When my father was crossing the U.S.-Mexico border like an undocumented Road Runner back in the 1970s, la migra caught him more than a few times.

They chased him and his friends through factories in Los Angeles and across the hills that separate Tijuana and San Diego. He was tackled and handcuffed and hauled off in cars, trucks and vans. Sometimes, Papi and his pals were dropped off at the border checkpoint in San Ysidro and ordered to walk back into Mexico. Other times, he was packed into grimy cells with other men.

But there was no anger or terror in his voice when I asked him recently how la migra treated him whenever they'd catch him.

"Like humans," he said. "They had a job to do, and they knew why we mojados were coming here, so they knew they would see us again. So why make it difficult for both of us?"

His most vivid memory was the time a guard in El Centro gave him extra food because he thought my dad was a bit too skinny.

There's never a pretty way to deport someone. But there's always a less indecent, a less callous, a less ugly way.

The Trump presidency has amply proven he has no interest in skirting meanness and cruelty.

"The way they treat immigrants now is a disgrace," Papi said. "Like animals. It's sad. It's ugly. It needs to stop."

I talked to him a few days after a gunman fired on a Dallas ICE facility, killing a detainee and striking two others before killing himself. One of the other wounded detainees, an immigrant from Mexico, died days later. Instead of expressing sympathy for the deceased, the Trump administration initially offered one giant shrug. What passed for empathy was Vice President JD Vance telling reporters, "Look, just because we don't support illegal aliens, we don't want them to be executed by violent assassins engaged in political violence" while blaming the attack on Democrats.

It was up to Homeland Security secretary Kristi Noem to try and show that the federal government has a heart. Her statement on the Dallas attack offered "prayers" to the victims and their families but quickly pivoted to what she felt was the real tragedy.

How ungrateful critics are of la migra.

"For months, we've been warning politicians and the media to tone down their rhetoric about ICE law enforcement before someone was killed," Noem said. "This shooting must serve as a wake-up call to the far-left that their rhetoric about ICE has consequences…The violence and dehumanization of these men and women who are simply enforcing the law must stop."

You might have been forgiven for not realizing from such a statement that the three people punctured by a gunman's bullets were immigrants.

This administration is never going to roll out the welcome mat for illegal immigrants. But the least they can do it deal with them as if ... well, as if they are human.

Under Noem's leadership, DHS' social media campaign has instead produced videos that call undocumented immigrants "the worst of the worst" and depict immigration agents as heroes called by God to confront invading hordes. A recent one even used the theme song to the cartoon version of the Pokémon trading card game — tagline "Gotta catch them all" — to imply going after the mango guy and tamale lady is no different than capturing fictional monsters.

That's one step away from "The Eternal Jew," the infamous Nazi propaganda movie that compared Jews to rats and argued they needed to be eradicated.

Noem is correct when she said that words have consequences — but the "violence and dehumanization" she decries against ICE workers is nothing compared to the cascade of hate spewing from Trump and his goons against immigrants. That rot in the top has infested all parts of American government, leading to officials trying to outdo themselves over who can show the most fealty to Trump by being nastiest to people.

If there were a Cruelty Olympics, Trump's sycophants would all be elbowing each other for the gold.

Politicians in red states propose repulsive names for their immigration detention facility — "Alligator Alcatraz" in Florida, for instance, or "Speedway Slammer" in Indiana. U.S. Atty. Bill Essayli, Trump's top prosecutor in Southern California, has trumpeted the arrests of activists he claimed attacked federal agents even as video uploaded by civilians offers a different story. In a recent case, a federal jury acquitted Brayan Ramos-Brito of misdemeanor assault charges after evidence shown in court contradicted what Border Patrol agents had reported to justify his prosecution.

La migra regularly harass U.S. citizens even after they've offered proof of residency and have ignored court-ordered restraining orders banning them from targeting people because of their ethnicity. Border Patrol sector chief Gregory Bovino continually squanders taxpayer dollars on photo ops, like the Border Patrol's July occupation of a nearly empty MacArthur Park or a recent deployment of boats on the Chicago River complete with agents bearing rifles as if they were safari hunters cruising the Congo.

Our nation's deportation Leviathan is so imperious that an ICE agent, face contorted with anger, outside a New York immigration court recently shoved an Ecuadorian woman pleading for her husband down to the ground, stood over her and wagged his finger in front of her bawling children even as cameras recorded the terrible scene. The move was so egregious that Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughin quickly put out a statement claiming the incident was "unacceptable and beneath the men and women of ICE."

The act was so outrageous and it was all caught on camera, so what choice did she have? Nevertheless, CBS News reported that the agent is back on duty.

Noem and her crew are so high on their holy war that they don't realize they're their own worst enemy. La migra didn't face the same public acrimony during Barack Obama's first term, when deportation rates were so high immigration activists dubbed him the "deporter-in-chief." They didn't need local law enforcement to fend off angry crowds every time they conducted a raid in Trump's first term.

The difference now is that cruelty seems like an absolute mandate, so forgive those of us who aren't throwing roses at ICE when they march into our neighborhoods and haul off our loved ones. And it seems more folks are souring on Trump's deportation plans. A June Gallup poll found that 79% of Americans said immigration was "a good thing" — a 15% increase since last year and the highest mark recorded by Gallup since it started asking the question in 2001. Meanwhile, a Washington Post/Ipsos September poll showed 44% of adults surveyed approved of Trump's performance on immigration — a six-point drop since February.

I asked my dad how he thought the government should treat deportees. Our family has personally known Border Patrol agents.

"Well, most of them shouldn't be deported in the first place," he said. "If they want to work or already have families here, let them stay but say they need to behave well or they have to leave."

That's probably not going to happen, so what should the government do?

"Don't yell at people," my dad said. "Talk with patience. Feed immigrants well, give them clean clothes and give them privacy when they have to use the bathroom. Say, 'sorry we have to do all this, but it's what Trump wants.'

"And then they should apologize," Papi concluded. " They should tell everyone, 'We're sorry we've been so mean. We can do better.'"

Well, that ain't happening, dad.

____

©2025 Los Angeles Times. Visit at latimes.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.