Donald Trump can’t even face what he’s done
Kirstjen Nielsen may be gone, resigning shortly after she humiliated herself by trying to defend the White House’s abominable family separation policy yet again, but the dark cloud of the Trump administration’s bigotry is more visible than ever. It’s beyond despicable that the current administration not only locked children in cages and defended it, but that it plans to do it again, even if it means openly defying the law.
Were Donald Trump anything resembling the strong leader he imagines himself to be, he would have at least taken the time to visit one of the camps where the migrant children are being detained, or where several have also died, when he traveled to the southern border last week for a plaque dedication to his racist wall. Nope, he was too worried about the optics, according to Nielsen. Perhaps to put it better would be to say that he’s worried too much about his strongman image, and his standing among racists, to act human for once.
Now that this sickening scandal has been brought to the forefront once again, largely by his own doing, Donald Trump is only growing angrier. You have to ask: what did he expect if all this time, he’s been encouraging officials to ignore the law? Perhaps he was expecting people to blame his predecessor, and that would be the end of it.
At a White House meeting with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, Trump once again brought up the claim that “President Obama separated the children,” ignoring how often this claim has been debunked. He claims to have changed the law with his executive order – another example of him saving the less fortunate from a crisis of his own design.
We’re talking about lives permanently altered because of this administration – and Donald Trump can only view the problem in terms of how others will see it. He can frighten his base by reinforcing their own bigotry against asylum seekers. He can pretend to solve the problem he created by signing an order. But when pressed on what his actual plans are, the times when he needs to present an idea and not perform, we see a much less secure side of him. It’s not enough for the media to heavily report on this crisis. Every day from now until the end of his time in office, people must ask Donald Trump publicly why he supports family separation – until he has no lies to hide behind.
James Sullivan is the assistant editor of Brain World Magazine and an advocate of science-based policy making