NCCPR news and commentary round-up, week ending July 12, 2022

● When workers for family policing agencies do awful things, they often can’t be successfully sued because of a doctrine known as “qualified immunity.”  Honolulu Civil Beat has a story about how the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has exercised sound judgment and common sense in applying this doctrine. 

● The same cannot be said for the Eighth Circuit, which effectively has given family police caseworkers a green light to retaliate against families who dare to fight back.  I have a blog post about it. 

● When you ask people at the group that calls itself “Children’s Rights” why their McLawsuits almost never deal with the issue of children needlessly torn from their homes, they claim (wrongly) that this can’t be addressed through class-action litigation.  One of their worst McLawsuit settlements is in Michigan.  Now, NBC News has exposed the massive, state-sanctioned neglect of foster youth’s education in that state.  As one such youth put it: 

“They take us away from our parents for things that they’re not doing, but then y’all not doing the things you’re supposed to do.  Who’s going to take us from you?” 

OK, “Children’s Rights,” this is an issue that involves young people already in foster care – yet your McLawsuit does nothing about this, either.  Perhaps potential funders should think about this. 

● A Texas lawmaker explains why the state’s new more stringent definition of “neglect” makes all children safer.

● Washington Post columnist Karen Attiah responds to those claiming the overturning of Roe v. Wade somehow is not a problem because, you know, foster care: 

But the foster system and adoption are far from panaceas. This is the United States, remember: Since slavery, we have had a long, racist history of Black women’s children being legally taken from them by White state systems.
 
Indeed, white supremacy believes it is right to force birth on Black women while also being far quicker to conclude that Black parents are incapable of taking care of their children. Black people are more likely to be accused of child abuse and neglect in Texas; Black children in Texas are taken away at higher rates by child protective services. Black children also remain longer in the foster care system than White children. Expect all that to worsen now. 

● “I will listen with you, I will grieve with you, I will weep you with you and I will feel your pain,” said Interior Secretary Deb Haaland as she began a “Healing Tour” to meet with Native American survivors of so-called “Boarding Schools” and their descendants.