Initial reports of a 7-year-old girl's death in Federal custody were that the Federal agents of the Customs and Border Protection (CBP), a part of the Department of Homeland Security or DHS, were told by the girl's father that she was fine. He even filled out a Federal form that told the Federal agents the girl was healthy when she was taken into custody.
On the other hand, the initial reports of the little girl's death in Federal custody also were that her father told CBP that she "had nothing to eat or drink for days[.]"
These initial reports were from Washington, D.C. in the Washington Post. They were "based on reports and interviews with consular officers as well as Homeland Security and Customs and Border Protection officials[.]"
In other words, the initial reports came from the Federal Government and from whatever was added by unknown, unnamed "consular officials" presumably familiar with Guatemala which is where this girl and her father came from. See Nick Miroff, Hours Before Her Collapse in U.S. Custody, a Dying Migrant Child's Condition Went Unnoticed, Washington Post Online Friday, Dec. 14, 2018 at 10:38 PM.
These initial reports of information provided by the Federal Government raise a few questions.
How could the child have been healthy if she had nothing to eat or drink for days?
How could the girl's father have told the Federal agents and filled out their form in English when he did not speak English? His "primary language" we are told is "a pre-Columbian Mayan tongue." Hours Before Collapse in U.S. Custody, supra. It is a pretty good bet that none of the people employed by the Federal Government at the border in the desert speak pre-Columbian Mayan. So they must have communicated with the father, not in English or in Mayan, but in what may have been obvious was his second language, Spanish.
Next question: The 7-year-old girl just crossed a desert with her father before CBP took them into custody. Normal people would expect that she was or might have been dehydrated. Even Little League Umpires make sure that the children playing baseball and softball stay hydrated during games in the spring and summer, whether or not the games are played in the desert.
The CBP itself is not unfamiliar with people crossing the desert. The CBP agents that took the girl and her father into custody are in the desert themselves so they can be reasonably expected to be familiar with the idea that being in the desert can be dehydrating if a person is not careful. Why did the CBP not notice that this little girl in the desert was dehydrated?
We are told that the CBP checked her out and found no signs. Yet we know that she was dehydrated because that is why she died after all. So why did the Federal Government not notice after they arrested her?
Next question: Why were the agents of the Federal Government apparently not equipped for this dehydrated, apparently hungry and certainly tired 7-year-old, who was one among thousands of people turned away from more urban ports of entry by the current Federal Government and forced to seek asylum by crossing a desert?
If this is intentional cruelty, then among other things it isn't even efficient.
The people just keep coming. Like this little girl and her father who were seeking asylum.
The current Federal Government apparently justifies this change in immigration policy at the border, as the CBP head told Congress three days after the child's death, to discourage people from crossing a desert to get into the United States who hope to avoid detection. With a seven-year-old? Not one of the reporters on this story seems to have asked that question, yet.
But to the contrary, all of the reporting about asylum seekers is in agreement on at least one thing: Asylum seekers like this little girl and her father "were not seeking to evade capture but to turn themselves in." Hours Before Collapse in U.S. Custody, supra (emphasis added). The Federal Government's justification does not even seem real. In any case, it is not suited to the situation faced by the thousands of people seeking asylum.
Next questions, both related to one another: Why did it take a week for the Federal Government to admit that the girl had died despite a legal requirement to report deaths within 24 hours, and why did the head of the CBP not say a word about this girl's death when he already knew that she had died by the time he, the head, testified to Congress about immigration?
The current Federal Government's current CBP head "did not mention the girl's death, which was disclosed by CBP only after The Washington Post inquired about it Thursday evening." Hours Before Collapse in U.S. Custody, supra (emphasis added). That answers that question.
A seven-year-old girl died in Federal custody. The current Federal Government has stepped up ... and blamed her father for her death.
More questions to come. These are enough questions to ask for now. But the questions will continue.
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