To Senator Rubio (Refugees)

            Several weeks ago I was so repulsed by the executive actions taken by President Trump in regards to banning travel and refugees from numerous Muslim majority countries that I did something I tend to view as the activity of only loner kooks, I wrote my senator.  Unfortunately, I am from Florida and the senator I had to contact was Marco Rubio-R.  (Our senior senator, Bill Nelson-D I took for granted as not supporting the idiot flailing of our current president).

            I did the somewhat crass thing of pointing out how Rubio had run against Trump specifically because of policy positions like this one, and how he is a child of Cuban parents who under a ban of this type in their era would have been kicked out of the US.  I am playing the bigotry card, but I also think that in debating a bigoted policy that is allowed.  I then posted some select parts of a speech he gave with emphasis on certain parts added.

            I am disappointed that he has taken no initiative in the past few weeks.  His absence from the public eye or public ridicule/feedback has been conspicuous and noted.  I take issue with such behavior.  Presented below in the letter I sent to his Washington office.  Feel free to criticize me, feel free to copy the text and send it to protest the Muslim Ban Order, or feel free to shrug and continue living your lives.

            If you like or hate this please take the time to comment, +1, share on Twitter, Tumblr, or Facebook, and otherwise distribute my opinion to the world.  I would appreciate it.

            Whatever.

______________________________

(My Name)

Masters of Applied American Politics and Policy

(My Address)

(My Email)

(My Number)

January 30, 2017

Senator Marco Antonio Rubio

Junior United States Senator of Florida

284 Russell Senate Office Building

Washington DC, 20510

To Senator Rubio,

Senator, I would like to express my deepest disgust with the current treatment of refugees by the executive branch of the United States.

President Trump has begun dismantling carefully and deliberately constructed diplomatic institutions and has allowed white nationalist sentiment to dominate his policy decisions.  This is untenable.

To turn away those in need violates every moral consideration that the Republican Party claims as its guiding stars.

These people are homeless, they are made to go thru thorough vetting, and there is no reason to believe they are any threat.  Pointing out that they share the faith of a current enemy and to claim that as a reason why to turn them away is bigotry.

Up until last year I had been registered as a Republican my entire adult life.  But when I saw that now President Trump had gained the nomination of the party, I turned away in disgust.

You did your best to draw people away from Trump, and I ask that you do your best to draw them away again.

Your family, as you have often stated, left Cuba.  Had this sort of ban existed at the time you would not be an American citizen today.  Your family would have been turned away.  To claim otherwise would be dishonest.

You can justify to yourself that there are some fine differences between the two situations, I can draw a few myself, but that sort of hair splitting is dishonest.

I ask that you hold and display convictions you have professed to have.  I ask that you position yourself as the future of the Republican party that does not turn away homeless children.

I beg of you to not let the fears and bigotry of white supremacy and nationalism destroy the Republican Party and the country.

Does it not worry you, that the act of me sending this letter perhaps will result in me being put on a list somewhere?  That the idea of speaking opposition to persecution of the innocent and the abandonment of the helpless may harm me and others like me?  This is not noble.  This in not normal.

Citizens are being asked for their papers.  People are being held against their will because of the nation of their ancestry.  This is not normal.  This is not okay.

With sincere hopes,

(My Name)

Masters of Applied American Politics and Policy

(My Address)

(My Email)

(My Number)

“So, from a political standpoint, the easiest thing to have done in this campaign is to jump on all those anxieties I just talked about, to make people angrier, make people more frustrated. But I chose a different route and I'm proud of that.

“That would have been -- in a year like this, that would have been the easiest way to win. But that is not what's best for America. The politics of resentment against other people will not just leave us a fractured party, they are going to leave us a fractured nation….

“…I ask the American people: Do not give in to the fear. Do not give in to the frustration. We can disagree about public policy, we can disagree about it vibrantly, passionately. But we are a hopeful people, and we have every right to be hopeful. For we in this nation are the descendants of go-getters. In our veins runs the blood of people who gave it all up so we would have the chances they never did. We are all the descendants of someone who made our future the purpose of their lives. We are the descendants of pilgrims. We are the descendants of settlers. We are the descendants of men and women that headed westward in the Great Plains not knowing what awaited them. We are the descendants of slaves who overcame that horrible institution to stake their claim in the American Dream. We are the descendants of immigrants and exiles who knew and believed that they were destined for more, and that there was only one place on earth where that was possible. This is who we are, and let us fight to ensure that this is who we remain. For if we lose that about our country, we will still be rich and we will still be powerful, but we will no longer be special.”

            -Senator Rubio, March 15^th, Miami