Political Quotes

“I thank the Senator of Illinois for the question. As you are telling this story, I was thinking about a story from Oregon in which a woman who has been there for a long time--she has legal status in the United States. Her mother visits from Honduras, and her sister lives in Canada. There is a park on the border between Washington State and Canada where people can go into the park and meet. They have to leave by the same entry they came in. They have done this before, and so her mother gets to be with her, and then with her sister, the three of them and four children--7-year-old triplets and a 9-year-old, I believe. And the children are U.S. citizens. So they do what they have done before: They go up to meet the Canadian sister in this park. While they are hugging, she gets arrested. Arrested why? For smuggling her sister into the United States. But they are in this park that is set up for that purpose. She is still being held. The children were released, and they are with a family friend. And the grandmother was released, the mother's mother, but the mother, Jackie--mother of the four American children--is still being held. We keep protesting, writing, calling, and she is still being held. The case against her was dropped. Why? Because you can't arrest somebody for hugging in a park set up for that purpose. This is my understanding of the case. But think about how that story says everyone is at risk all the time. Everyone is at risk. So there is fear and trepidation.…”