Branstad misleads with call to secure border

This week, Gov. Terry Branstad made it clear that immigrant children, unaccompanied by an adult and detained along the southern border, would not be welcomed into Iowa while awaiting their day in court.

The pronouncement did little to stymie efforts underway by a Quad Cities coalition led by Davenport Mayor Bill Gluba, but it has ended a western Iowa plan for a 48-bed shelter facility. It also has served as a spark to bolster, if not launch, other initiatives - like the Eychaner Foundation's 1000 Kids for Iowa - aiming to bring such children into Iowa for shelter and care.

With a nod to November, Branstad expressed sympathy for the children but said government's first order of business must be to secure our southern border.

'Just because we're an empathetic and supportive country doesn't mean that we can take everybody,” Branstad said. 'People need to know that there is a legal way to come to this country and they need to follow the rules.”

But it is misleading to imply or assert the children in question sneaked across with the intent of evading immigration authorities. Quite the opposite is true.

In fact, most of these children are seeking out border patrol agents and requesting help. As such, our law requires federal authorities to investigate for instances of persecution, human trafficking or other situations that may warrant asylum.

In other words, while Branstad's directive to secure the border might poll well, it would do nothing to end this current humanitarian crisis.

When the youngsters, coming from a non-contiguous nation unaccompanied by an adult, continue to travel to the border and present themselves to U.S. authorities, the authorities must apprehend them and investigate their claims for asylum.

Under the bipartisan 2008 reauthorization of the William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Act, which was signed by President George W. Bush, such immigrant children cannot be deported without having those claims adjudicated. Currently, federal immigration courts have a backlog of more than 375,000 such cases.

Branstad is justified to demand clear, comprehensive immigration reform laws from our nation's capital. But he is wrong to try to reduce the plight of these youngsters to political talking points, and fails to live up to Iowa's progressive past for the betterment of us all.

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