Daria Liza Avila Chevalier

We're not talking about criminal law.

And we really need to have an understanding of what it is that we are doing when we say that people who are non-citizens, who have a different status based on where they were born, why they should endure an additional form of punishment when they have already gone through the criminal system.

Yes.

And the reason I say that is because we have a criminal system.

It isn't perfect, but it exists.

And it is one that if we accept as the process by which we want to engage with these issues, right, then we need to make sure that it is one that isn't also discriminatory on the basis of where people were born.

To subject someone who has committed a crime to both a criminal system and then additionally to an immigration system that also detains them in the very same facilities that people who are convicted of criminal convictions are also held, right?

and then deported and ripped away from everything they know and love, that is also punishment.

It is double punishment.

And if we truly believe that double jeopardy is something that is unconstitutional, something that is unethical, we cannot subject people to that on the basis of where they were born.

And I also believe that the question of deportation is one that is deeply racist.

It is one that believes that because someone was born outside of this country, that they deserve one of the most cruel forms of punishment imaginable, to be stripped away from your entire community.

And to the point, it's not language I would use.

And, you know, I'm a black woman.

I would have loved to seen a black woman president.

Right.

And despite my many criticisms, I still voted.

Yeah.

I still voted for Biden and Harris.

Right.