We U.S. citizens in Italy oppose the U.S. government's cruel, inhumane and unjustified separation of children from their parents along the U.S. border with Mexico and at other ports of entry into the U.S. We protest the conditions in which these children and their parents are kept. We protest the irreversible trauma that is being perpetrated against people who are simply seeking a better life and in many cases fleeing serious persecution.

To separate immigrant families in this manner is both immoral and illegal. Children as young as 18 months are torn from their mothers’ arms by the U.S. government for the express purpose of deterring others from crossing the border. In this way, families that have faced persecution and other extreme harm are being victimized again by the government to which they turn for help. We oppose the inhumane policies of the Trump Administration’s Department of Justice and Department of Homeland Security and we call for immediate reform.

The Trump Administration's conduct is a huge stain on the United States, a democracy founded and built by immigrants. It is a stain on U.S. citizens living abroad, and it is now a threat to the lives and safety of millions of immigrant children. What the Trump Administration is doing, with the cooperation of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents, is a crisis of massive proportions. Its “zero tolerance” policy, under which all adults entering without documents are prosecuted in mass criminal trials and accompanying children are taken from them as a deterrent, violates not only the U.S. Constitution but also international law. It runs totally counter to guidance from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. It has been rightly decried by Amnesty International and numerous other organizations. The Trump Administration has done nothing to address the serious humanitarian and legal concerns. Instead it continues to escalate the policy of separating immigrant families, while also sowing lies and confusion in the public debate.

Many of us are ourselves immigrants in Italy. Many of us are the sons or daughters of immigrants in the U.S. We are disgusted by the dehumanizing rhetoric President Trump uses against immigrant people. We demand that the Trump Administration stop using immigrant children as bargaining chips. We denounce all inhumane and discriminatory immigration policies of the Trump Administration, and also abusive policies implemented by past U.S. administrations.

We demand that the U.S. Department of Justice and Department of Homeland Security IMMEDIATELY stop the implementation of any policy that separates children from their families, that the Administration ensure the well-being of children in its custody, and that it immediately start reuniting the separated children with their families.

CC: Michael T McCaul Sr, House Homeland Security Committee; Senator Ron Johnson, Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee