[guest post by Dana]

This isn’t good:

Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents are repeatedly releasing detainees who have been diagnosed with the coronavirus… In one example, an asylum-seeker from Cameroon was driven from immigration detention to a bus station in the California border city of Calexico and, when volunteers greeted him and offered help, he told them he had been diagnosed with COVID-19. The next day, a Cuban man was dropped off who had also just tested positive.

…

Jules Kramer, chief of operations at the Minority Humanitarian Foundation, a nonprofit that aids migrants and refugees on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border. “It’s a threat to public safety. It’s a threat to our asylum seekers. It’s a threat to the people on the ground helping.

Per ICE:

ICE officials said in a statement that the medical staff at the Imperial Regional Detention Facility, where they were monitoring 12 people who have the virus as of late last week, tests people for the virus before they are released, and counsels them on federal health guidelines such as wearing personal protective equipment and quarantining.

“U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is firmly committed to the health and welfare of all those in its custody,” spokeswoman Paige Hughes said in a statement. “In these particular instances, ICE had no legal authority to continue detention for the individuals referenced.”

“In addition, the individual’s sponsor, should they have one, and the Imperial County public health officials are notified,” she added. The agency would not say whom it notified.

However, Imperial County officials said not so fast, ICE:

Imperial County officials gave a different account, saying ICE did not notify them that they were releasing people diagnosed with the virus.

“The unknown release of COVID positive nonresidents of the County is definitely a concern for the health of our community, but in recognizing that these individuals are in need of humanitarian aid, the County of Imperial took action,” Rebecca Terrazas-Baxter, the county’s intergovernmental relations director, said in a statement.

From the report:

Nearly 10,000 detainees have been infected with the virus and nine have died. More than 420 detainees have the virus, up from 370 a few days ago, according to the agency’s website.

And while this is in reference to the surge of unaccompanied minors currently being detained in the U.S., it seems that if ICE is releasing COVID positive individuals into the population – without warning – then that just emphasizes the multi-layered severity of the crisis at the border:

Only a week ago, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas declined to use the word “crisis” as his agency shifted border-patrol deployments because of a surge of migrants coming from Mexico. President Joe Biden ignored a question about the issue during a Tuesday event on pandemic relief for small business. White House press secretary Jen Psaki wouldn’t accept that word either at her briefing Tuesday.

“Look, I don’t think we need to sit here and put new labels on what we have already conveyed is challenging, what we have conveyed is a top priority for the president,” Psaki said. But semantic arguments aside, it’s indisputably a mess, with the number of unaccompanied children arriving in the U.S. reportedly tripling in just the last two weeks, according to reports.

–Dana

[guest post by Dana]

It’s 2021. How on earth does a trained teacher think this is a good idea? Especially on the heels of Black History Month:

The mock Twitter posts were taped to a wall inside a North Carolina elementary school, written in the careful penmanship of fourth-graders.

“You may not agree with slavery but I do and I’m honest about it. #SlaveryforLife,” read one, above the made-up account name @dontStopSlavery. Said another, using the handle @Confederate4life: “Why do we need to leave the country? We can stay and our slaves! #SLAVERYFOREVER.”

The messages were the result of an assignment asking Waxhaw Elementary School students to write tweets that North Carolina residents might have posted if Twitter had existed in the Civil War era. Initially, the school about 20 miles south of Charlotte shared a photograph of the “Civil War Twitter Board” on Facebook, writing in the caption that the fourth-grade students “picked the tweet they were most proud of” for the display.

Thinking that this particular assignment would be an effective way for students to learn about *North Carolina’s* history during the Civil War era leads me to believe that the teacher should not be in the classroom. Moreover, that the school posted photos of the “tweets” on Facebook leads me to believe that it wasn’t just the teacher who approved of the project. Depending on their size, school districts either have a dedicated Communication Officer responsible for managing all district social media accounts or on-site teachers are paid a stipend to be the technology liaison for their site. Regardless of who it was that posted the assignment results on Facebook, it demonstrated an utter lack of discretion and sensitivity. How could they *not* know that parents and community members, especially those in the Black community, would be offended by the assignment and its involvement of young children? I don’t think that it was necessarily just an error in judgment, however. There remains the possibility that the teacher knew exactly what she was doing, and didn’t care who might be hurt as a result. I don’t know. But because children were involved, I am not inclined to give any adult involved the benefit of the doubt. Also, why did none of the other adults on campus protest? Surely, fellow teachers, custodians, and perhaps even an administrator had been in the classroom while the project was displayed on the walls.

You can read North Carolina’s Essential Standards: Fourth Grade Social Studies here. Excerpt:

The historical significance of various statues in North Carolina.

For example: The statue of the confederate soldier outside the Old State Capitol building is significant because it represents the confederacy and honors the lives of the southern men who fought for the Confederacy.

It should be noted that “the school is 20 minutes from the Monroe County Courthouse, where a Confederate monument has stood since 1910, and last year, a Union County school board member resigned after making racist posts on social media”. This helps to inform us of the region’s climate, even today. Also, 10.2% of the student population at the school are Black.

It’s sad too that there were no tweets against slavery in the Facebook post:

The “tweets,” which were taped to the classroom wall, do not mention any historical figure by name. None of the ones highlighted on the school’s Facebook page were anti-slavery. FOX 46 asked which historical figures the “tweets” were supposed to represent but did not get an answer.

Finally, district superintendent Andrew G. Houlihan issued a public apology to students, staff, and parents:

will ensure this doesn’t happen again. We are actively dev. PD to address diversity, equity and inclusion and rec. that lessons such as these have no place in any @UCPSNC school. We are addressing this matter and sincerely apologize to our Ss, staff, families and community.

— Andrew G. Houlihan (@AGHoulihan) March 12, 2021

–Dana

The #FAKENEWSBEZOSPOST has the story:

Federal authorities have arrested and charged two men with assaulting U.S. Capitol Police officer Brian D. Sicknick with bear spray during the Jan. 6 Capitol riot but have not determined whether the exposure caused his death.

Julian Elie Khater, 32, of Pennsylvania and George Pierre Tanios, 39 of Morgantown, W.Va., were arrested Sunday and are expected to appear in federal court Monday.

“Give me that bear s—,” Khater allegedly said to Tanios on video recorded at the Lower West Terrace of the Capitol at 2:14 p.m., where Sicknick and other officers were standing guard behind metal bicycle racks, arrest papers say.

About nine minutes later, after Khater said he had been hit with bear spray, Khater is seen on video discharging a canister into the face of Sicknick and two other officers, arrest papers allege.

The article makes clear that no autopsy report or toxicology report has been made available to the public, so there is still much we don’t know about Officer Sicknick’s death. Still, it would be quite a coinkidink for him to have suddenly dropped dead one day after being attacked with bear spray due to entirely unrelated causes.