Read on Twitter
Thread. A jumble of emotions as Pres Biden signed the first round of executive orders, including repeal of the Muslim Ban. I was a consular officer serving in Madrid when the Ban into effect. /1
For many of us in gov, Jan 27, 2017 was a wake up call that yes, the next four years were really going to be that bad. That the Trump gov intended to turn their racist campaign rhetoric into policy. The Ban sparked off the first widespread round of “stay or go” conversations. /2
Leaving the FS remains among the most difficult decisions of my life. I was afraid that if I stayed, I would become complacent to transgressions of my moral hard-lines. At the same time, I lost sleep worrying that I was giving up the ability to mitigate harm from the inside. /3
I know countless colleagues who weighed the same choice and decided to stay. I know many of these people spent the last four years working in extremely difficult conditions, doing their best to maintain the integrity of our institutions. I feel a debt for their service /4
Four years later, I think that the “stay or leave” conversation was often framed in a zero-sum way that didn’t match the moral complexity of the moment. Or, the act of “staying or leaving” is one choice that leads to many more, equally complex choices /5
This op-ed by a former DoJ lawyer, who decided to stay in the hopes of mitigating harm from the inside, is a brave self-assessment. The author concludes that her choice to stay enabled racist policy. /6 https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/20/opinion/trump-justice-department-lawyer.html
She writes that applying her legal expertise to drafting the 2nd and 3rd versions of the Ban made their underlying racism more palatable. Putting a veneer of legal respectability on the Bans ultimately strengthened the Trump admin’s case before the Supreme Court. /7
As we take stock of the past 4 years, I think it is important to be honest about the limits of our ability to make change from different positions inside and outside gov. /8
Not in a spirit of casting judgment but in order to take a full accounting of the blindnesses and weak spots in our institutions and reckon with personal responsibility as citizens in a democracy. /9
For public servants who made the choice stay when charged with implementing policies you morally disagreed with – in what ways were you able to use your position to stop harm? What were the limits of your abilities? Were there unintended consequences to your actions? /10
For those of us who left - did your act of protest end with leaving? How have you been able to use your gov experience to advocate for change? Has your act of leaving helped anyone but yourself? /11
I’ve spent the past 3 years trying to answer these questions for myself. I will always be proud for speaking out publicly against the Muslim Ban. But it took me more than a year after leaving gov to find the courage to do it. There have been many times I quieted my voice. /12
Thinking about all the families who remain separated by visa backlogs and bureaucracy, the only thing that I’m really sure of is “staying” or “leaving” are in and of themselves not enough. We have to actively choose how we show up for what we believe in every day. /13
