On March 15, 2019, Donald Trump sat behind the Resolute desk in the Oval Office and signed the first veto of his presidency, blocking a resolution passed by Congress that would have reversed his declaration of a national emergency at the U.S.-Mexico border.
Before he signed the veto, Trump looked to his right and addressed Sabine Durden, whose son was killed in 2012 by a drunk driver who was in the country illegally. “They will not have died in vain. Did I tell you that a long time ago? Four years ago, right?” Trump said. Durden is a leading figure in the Angel Moms movement, which calls attention to U.S. citizens who have been victims of crime committed by “illegal aliens.”
The woman responsible for elevating mothers like Durden to the national stage is Maria Espinoza, a native of Houston. In 2009, after four law enforcement officers in Houston died in shootings or car accidents that involved undocumented immigrants, Espinoza founded the Remembrance Project. The goal was to find people hurt by crime and amplify their stories, casting so-called illegal invaders as uniquely prone to murder, rape and drunk driving (although statistics show the opposite). Espinoza seeks to squelch amnesty efforts, deport anyone who’s here illegally and harden the border. She travels around the country organizing events where families of crime victims hold up a banner called the Stolen Lives Quilt.
Meet Maria Espinoza, the Texan Elevating ‘Angel Moms’ to the National Stage
Maria Espinoza and Foster Friess by Alice Linahan is licensed under Flickr Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.
Source:
Texas Observer
Maria Espinoza and Foster Friess by Alice Linahan is licensed under Flickr Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.