for their children. And the children? Torn from their parents and cast into bureaucratic purgatory. Far from making America great again, Trump’s actions, and those of his feckless administration, betray the high-minded principles of Enlightenment that were embraced by the Founders of this once-great country. The land of opportunity is becoming under Trump a land of chauvinism, avarice, and xenophobia.

Gregory E. Smith

Boston