Readers Write: The Whipple Building, ICE agent standards, the truth, Liam Conejo Ramos

Opinion editor’s note: Strib Voices publishes letters from readers online and in print each day. To contribute, click here.

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“ICE out” is a good slogan, and there’s no reason to back off just because the monster is getting a face-lift. (Adios, Border Patrol Cmdr. Greg Bovino.) But it’s time to elevate another slogan: “We want in.” Specifically, into the immigration detention facilities, starting with the Whipple Federal Building lockup. Not personally, but by way of reliable surrogates, we need to see what’s happening in these black holes.

The Trump administration’s reaction to the Renee Good and Alex Pretti killings shows why. Trump officials will say anything if they think they can get away with it, and what they do say is best understood as ad copy (“murderers, rapists and pedophiles!”), tethered to reality by the thinnest of threads or nothing at all. Recent events, however, demonstrate that even some of their stalwarts can be shaken out of their trance by video footage.

The problem is that it’s unlikely anyone will pull video out of a detention facility. But given the brutality of what the goon squads are doing when they know they are being recorded, what’s happening inside is likely much worse. Anecdotal accounts have been horrific. True or not, we need to see it.

Cheers to the elected officials who a few weeks ago tried to get into the Whipple facility. They were blocked, but they should persist by any means available, including lawsuits. In the meantime the rest of us could start making more noise about it. The message: We want in. ICE and border-control holding facilities should be subject to frequent, unannounced and thorough inspections, conducted by independent examiners who are not on Trump’s leash.

David Rubenstein, Minneapolis

So, ask yourself: Why doesn’t Immigration and Customs Enforcement management insist on similar standards?

Joe Ritter, Minneapolis

There is much to be said on the details of the tragic death of Alex Pretti and the big picture it’s a part of. But I’d like to drive toward more “mid-level” truths on the art of manipulation. Because, even if one thinks deadly force was completely justified in this case, the gulf between the initial story the administration spun and what visibly happened is obvious. And that, alone, should give you pause. While the lies themselves were crude, I would suggest the psychology behind them is more sophisticated and making them obvious serves multiple functions.

These times are confusing and overwhelming, but I think the basic formula for psychological defense is simple: Keep your heart warm and your head frosty.

Michael Pender, Northfield

There have been countless videos on social media about immigration agents trying to prevent observers from making videos and knocking phones or taking phones away. The reaction of federal officers when people try to video the truth is violence, pepper spray, tackling, arresting.

Let’s think about and focus on why for just a moment: It’s because Trump and the feds don’t want the truth to be exposed. Videos show the truth. If Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents were following the law, why would they care about recording their actions? If ICE agents were following the law, they wouldn’t care if their identities are known. Legit law enforcement has nothing to hide. The very fact that there’s such a strong effort to prevent the truth is the biggest alarm of all.

Sound the alarm everywhere. Make people understand what’s going on. This administration is going to extremes to hide the truth because it no longer follows the Constitution or has any humanity. We know from history where this leads, and we know it needs to stop now.

Laura Neuman, Eden Prairie

“[F]or some among us, the perfidious lust for unbridled power and the imposition of cruelty in its quest know no bounds and are bereft of human decency.” These words were written by a district judge in Texas who ordered the release from detention of 5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos and his father (“Judge rules Columbia Heights boy and father must be released from Texas detention center,” Jan. 31). They pertain to more than this particular case; they aptly describe the force that motivates the Trump administration and the moral vacuum at its core.

As a Jewish American, I feel compelled to speak out against recent public comparisons by Gov. Tim Walz and other Democratic politicians between the experiences of individuals in modern immigration detention and what Anne Frank — and millions of Jews — endured during the Holocaust. These statements are not simply misguided; they are profoundly offensive and historically indefensible.

The Holocaust was a systematic, state-driven attempt to annihilate an entire people. Jews were stripped of every right, hunted, deported, enslaved, starved and murdered solely because of their identity. Six million Jews were killed — not as a byproduct of policy but as the explicit goal of the Nazi regime.

To equate this genocide with the enforcement of immigration laws is to erase the reality of what happened. Immigration detention, whatever its flaws, is governed by legal processes, oversight and the basic obligation to provide food, shelter and medical care. People in these facilities maintain legal rights and the ability to seek counsel, hearings and appeals. These facts are not remotely comparable to the machinery of extermination built by the Nazis.

When public figures invoke the Holocaust to score rhetorical points, they trivialize the suffering of its victims and diminish one of the darkest chapters in human history. There are many ways to debate modern policies, but Holocaust analogies should not be one of them. This history is too grave, too real and too deeply etched into the memory of my community to be used as a metaphor.