A Damning Indictment of Trump’s Kids in Cages

Oscar-winning documentarian Errol Morris explores the 2016 Trump administration’s use of “cruelty as a tool” in Separated, a damning indictment of child separation as official US government policy to thwart illegal immigration. Adapted from the book Separated: Inside an American Tragedy, by NBC News journalist Jacob Soboroff, the film focuses on former employees of the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR). They discuss how political vitriol and fierce anti-immigration sentiment became a human rights debacle that still reverberates to this day.

Separated cannot be viewed in a vacuum considering that Trump, and many of the people who implemented child separation, will soon return to power in the executive branch. Immigration was the second-top concern for American voters after the economy. Outrage at the policy, and its disturbing aftermath, had little effect on those who view immigration as an existential crisis for America. Thus, the film will be judged on its informative merits and artistic execution, followed by a devil’s advocate perspective that harsh deterrents are the only effective way to stem a tide that has surged to a conservative estimate of over 11 million undocumented people.

Morris (The Thin Blue Line, Fast, Cheap & Out of Control, The Fog of War) opens with a vocal montage of former presidents swearing to clamp down on undocumented immigration. Donald Trump is then seen at a boisterous 2015 campaign rally promising to “build a border wall” to enthusiastic supporters. Nearly nine years later, Trump’s Democratic opponent in the Presidential election advocated for a similar policy, one of many strategic and moral errors in Kamala Harris’ campaign.

Exposing the Men Who Made the Cages

Morris introduces Jonathan White, the ORR’s deputy director at the time. He explains that for decades the US government made sure to keep undocumented children with their families. Those who made the treacherous border crossing alone, UACs (Unaccompanied Children), were processed and reunited with their relatives in the country. The goal was for Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to never hold a child for more than 72 hours if possible. Everyone understood that keeping children in shelters or institutions was traumatic. “Catch and release” was deemed vital to their well-being.

Separated stamps specific individuals in the Trump administration as the villainous primary architects for this profound change of tactics. These men laid the ideological groundwork before surreptitiously implementing their plans:

• Stephen Miller — a senior Trump advisor and rabid xenophobe, now Trump’s incoming Homeland Security advisor and the deputy chief of staff for policy.
• Tom Homan — former Acting Director for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), now the incoming “border czar.”
• Jeff Sessions — Trump’s Attorney General from 2017 to 2018.
• John Kelly — Trump’s Chief of Staff from 2017 to 2018, who would later call Trump a “dictator” with a fondness for Adolf Hitler.

White and his colleagues at ORR knew that something was amiss in 2017 with children, including infants, being purposely kept from their parents after being apprehended by CBP. This was denied on all levels by higher-ups but obvious to those tasked with caring for the minors.

Errol Morris Continues His Mastery of Documentary Styles

Morris intercuts the bureaucrat interviews with three visual aids to his narrative. We see a fictionalized account of Gabriela (Gabriela Cartol), a 28-year-old Guatemalan woman, and Diego (Diego Armando Lara Lagunes), her elementary-aged son, making the dangerous journey through the “northern triangle” to the US-Mexico border. Animation set to a striking violin accompaniment exacerbates the danger. Efforts by ORR staff, Jacob Soboroff, and eventually other journalists are depicted on screen as emails. This allows Morris to show the audience various chains of command and who was directly responsible as the policy went full steam ahead.

Separated takes a visceral turn in its second act as the administration’s lies and deflections about child separation became a public outcry. There was no reversal but a doubling down as the “decision memo” by now DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen cemented the policy despite serious internal concern about its constitutionality. Legal challenges explode as the ACLU’s (American Civil Liberties Union) Lee Gelernt challenges the administration in court for “blatant cruelty” but refuses to label child separation as “torture” to not further exacerbate the anger and division in America.

Those who believe the most extreme methods are warranted to stop illegal immigration will have no compunctions. Videos and images of crying children in cages locked away from their parents are a necessary evil in Separated, and effective in showing Morris’ point. Trump claims in various interviews that this is the only way to stop the undocumented from coming. White and others vehemently disagree. People flee their native countries to escape poverty and violence. America is a land of hope and opportunity, not a punisher of desperate people. Human rights abuse can never be allowed…but the people have spoken loudly in the November election.

Apathy, anger, or not, the Biden administration’s handling of the problem has been resoundingly rejected, despite doing the same thing for the past two years. Miller and Tom Homan will now have free rein to execute plans for mass deportations. The administration has made clear that all methods are on the table to extricate the undocumented. It remains to be seen if child separation will return in force, but there’s no reason to believe Trump 2.0 won’t be more aggressive in this regard. That should be chilling to all with over a thousand undocumented children still in US custody. The ACLU’s branding of “state sponsored orphans” will historically stain this country if those reprehensible numbers increase.

An Unfortunate Use of Fiction in an Important True Story

Morris accomplishes his goal when sticking to the facts. They are incontrovertible and absolutely appalling. But trying to tug heartstrings with a dramatized recreation of an undocumented mother and son falls flat. His use of dramatized reenactments has worked in the past (as in his controversial classic, The Thin Blue Line), but is unnecessary overkill here.

While most people agree that some form of immigration control is necessary, whatever that looks like should not include barbarism. Child abuse is an unforgivable evil, no matter the nationality of the child. It can never be condoned and deserves the maximum punishment. Kids should not suffer for the actions of their parents or for the bureaucratic mess our politicians have created. White’s assertion that we risk lifelong trauma to the innocent with child separation is indisputable. He just didn’t need dramatic reenactments to confirm that.

Separated is a production of NBC News Studios, Participant, Fourth Floor, and Moxie Pictures. It premieres December 7th at 9 p.m. ET on MSNBC. Learn more here.