An Immigrant’s Christmas Eve

Tali Farhadian Weinstein, a fellow Paul & Daisy Soros Fellow and General Counsel to the Brooklyn DA, shares in  a NY Times op-ed a memoir of her family’s arrival from Iran to the US in 1979.

Analogizing her perilous flight from violence and instability in her home country to the plight of Central American asylum seekers at the US-Mexico border, she explains that an INS officer had mercy on she and her sister and granted “deferred inspection” so that they could reunite with their father for Christmas and find representation for their asylum claim.

For those who support maximalist law enforcement — and “sealed” borders — my presence in the United States might look like a failure. But blind enforcement is not what it means to live in a society of laws. In a democracy, anyone who has the power to enforce the law also has the power — and the duty — to enforce it with discretion. Not every crime should lead to punishment. Not every punishment should be meted out at the maximum. Law enforcement requires us to exercise our humanity and sense of justice, always mindful of the demands of safety, in individual cases. Discretion in law enforcement can be abused, of course, but the alternative — the letter of the law without the spirit of the law — is worse.

I was lucky to stand before a law enforcement officer who understood this, and who granted my family a few days of freedom when we needed them most. 

MHC