A few high-level federal employees are lying to all of us. These are public employees the American public pays to work for us. They swear an oath to act in our interests. And yet they’re lying to us, the American people. They use the trappings of federal authority – stuff we gave them – and insist on telling us preposterous lies about what they’ve done (lies), what they’re doing now (lies), and what they aren’t doing (lies). These people should be put in jail for their crimes.
The administration lies so often we can’t even count them, but here are a few. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross lied about the 2020 Census in testimony to Congress. Attorney General William Barr lied to Congress about the Mueller Report while he withheld the truth for weeks. Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen lied to Congress when she swore that the administration had no policy to separate families at the border. The Trump administration continues to lie about how many children are affected. Sarah Sanders repeatedly lied in official White House briefings when she told reporters about thousands of (imaginary) terrorists that were not crossing the border. Donald Trump, of course, lies about almost everything.
Even the Trump administration knows that they’re lying. They’ve routinely blocked access to Congresspeople, no matter how they asked. They swore the rumors about overcrowding and poor hygiene were false. Fake news.
Today, the DHS Office of the Inspector General issued a Management Alert – DHS needs to Address Dangerous Overcrowding And Prolonged Detention of Children and Adults in the Rio Grande Valley (Redacted). It lists out everything, with evidence and pictures.
You have to look at the timing to really understand how fearlessly our own government was lying to us. DHS management already had the draft OIG report in hand. (That’s how government inspection reports work.) The DHS leaders probably even knew when the final report would go public. And yet they lied to reporters – us – about it, over and over. This is a quote from the Washington Post:
While senior Department of Homeland Security officials have for months sounded the alarm over a record number of Central American families crossing the southwestern border, officials in recent weeks have disputed the descriptions of the conditions of detained migrants. Mr. McAleenan last week described the allegations at the Clint facility as “unsubstantiated” and called it “clean and well managed.”
Washington Post, July 2, 2019, Government Watchdog Finds Squalid Conditions in Border Centers
They all knew their own OIG would contradict them within a few days. And yet they lied anyway, deliberately and intentionally. They lied about overcrowding, soap, showers, medical care, clean clothing, and sleeping on concrete floors. No, our official government representatives told us, our government is not harming these children. But they are. Worse, these all weren’t just lies, they were stupid lies that would be uncovered almost instantly.
So why do it? Why lie to us when they know that damning report was in the wings? Because they had no reason not to lie their heads off. They’re rewarded for lying. They’re more likely to be punished if they tell us the truth. And the consequences for lying? Precisely, totally nothing. Nobody will punish them or even speak a harsh word. They’ll continue in their jobs just fine, possibly with new promotion potential. That’s how it works under our new Republican government.
Until we change that – until we hold our public servants to the truth – we will never get the full story. And knowing what our government is doing is a critical support to any liberal democracy. Our system of government depends on an informed electorate. We cannot survive a wholly dishonest executive. A free and open press helps, but it isn’t enough to overcome the kind of systemic, institutional corruption that Trump and the Republicans are exercising.
Put liars in jail. It’s not everything, but it matters. Hold them accountable. I’m not talking about differences of opinion or exaggerations. I’m saying that when someone, acting in their official capacity, outright lies about issues of substance in press releases, comments, or written reports, that’s malfeasance. It’s a crime against America.
Lying has to matter. I hate to sound hyperbolic, but if lying doesn’t matter — if we don’t demand better, we’re doomed as a nation. And right now, this minute, our own government is harming children in our name. It isn’t an accident or bad planning. They’re doing it deliberately. It’s not a bug; it’s a feature.
