The Winds of Time
By James Quadra
In 2019, Carlos Gregorio Hernández Vásquez, a 16-year-old Guatemalan teenager, died in the custody of US immigration authorities. Video evidence showed that the U.S. Border Patrol, operating under Trump’s campaign of hate toward Latino immigrants, held Carlos, who was sick with the flu and had a high fever, in a concrete cell without proper medical attention or any supervision. Border Patrol agents discovered his body only after his cellmate called for them.
When I read about Carlos’ heartbreaking death, I was struck by how fortunate my parents were to be able to legally emigrate from Nicaragua to the U.S. in search of a better future. When my parents arrived in the US in the 1940s, the country had just fought a war against Nazi Germany and Japan. The Cold War with the Soviet Union had started. The reconstruction of Germany and Japan was in progress and the U.S. economy was adapting to peacetime conditions. This was the backdrop of the immigration policies of the Truman administration. President Truman was not a popular president, but he certainly was not a would-be despot who stoked his followers by fabricating threats to the U.S.; like claiming that caravans of Latinos were about to violently storm the U.S.’ southern border.
I was also struck by both the parallels and differences between Carlos’ experience traveling to the U.S. and my experience returning to the U.S. after spending most of my childhood in Nicaragua. My parents decided to return to Nicaragua in the 1960s with their six U.S. born children. I returned to the U.S. in 1973 when I was 12 years old after an earthquake destroyed the Nicaraguan capital, Managua, and while a revolution brewed against the reign of terror of a brutal dictator – Anastasio Somoza. Within a month of the earthquake, my younger brother and I were on a plane on route to San Francisco, California to join my older sisters. We left family and friends behind. My mother was not able to join us for almost a year. Like Carlos, my brother and I were children escaping difficult conditions and in search of something better. However, with U.S. passports in hand, we did not risk U.S. Immigration Officers taking us into custody.
When I arrived in San Francisco in 1973, the promise of freedom and justice dazzled me. The sentiments that drove the civil rights and anti-war movements of the 1960s still permeated the air and made everything seem possible. Nixon’s 1974 resignation under threat of impeachment made me believe that the U.S. system of government could ensure that democracy would survive even when election corruption invaded the White House. The peaceful resolution of the Watergate investigation was in sharp contrast with what I had witnessed in Nicaragua under the Somoza regime. Unlike Nixon, who was driven out of office by the legislative branch exercising its constitutional mandate to investigate corruption, Somoza gave up power only after a violent revolution. I was proud to live in a country where that was possible. Children dying in cages at the border was not something I could even imagine then. So, at 14 years of age, I happily wrote a poem about Watergate:
Watergate
I believe Nixon knew all the time
About the Watergate crime
And while his followers rotted in the can
He grabbed Ford’s pardon and ran
Now they say he is sick and can’t testify
Everybody’s wondering if it’s all a big lie
Why did he get sick before the trial not after
Every time he hears of it his blood clot moves faster
Now Nixon is free
No trial No fee
But will his conscience let him be
Who is worse off his boys or he
At 14, it was easier to find humor in the crimes of elected officials. The winds of time have changed that. My view of our democratic process is no longer that of a dazzled child escaping a dictatorship. Thirty-five years of practicing law - representing people of color, and women who have been discriminated against - has drastically changed my point of view. Our legal system does not guarantee a just outcome. A jury of our peers does not exist. Judges are biased. Truth does not always win the day. Yet, before Trump, I believed that we were making real progress toward a “more perfect union”. Trump’s election changed that.
Emboldened by seeing one of their own hold the highest office in the land, racists crawled out of the darkness in huge numbers to spew hatred. Hate crimes rose drastically. Trump fed his followers’ dream of making America White again by demonizing Latinos like Carlos. Ignoring the huge contributions of Latino immigrants to the U.S’ economy and culture, Trump falsely claimed that Latino immigrants seeking refuge were largely “bad hombres” who were rapists and drug dealers. According to Trump, Latinos legally seeking asylum needed to be stopped and that meant that even their children should be put in cages. Millions of “democracy loving Americans” approved of this crime against humanity. A crime that took Carlos’ life.
This brave boy, who traveled so far to reach the supposed “shining city on the hill” in search of something better for his family, was seen as dispensable. Today, we rightfully praise the children that have escaped the war in Ukraine. Many of these Ukrainian children traveled hundreds of miles alone like Carlos. The media is full of articles praising their courage. No such praise is given to Latino children, who like Carlos, survive an incredibly dangerous trek to seek U.S. help, only to be treated as less than human. The value of their lives is ignored because - unlike Ukrainian children - they are not white Europeans.
As a parent, even the thought of my sons experiencing just a bit of Carlos’ suffering fills me with dread. When I first learned of what happened to Carlos, I kept thinking about his mother Gilberta learning about his death. I can only imagine the pain Carlos death caused her and his family. And so, no longer a naive 14-year-old, I wrote another poem:
Carlos
He will not wake
Abandoned in a cage
And worlds away his mother cries
Desperate tears
For the terror he felt
For the pain he suffered
An endless longing
For the smile she will never see again
For grandchildren she will never meet
Haunted by questions
Why despise her son?
Why ignore his courage?
Because of his cinnamon-colored skin?
Because the blood of warriors flowed through his veins?
Why?
Although Trump is no longer in office, his minions still preach hate. About half the country voted for him and may do so again. Unlike the Republicans of Nixon’s day, the Republicans in Congress today refuse to hold Trump accountable for any of his crimes, including his role in the assault on the Capitol. So, it is difficult not to lose hope. But then I see my children’s eyes, dark and beautiful like Carlos’ eyes, and capitulation is not an option. Instead, I hope people of conscience will continue to shine a light on those that peddle evil, and that the world will somehow move toward real justice. There is no question that we have suffered a setback, but the battle for a “more perfect union” continues. And, I have a bit of fight left in me.
To learn more about Carlos please visit:
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/migrant-boy-who-died-u-s-custody-wanted-help-brother-n1008826
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Jim Quadra’s day job is representing plaintiffs in civil rights, catastrophic injury and complex business litigation. He moonlights as a would-be poet. He was inspired to start writing by his father Jaime Quadra, a poet from a prolific family of writers that includes the renowned Nicaraguan poet Pablo Antonio Cuadra. Jim has now passed on his love of writing to his children Roberto and Antonio. Learn more about Jim and his family at:
https://www.quadracoll.com/james.html
https://www.avvo.com/attorneys/94105-ca-james-quadra-132189.html