This isn’t public service, and these are not public servants

Fred Rogers, who entertained and taught children for more than 50 years, once said, “when I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.’”

In 15 years of public service, that idea has always animated and guided me. Being a helper is important at every level: From postal carriers and park rangers to VA doctors and nurses to homelessness counselors and firefighters. All helpers. Every one of them.

To be a public servant, one must buy into the ethos of being a helper completely. I’m going to come back to this point.

But first: We’ve all seen the many horrific videos of masked immigration agents and their bounty hunter colleagues terrorizing gardeners, hotel workers and cooks across America. They beat people, smash car windows and intimidate bystanders.

It’s all gotten very ugly, very fast.

When ICE and its sister organizations launch raids, they do so masked, like cowards. They do so without judicial warrants. They go to arrest children while wearing more body armor than I wore in Iraq and Afghanistan. In May, they even arrested the Democratic mayor of Newark while he was attempting to conduct oversight of a privately-run ICE detention facility.

It’s not just specific instances of brutality, cruelty and lawlessness, either. Two weeks ago, the Trump administration opened what it is calling “Alligator Alcatraz.” This is a detention facility, in Florida, designed to hold immigrants who’ve not been convicted of crimes. It is, by even the strictest definition, a literal concentration camp.

When asked to address the idea that escapee migrants may “just get eaten by wildlife,” President Trump said, “I guess that’s the concept.” Appallingly, this hearkens back to America’s long-standing white supremacist fixation with feeding Black and Brown people to alligators. Of course, he said he wants to see similar facilities “in many states.”

It’s troubling to say the least.

So let’s get back to Mr. Rogers. Is this activity helping anyone? Does it even resemble public service? I would argue that it does not. Rather, it reflects a clear pattern of state-sponsored violence and abuse. It is undeniably fascist.

The job of the public servant, first and foremost, is to protect residents and keep them safe. This is not a new concept. It is literally enshrined in America’s founding document: In the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson wrote, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” It does not mention citizenship.

ICE, to put it mildly, is not living up to this standard. It does not respect any of these unalienable rights. Its behavior is so far beyond the pale that it now threatens to undermine public safety, civic order and law enforcement across the country.

ICE isn’t helping anyone. They’re not making us safer or more prosperous. With every new headline, I find it harder to understand what role they’re playing that would allow us to even call them public servants. What I’m seeing are masked thugs terrorizing communities across America.

I don’t want to see that in my country. In fact, I think this loathsome organization should be abolished, its leaders prosecuted and its employees fired and barred from actual public service.

Ultimately, immigrants don’t come here to make our lives harder. They come here to contribute, even as they are fleeing desperate circumstances. And in almost all cases, they make our country better.

America is a beacon of hope. Or at least it used to be. And it can be. In The New Colossus, at the base of the Statue of Liberty, most people are familiar with the line, “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.” But they often forget she also referred to that monument – to this country – as the “Mother of Exiles.”

That’s why all American public servants have an obligation to help immigrants – not to reject, harass, arrest and deport them. We should extend that hand, because that’s what public servants do. Look for the helpers.

Brandon Friedman is the CEO of Rakkasan Tea Company and an appointee on the City of Dallas Police Oversight Board. During the Obama administration, he served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs at the Department of Housing and Urban Development and as the Director of Digital Strategy at the Department of Veterans Affairs. He served two tours as an infantry officer in the Army’s 101st Airborne Division in Afghanistan and Iraq. Follow him on Bluesky.