Readers React: There’s nothing racist about the world ‘illegal’

To the editor: The ACLU’s Hector Villagra indicates that the U.S. government’s deplorable position is that “deportation hearings in which children must defend themselves are not right, but they will continue.” Is it “right” that unaccompanied foreign minors continue to arrive here illegally to become an economic burden for American taxpayers? (“The injustice of deporting children without representation,” Opinion, March 17)

Perhaps Villagra has yet to realize that the U.S. government works for the American people, many if not most of whom seem to agree that those who arrive in the United States illegally do not have the same rights as citizens. Perhaps this reality might help explain the Donald Trump phenomenon, which the left-leaning intelligentsia has branded as racist.

My question for them, however, is what about the word “illegal” is racist?

David Goode, Manhattan Beach

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To the editor: As a mother of two and a grandmother of four, I think it is outrageous to think any child, immigrant or not, could defend himself or herself in any court hearing.

Lee Soskin, Sherman Oaks

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