Trump’s Deportation Plans for Immigrants

To the Editor:

Re “Trump’s ’25 Immigration Plan: Giant Camps, Mass Deportation” (front page, Nov. 12):

After choking on my coffee reading this excellent in-depth piece, I contemplated the America we will live in if these ambitious and aggressive ideas bear fruit.

Do the architects of this plan really believe we will have a stronger, safer and more prosperous country by setting up giant immigrant camps and carrying out mass deportations?

I am descended from “white” privilege and members of the Daughters of the American Revolution. My family has grown stronger in recent years by the blending of ethnic, cultural and religious origins through marriage and adoption — with Indonesian, Malaysian, Algerian, Romanian, Iranian and Danish heritages combined with Scot Irish and English ones.

We have family members who are Jewish, Muslim, Sikh, Buddhist, atheist and agnostic as well as Episcopalian, Quaker and Catholic.

The reality is that our economy and society thrive because of our diversity. For that reason, my license plate is framed with the slogan “Make America Great, Welcome Immigrants.”

Cynthia Mackie
Silver Spring, Md.

To the Editor:

Stating that immigrants are “poisoning the blood of our country,” Donald Trump has offered a vision for another term that includes immediate mass deportations, ending DACA, an even more restrictive Muslim ban, relegating migrants to huge tent cities in Texas and more.

I read this with the same dread I felt when articles were written about the possible overturning of Roe v. Wade. Many people thought, “Oh, that won’t happen here.” But it did. It did happen.

Donald Trump and Stephen Miller will wreak havoc on everything our country stands for. It will be a daily dose of outrage and horror. Those who aren’t tuned in to this potential for disaster will realize what they were ignoring only when it is too late.

The next election may be the most important in our history as a country. Sitting it out or voting third party is not an option. Our country’s future and our quality of life depend on showing up to vote.

People need to understand that these are not offhand remarks. Mr. Trump does what he says he’s going to do. He has clearly shown us what he is and who he is: a wannabe dictator.

Kathryn Janus
Chicago

To the Editor:

Donald Trump’s immigration restriction plans contain much that will be to the liking of the American people. As a lifelong Democrat and the son of immigrants who had to wait years for citizenship, I like it myself because 1) huge amounts of taxpayer dollars are going to the support of undocumented immigrants and 2) America faces a crisis of overpopulation, which is already straining our natural resources.

I categorically reject the demonization of immigrants, and I also note that Mr. Trump’s policies generally favor the top 2 percent, not the average American. But if President Biden ignores this issue, or keeps doing what he is doing, it will cost him the election.

Alan Saly
Brooklyn

To the Editor:

It is worse than hypocritical that the man behind the dark menace of deportation — Stephen Miller — descends from a family of immigrants who escaped the pogroms in Eastern Europe and found refuge in America.

As a Jew and the son of Holocaust survivors, I am frankly appalled by Mr. Miller’s harsh and seemingly uncompromising position.

America is nothing if not a nation of immigrants. For Mr. Miller to foment an unrestrained assault against immigrants is, if I may use the term, “beyond the Pale.”

Edwin S. Rothschild
McLean, Va.

Shocked by Trump’s Vow to Root Out ‘Vermin’

To the Editor:

Re “After Calling Foes ‘Vermin,’ Trump Campaign Warns Its Critics Will Be ‘Crushed’” (nytimes.com, Nov. 13):

At a campaign event Saturday in New Hampshire, Donald Trump vowed to “root out the communists, Marxists, fascists and the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country.”

So often I have heard variations on the poem that begins, “First they came for the Communists …”

Did the people attending a Veterans Day event not hear the echo from less than 100 years ago when they or their parents or grandparents went to war to protect democracy against fascists from Germany and Italy who voiced these same goals?

It is shocking that a vast support network is prepared to put these plans into effect here if the former president is re-elected in 2024.

Bob Adler
New York

To the Editor:

People are not vermin. Even the person who compares his political opponents to “vermin” is not vermin; he is a human being.

Donald Trump’s despicable speech, however, should make every American recoil in horror that he would use such a dehumanizing tactic toward people who disagree with him. The Republican Party should immediately distance itself from Mr. Trump and his dangerous rhetoric.

Anyone who believes that people are vermin should not be elected to any office, from local P.T.A. president on up. Certainly, the highest office in the land should never be in the hands of such a person.

Justin Stormo Gipson
Newman Lake, Wash.

Women in China, Loath to Turn Back the Clock

To the Editor:

Re “China’s Male Leaders Signal to Women That Their Place Is in the Home” (news article, Nov. 3):

Although Mao Zedong proclaimed that “women hold up half the sky,” the weight of thousands of years of Chinese culture held back — and continues to hold back — many from attaining their full potential.

My mother, born before the 1949 Communist takeover of the government, was prohibited from going to school by her father, but even decades later suffered limited choices, gender discrimination and the societal stigma of having only daughters.

Now that Chinese women have tasted power, freedom and independence, they are not going to go back to being merely wives, mothers and caretakers any more than American women, as evidenced by the recent U.S. elections, are going to give up their hard-won reproductive rights to satisfy the wishes of right-wing conservatives.

Men on both sides of the globe are going to find that turning back the clock is a lot harder than they thought.

Qin Sun Stubis
Bethesda, Md.
The writer is a newspaper columnist and author of “Once Our Lives,” a historical saga about four generations of Chinese women.

Billionaires, Invest in Earth

To the Editor:

Re “Space Billionaires Should Spend More Time Thinking About Sex,” by Kelly Weinersmith and Zach Weinersmith (Opinion guest essay, nytimes.com, Nov. 5):

Doesn’t it make more sense to address challenges to our future on Earth, a very appealing home for humans, than to try to adapt to hostile, inhospitable planets? We’d likely be better off if Elon Musk and his fellow billionaires would invest their vast sums in things like wind turbines and infrastructure. They might also help advance the human race by promoting development of qualities like compassion, reconciliation and cooperation.

Beyond that, the authors make great points about the difficulties of sex and procreation in space. Let’s not forget Earth’s sex appeal!

Marjorie Lee
Wayland, Mass.