{"id":21290,"date":"2019-03-26T14:33:39","date_gmt":"2019-03-26T18:33:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/live-immigrationreform.pantheonsite.io\/?p=21290"},"modified":"2019-03-26T14:33:40","modified_gmt":"2019-03-26T18:33:40","slug":"when-the-truth-about-border-security-doesnt-make-the-cut-immigrationreform-com","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/2019\/03\/26\/when-the-truth-about-border-security-doesnt-make-the-cut-immigrationreform-com\/","title":{"rendered":"When the Truth About Border Security Doesn\u2019t Make The Cut"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A significant portion of the media\u2019s immigration reporting is both vague and misleading. A recent story in The Cut<\/a><\/em> is a perfect example: Titled \u201c9-Year-Old Girl Detained at Border for Providing \u2018Inconsistent Information,\u2019\u201d it purports to call out U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) for unreasonably detaining a young child. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\u2019re told that Julia Isabel Amparo\nMedina, a U.S. citizen, was attempting to cross the U.S.\/Mexico border at the\nSan Ysidro port of entry, when CBP officers took the youngster into custody and\nheld her for over 32 hours. Of course, what The\nCut <\/em>glosses over is how <\/em>the child\nattempted to cross the border and why<\/em>\nshe was detained. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Apparently, Julia and her brother\nOscar Amparo Medina live in Tijuana and commute to school in the United States.\nOn the day Julia was taken into immigration custody, a family friend named\nMichelle Cardenas offered to drive the Amparo Medina children to school, along\nwith her own kids. However, when Ms. Cardenas found herself running late and in\na slow-moving inspection line, she told the children to \u201cjust walk across the\nborder.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nCut<\/em> didn\u2019t think that was a big deal. After all, what else should a busy\ntransnational mom running late for the school day be expected to do?\nNevertheless, what The Cut <\/em>didn\u2019t\nseem to grasp was how the situation might appear to CBP.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sending children, who present stolen American passports, through a port of entry without an adult is a common smuggler\u2019s ploy. All U.S. citizens, even unaccompanied children, are entitled to be readmitted to the United States. Children grow and change quickly enough that immigration inspectors will often disregard differences between a minor\u2019s appearance and the photo on his\/her passport. So smugglers<\/a> equip foreign kids with filched U.S. citizenship documents, drop them off at a port of entry, and instruct the children to make their way through the immigration inspection line by themselves. If the kids manage to clear immigration, another smuggler reclaims them on the American side of the border.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Judicial decisions on family separation<\/a>, and the detention of minors<\/a>, have turned children\u00a0 into \u201cget-into-America-free\u201d tickets. As a result, CBP is hyper-vigilant about making sure that children<\/a> crossing the border aren\u2019t \u201crent-a-kids\u201d being used in \u201cchild recycling<\/a>\u201d schemes, or victims of human trafficking<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, rather than deliberately terrifying a nine-year-old, as The Cut<\/em> implies, CBP officers seem to have stopped young Julia and taken the appropriate steps to identify her and return her to an actual family member. Moreover, the whole situation could have been avoided if Ms. Cardenas had simply exercised better judgment. But, The Cut<\/em> declined to address any of those issues \u2013 because they don\u2019t support the \u201cCBP as racist\/alien as victim\u201d narrative<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Cut <\/em>\u00a0isn\u2019t the type of media organization you\u2019d expect to produce insightful coverage of a complex issue like immigration. Its pages are filled with the sort of light-hearted fluff that one reads in the lobby of the dentist\u2019s office while waiting for a cleaning. Nevertheless, even pop-culture news outlets should have some kind of editorial standards. If it can\u2019t provide both facts and context, without misleading hype, then The Cut<\/em> ought to stick to its forte: pieces like \u201cThe Divorced Woman Trying to Stop Sleeping With Her Ex<\/a>,\u201d and \u201cIs It Any Fun to Shop at New York\u2019s New Mega Mall<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A significant portion of the media\u2019s immigration reporting is both vague and misleading. A recent story in The Cut is a perfect example: Titled \u201c9-Year-Old Girl Detained at Border for Providing \u2018Inconsistent Information,\u2019\u201d it purports to call out U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) for unreasonably detaining a young child. We\u2019re told that Julia Isabel<\/p>\n

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