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When families flee violence in Central America and ask for asylum in the US, armed officers confront them and, on Trump’s orders, pry children from their parents and disappear. More than 2,000 children have been taken from their families and imprisoned. More child detention centers are being opened to handle the overflow.

The parents and children have no idea if they will ever be reunited. The American Academy of Pediatrics says this sudden, forced separation can result in a lifelong emotional disability, similar to PTSD.

Consistently, Trump and his propaganda machine have blamed immigrants for everything from draining welfare services to murder. It’s working. Hate crimes have soared. As ICE sweeps through communities, a climate of fear from the armed bigots and federal thugs of ICE now oppress immigrant neighborhoods.

Trump is feeling significant blowback. Republicans and Democrats, religious leaders and pediatricians, scholars and ethicists, even Laura Bush have all denounced this policy.

Turn up the heat!

Call your MoCs now. They need to stop this policy of torturing children and terrorizing families. Bills that capitulate to Trump’s demands for border wall funding and a reduction in legal immigration are ransoms we cannot pay.