by Professor McCorkle and Will Davis
On Monday, April 12, 2021 South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster signed an executive order barring unaccompanied minors from being housed by foster care or group homes in South Carolina. This announcement came right after McMaster made a very public trip to the border last week. His argument is that DSS is already short on quality foster care to house children in the state and cannot afford to house other children coming into the state.
Now, we understand that the foster care system in South Carolina needs greater support, efficiency and structure but to deny families that would take up the charge of caring for children and look to care for others at our doorstep is unethical, cruel and against the excellent American way. We did feel that as two individuals who have spent extensive time on the Mexican side of the border-serving, praying with, and learning from the migrants at the border camp in Matamoros, Mexico, we could give some insight that is sorely missed in the current discussion.
If you would listen to McMaster and many in our state, you would think that the problem is that Biden’s policies are too lenient. It is true, Biden has not allowed the quick removal and expulsion of minors, which was practiced under Trump, but this is because to deport minors back into often horrific conditions and potential kidnapping is a human rights violation and against any legitimate ethical framework. However, this alone does not explain the large surge of unaccompanied minors. Perhaps the more substantial issue is how Biden has continued with many of Trump’s policies, particularly Title 42 which restricts those seeking asylum in the name of stopping the spread of COVID, which now is little more than an excuse to not open back up the borders to migrant families to go through the asylum process, which they are entitled to do by U.S. law.
This has caused many families to make the heart wrenching decision to send their children illegally across the Rio Grande after they have been deported or stopped from entering. Families are forced to pay cartel members to have their children cross the river. If they try to cross without paying, they can be killed. Of course, this restrictive system bolsters the cartels even more. We were just talking to a friend in one of the border cities a few weeks ago who was in this desperate situation. She wanted to send her children across rather than stay in the dangerous border city they were residing. It is a decision no family should have to make.
There are many who want to create anxiety about immigration. It is a worn out tactic used by those who want to create fear of the other to gain political clout. McMaster is playing politics. It’s easy pickings when society has “hardened hearts” towards immigrants on the Southern border and is feeding that narrative under the guise of “protect and care for our own.” Enough with false and antiquated cries which roar against scriptural commands. We are hoping as a society we can move beyond this simplistic thinking. Immigrants are not to be feared. We will never forget one of the last nights we were in the border camp that the people were praying that they would finally have the chance to cross through the Rio Grande, which they compared to the Jordan River. Just as God delivered the children of Israel, he would deliver them. From the Christian scriptures it is clear that God is particularly close with the fatherless, foreigner, and oppressed. Let’s make sure we are not standing on the other side in our fear and anger. Our problem in South Carolina is not immigrant children overrunning our system, it is us turning a blind eye and hardening our hearts.
This past year has shown us it is due time for Americans to reevaluate their stances on global-connectedness, the proper Christian framework of caring for the orphan, widow, the sojourner and oppressed. We believe this is a wake up call for churches especially in the Southern “Bible belt” to recall the scriptures of caring for our neighbor and the least of these, or stepping up to the call and need of supporting the South Carolina foster care system while still embracing immigrant children. It’s time to reimagine what caring for sojourners, asylum seekers, immigrants, refugees look and sounds like. There is no way you travel to the border, read or listen to those who serve at the border as we have and not understand that something new must be done!
McMaster’s executive order is another compassionless political move that fuels cowardly convictions which are roots of biased, discriminatory and xenophobic mindsets to which any of us can succumb if we do not actively work against it. I hope that we will evaluate DSS and foster care in our state with the true intent of caring for South Carolinian families and children, a stop order on embracing others isn’t necessary.
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