Over 50 Iowa moms took over Sen. Joni Ernst's office to protest U.S. treatment of migrant kids

[rurallib]

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2019/7/11/1870944/-Over-50-Iowa-moms-took-over-Sen-Joni-Ernst-s-office-to-protest-U-S-treatment-of-migrant-kids

U.S. Sen. Joni Ernst initially refused to speak with more than 50 concerned Iowa mothers who converged on her Des Moines office this week to call on her to do something about the Trump administration’s inhumane treatment of migrant children in border facilities and prison camps across the U.S.

Ernst at first tossed the Moms Against the Camps activists to Corey Becker, an immigration policy staffer that activists found out once worked for noted white supremacist Rep. Steve King. When activists asked Becker “how Ernst's immigration policy differs from Steve King,” Working Families advocate Shawn Sebastian tweeted, “he refused to answer because he felt it was ‘inappropriate.’”

Finally, “after 6.5 hours and about 100 Iowa moms passing through with their children,” Sebastian continued, Ernst agreed to a phone call the next day. It lasted just 20 minutes, with Ernst defending ICE terrorism against immigrant communities ("we need to keep Americans safe”) and taking the brave stance of opposing child abuse but asking them for “specific examples,” as if it hasn’t been all over the news recently. When they asked if Ernst could meet with them after reviewing conditions for herself, Sebastian said, she refused and hung up.

All the advocates wanted was for Ernst to put herself in the shoes of parents at the border for just one second, and some “carried signs that said, ‘What if it were Libby?’ referencing to Ernst's daughter. ‘We need to ask her as a mother, would be she happy if her child was locked in a cage?’” said advocate Bonnie Brown.

Much more at the link