Where is Nikki Haley? Human rights advocacy needed for immigrants

History will not give up demanding accountability from the evil actions taken against immigrants, by the failed Donald Trump administration. The human rights abuses of innocent children of immigrants is unforgivable.  For the life of me, I can't understand where United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley is during this inhumanity, while ICEgov is putting immigrant children in cages on the border. 

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley is missing in the humanitarian defense of innocent immigrant children.

An editorial in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch draws attention to the human rights violations now weighing on the Donald Trump administration for enforcing the cruel incarceration of innocent immigrant children.

It's a national embarrassment. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights has issued a blistering criticism of two nations for human rights abuses. One was Egypt. The other was the United States. This is not good company to keep.

Egypt was hammered for a crackdown on the rights of protesters. The U.S. was hit for the Trump administration’s policy of separating migrant children from their families to deter illegal immigrants and those seeking political asylum in the land of the free. The practice is shameful, a blatant violation of American values and arguably the biggest scar on the nation’s soul since police dogs and fire hoses were turned on civil rights protesters.

“The use of immigration detention and family separation as a deterrent runs counter to human rights standards and principles,” the UN office said. “The child’s best interest should always come first, including over migration management objectives or other administrative concerns.”

The Trump administration’s response to this criticism was predictable. UN Ambassador Nikki Haley basically told the human rights office to butt out: “Neither the United Nations nor anyone else will dictate how the United States upholds its borders,” Haley said. (Shame on Nikki Haley, whose parents are immigrants!)

Moreover, Hally went on to bash the human rights records of some of the nations sitting on the UN Human Rights Council; this was correct but irrelevant. The United States is supposed to be better than the likes of Saudi Arabia and Venezuela.

In the weeks since the plight of the children was revealed — the government admits to 658 separations from May 6 to May 13; other estimates are higher — the administration has refused to respond directly to critics. Instead it denies and lies, falsely blaming the problem on Democrats, equating scared toddlers with MS-13 gangbangers. Previous administrations detained children who crossed the border alone, looking for their parents. The “zero tolerance” practice of separating even young children from their families is all Trump.

Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., decided to see for himself. He tried to get into a detention facility inside an abandoned Walmart store in Brownsville, Texas. The private firm that runs the facility under government contract refused to let him in. Health and Human Services officials said Merkley hadn’t given the required two weeks’ notice.

Even worse, local police were called to run the Senator off.

Merkley was eventually allowed into the McAllen, Texas, Border Patrol Processing Center, where undocumented migrants are taken when they first arrive. Families are separated here, with kids staying 72 hours in cage-like enclosures before being sent to detention centers or foster homes. All that was missing were the boxcars.

For having a conscience, a White House spokesman blamed Merkley for policies that “allow violent criminal aliens to flood into American communities.”

This is standard Trumpian lying and blame-shifting. Using it to defend the unforgivable, somehow makes it worse.

Echo opinion published in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.