The former Customs and Border Protection chief who helped implement state-sanctioned kidnapping of migrant children at the southern border and recently addressed an anti-immigrant hate group shouldn’t be promoted to a top post in the federal government, but that’s exactly why Donald Trump wants to make Ronald Vitiello the new head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The Senate needs to reject him.
“Vitiello’s backers are trying to improve the prospects of his nomination by portraying him … as a ‘quiet and thoughtful leader willing to engage with people who have opposing opinions,’” America’s Voice noted, but he put his extremism on full display during a hearing on his nomination Thursday, refusing to say how long kids should be detained (Trump wants to do it indefinitely) or “whether the separation from their families caused them psychological harm,” the Washington Post reported.
Yes, children have been traumatized by family separation and are still being traumatized by family separation, because officials still have kids in U.S. custody. Vitiello has tried to minimize this humanitarian disaster, telling an event organized by the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) this past September that “only 2,500 people were affected by that situation.” FAIR, by the way, is an anti-immigrant hate group founded by a eugenicist.
During the hearing, Vitiello was also confronted by U.S. Senator Gary Peters of Michigan about a tweet from just three years ago, where he suggested to conservative talk show host Mark Levin that the Democratic Party should be renamed the "NeoKlanist" Party. Vitiello said he never meant it to be public, thinking it was a direct message. Oh. "It's important and I understand the gravity, it was meant as a joke. I wasn't trying to do anything other than make a joke,” he claimed. “I regret it.”
But not really, because FAIR’s founder, John Tanton, actually has associated with people connected with the Klan. “Quiet and thoughtful leader willing to engage with people who have opposing opinions,” my ass. “At a time when the American people have spoken up and voted out many defenders and facilitators of Trump’s ugliness on immigrants,” said Pili Tobar of America’s Voice, “the Senate should not advance the nomination of another defender and hater into a leadership position.” The Senate needs to reject him.