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Irish Echo editorial: punishing the deserving

February 16, 2011

By Staff Reporter

Last week, the federal government ruled that McAllister, his wife, Bernadette, and their four children, should be deported. The family fled loyalist terror in Belfast to build a new life, first in Canada and then, seven years ago, in the United States. Since then, they have been fighting for the right to continue the life of productive, law-abiding people that they have lived since they arrived here in 1996.
But three years ago the government ruled against Mr. McAllister’s right to stay, though it granted that right to his wife and children. This most recent ruling not only rejected McAllister’s appeal from the 2000 judgment, but it overturned the original ruling on the right of his wife and family to remain in the U.S. It is an especially inhumane ruling given that it threatens to break up the family of the McAllister’s eldest son, Gary, who is married to an American citizen.
The callousness of the ruling is hard to fathom, but it no doubt reflects the post 9/11 worldview of this administration. But policies that punish the deserving and harass the innocent are in the end counterproductive because they undermine the very ideals that we are supposed to be protecting. The fight against terror must not be allowed to victimize those who years ago, through not fault of their own, were caught up in violent and volatile situations but who have since proven themselves capable of being contributing members of society.
Fifteen years ago, a loyalist murder gang tried to wipe out the McAllister family and failed. Now the U.S. federal government is threatening to destroy the fabric of their lives. It would be a terrible injustice should it succeed.

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