How desperate do you have to be to make money in this country that you’re willing to exploit vulnerable people?
Or how greedy – for isn’t that the m.o. of this country from the beginning, exploiting the resources including labor, and wealth of other people for one’s own personal gain?
My own brother, the greedy type, one time had to replace the roof on his home, which was to cost over $35,000. He announced this fact at a family dinner and then proceeded to let us all know with a slick little chuckle, that he had searched until he found someone hungry, desperate. I didn’t understand, why hungry, desperate? He explained, still chuckling, the guys replaced the roof for $5000.
It was the last family dinner I attended after blasting him shocking into silence everyone else’s delighted laughter and expressions of admiration and pride in his cunning exploitation of a desperate person.
I learned today in court that there’s been folks scheming to take advantage of refugees who are super distressed about obtaining the safety and security – not to mention the ability to work – of legal status in this country. People who most likely do not speak the language, people who have already successfully navigated a dangerous, treacherous, exhausting route to arrive here.
People so unfamiliar with our system of courts and lawyers and rules and regulations.
People merely trying to survive and provide for their basic needs, and their families. People terrified of what could happen to them, should they be deported.
Then there are the people willing to exploit these most vulnerable refugees. They may have been immigrants themselves, or children of immigrants. They themselves might be/must be so desperate to make money – and we all know how difficult it is to make real money in this country – they are willing to do despicable things, not just robbing immigrants but putting them in a position of being deported.
Or maybe they’re the MAGA people, trying to ensure refugees miss their real court appointments so they can help tRump meet his goal of deporting millions of people: because if you do not show up for your court date, the judge will order you deported in absentia.
Whoever these people are, they pretend to be immigration lawyers, judges, officers of the court – and they even take people to a fake courthouse.
There was a family today – a mother, father, baby and child – who had entered the country through Texas legally on CBP ONE, reporting by video, to tell the judge the reason they missed the first court date was because they were scammed. Frauded was the word the interpreter used.
The judge, seemingly not surprised at all, said she knew this was happening and expressed her sorrow this had happened to them. She excused their missed court date, told them she would reschedule their date to appear – giving them a change to secure a real lawyer – and send them a list of those real lawyers and legal aid organizations, and then gave them instructions on how they could make sure the people claiming to help them were real lawyers.
She also gave them the option of attending over the video link or appearing in the courtroom. Of course they chose the video link.
