Masked secret police officers in unmarked cars. Warrantless arrests. Broken car windows. Crying children in the backseat. Bewildered onlookers. Families torn apart. Employers with missing laborers. Classrooms with empty seats. Communities on edge and afraid. This is the repressive reality under a government that has declared war on the millions of migrants living in the United States.
The unmistakable videos circulating online are a testimony to the appalling tactics being carried out under the direction of the federal government and cooperating local agencies. They show the arrests of individuals at the grocery store, on their job sites, traveling with their children, and babies being pulled from the arms of their parents or caregivers by armed men in masks and fatigues. In a matter of moments, the life they’ve been building and the people they love are suddenly stripped from them. Regardless of permanent, temporary, pending, or undocumented status as residents, the basic rights of thousands of people are being denied every day with increasing cruelty and violence.
This is the repressive reality under a government that has declared war on the millions of migrants living in the United States.
Advocating for a more just world for everyone requires humility and courage to confront the uncomfortable truths about ourselves. Since the late 1400s, North America and what eventually became the United States three hundred years later emerged as a land of foreign people, cultures, and ideals. From native tribes whose ancestors lived on these lands for thousands of years to European colonialism, the African slave trade, mass migration caused by war and poverty, and economic mobility, America has been shaped by our divergent past and ever-evolving promise for a better tomorrow. As the folk song goes, “This land is made for you and me.”
As of 2025, there are over 51 million foreign-born individuals currently living, working, and attending school in the United States.[1] They include naturalized, legal permanent, temporary, and undocumented people, representing 16% of the population. They are our neighbors, children’s classmates, college students, employees, and even members of the armed forces. Despite the attempt of Trump, his administration, and MAGA influencers to characterize the immigrant community as vile criminals and terrorists, the data and our personal encounters do not support these cruel and disparaging labels. There is no moral justification to the injustice being done against a mass population group.
The basic rights of thousands of people are being denied every day with increasing cruelty and violence.
Mahmoud Khalil, a former Columbia University graduate student, spent 104 days in an ICE detention center in Louisiana. Describing the sobering reality of the thousands like him arrested and awaiting their fate, he said, “Once you enter [the ICE detention center], you see a different reality. Just a different reality about this country that supposedly champions human rights, liberty, and justice. Once you cross, literally that door, you see the opposite side of what happens in this country.”[2]
In Florida where they now face overcrowding in existing ICE detention centers, the state quickly began assembling a temporary center on an abandoned airfield in the middle of Everglades National Park. They sadistically call it “Alligator Alcatraz”.[3] Rather than engaging community members to seek holistic immigration reform amidst growing geopolitical challenges, the government has resorted to near-unrestrained brutality on our city streets and in our backyards. Then, like a criminal enterprise, the administration and their enablers attempt to hide their bounty in the swampy lands of the Everglades.
There are emerging bright spots in opposition to the efforts to resist the totalitarian efforts to intimidate and remove non-citizens from the country. The courts—to a limited degree—are holding the Trump administration accountable for the rights afforded to citizens and non-citizens alike. Americans are also standing up in defense of their foreign-born neighbors with rallies, marches, and protests against immigration raids and the inhumane conditions in ICE detention facilities. We also celebrate the just release of Mahmoud Khalil, Rümeysa Öztürk, and the return of Kilmar Abrego Garcia from El Salvador whose stories have become the face of overreaching immigration enforcement. These small victories send a message that oppressive and inhumane acts by the government are never popular, and that should inspire hope in all of us.
Kidnappings by masked officers, stripping children from their parents’ arms, overcrowded holding cells and cages, and the denial of basic human rights, is an unacceptable and intolerable reality for everyone. A nation that chooses to protect and privilege the rights of some over others is not free, but oppressive and unjust. When injustice is sanctioned and institutionalized by the forces of government, everyone suffers. A better tomorrow is not found in self-protection, isolation, or exceptionalism, but through our collective compassion, diversity, and commitment to equality for all.
Hope and social change remain possible so long as we remain committed to a holistic and equitable world for everyone, everywhere.
[1] https://www.perplexity.ai/page/us-immigrant-population-breakd-ugJfuSYfRCaWw5BuROEH3g
[2] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jun/20/mahmoud-khalil-release-ice-detention
Matt Till 