ICE is a Joke

What's and American?

ICE is a joke.
Not the acronym — the idea.

Let me get this straight: we pay a government agency to roam neighborhoods and round up people whose only real crime is overstaying their welcome or slipping in through the back door of a party they were never invited to in the first place?

Yes — countries need borders.
Yes — rules matter.
That part isn’t controversial.

But maybe we stop bothering the people who aren’t taking anything from anyone.

The ones raising kids.
Working jobs nobody else wants.
Paying rent.
Paying taxes they’ll never fully benefit from.
Keeping entire industries alive while staying invisible on purpose.

Maybe we leave those people alone.

Maybe to them we say thank you.

At the very least, let their kids go to public school without fear.
Maybe guarantee citizenship if they graduate high school.
You know — the same deal America has always made with labor:

Work hard.
Keep your head down.
Maybe your kids get a shot.

Because let’s stop pretending America “gives” anyone anything.

America doesn’t give you shit.
You earn it — or you take it.
That’s been the deal since the beginning.

Isn’t that the dream?
Isn’t that why everyone came here in the first place?

If America has an identity, isn’t it this?

Start from the bottom.
Be the underdog.
Rely on no one but yourself.

And maybe — just maybe — your kids can keep the lights on.

Not be kings.
Not be rich.
Just be stable.

That’s the promise that pulled people across oceans.
Not comfort.
Not safety.
Opportunity — if you were willing to bleed for it.

They didn’t come for handouts.
They came for a chance.

And now we pretend that same hunger is criminal.
That the instinct we celebrate in our grandparents
is a threat when it shows up speaking another language.

America doesn’t descend from comfort.
It descends from desperation, risk, and refusal to stay stuck.

You don’t honor that history by building bigger walls.
You honor it by recognizing it when it walks past you
in work boots, carrying a lunch pail.

Instead of funding ICE, spend that money supporting the people who actually hold this country together.

The ones who build our homes.
Feed our families.
Care for our elderly.
Clean the places we pretend run themselves.

Because here’s the part nobody wants to say out loud:

We aren’t making babies.
We never really were.

And if you want pensions to still exist,
if you want social security to mean anything,
if you want the lights to stay on a generation from now —
the economy has to keep moving.

That doesn’t happen by chasing workers into hiding.
It happens by supporting the people doing the work.

You can scream about borders all you want,
but demographics don’t care about your feelings.
Math doesn’t vote.
Time doesn’t negotiate.

So yes — this is self-interest.
But hear it anyway.

Hear it because even if you don’t give a damn about them,
you should give a damn about yourself.

Because a country that punishes labor
and worships comfort
doesn’t collapse all at once.

It just slowly stops working.

And by the time you notice,
there’s no one left to blame
but the people who thought cruelty was cheaper than care.

And here’s the worst part — the part nobody wants to touch.

I could stand in a line of Mexican guys leaning against the wall at Home Depot,
and ICE wouldn’t touch me.

Not because I belong —
but because I sound like I do.

The second I open my mouth and someone realizes I’m from up north,
the whole thing flips.

And the bitch of it is this:
I don’t belong either.

I’m not a citizen.
I’m not a resident.
I’m just some guy wandering around.

And somehow… that’s fine.

No papers.
No scrutiny.
No fear.

So what are we actually enforcing here?

Law?
Order?
Or just vibes?

What about tourists?
The ones snapping photos, overstaying visas, hopping trains, blending in because they look like they’re supposed to be here?

Nobody’s checking them.
Nobody’s dragging them out of hotel lobbies.
Nobody’s tearing families apart over souvenir money and Instagram posts.

Because enforcement isn’t about legality —
it’s about who makes people uncomfortable.

We don’t police borders.
We police appearance.

We don’t hunt criminals.
We hunt familiarity.

And the moment you admit that,
the whole argument changes.

Because if the rules only apply when you look poor, speak wrong, or work with your hands —
then those aren’t rules.

They’re excuses.

And that brings me to the question I always ask:

Who’s an American?

Is it paperwork?
A passport?
A birthplace you didn’t choose?

Or is it the person who shows up every day,
works until their back hurts,
pays into a system they might never collect from,
raises kids who pledge allegiance to a flag
that hasn’t decided if it wants them yet?

Is it the woman changing your mother’s sheets in a long-term care home?
The guy framing your house in February?
The man washing dishes at midnight so your restaurant can open again tomorrow?

Because if that’s not American,
then I don’t know what the hell is.

America was never bloodline.
It was never purity.
It was never permission.

It was participation.

It was showing up without guarantees.
Taking risks without safety nets.
Betting everything on the idea that effort might matter.

An American is someone who believes — foolishly, stubbornly —
that if they do the work,
their kids might stand a little taller.

That’s it.
That’s the whole thing.

And the moment we forget that,
we’re not protecting America anymore.

We’re just guarding the memory of it.