To the editor: I’ve figured it out: The lady with the lamp welcomes the tired, the poor, the wretched refuse of teeming shores -- but she stands at the entrance to New York Harbor. (“Threatened ICE raids create more political noise than police action,” July 15)

Nothing on the pedestal says anything about our southern border. No one welcomes those who enter there. The lady is a loss leader. You can come in through that gate but nowhere else. Don’t take the words seriously.

Can you imagine the statue that would be erected at El Paso? Calexico? San Diego? I see a Border Patrol agent saying, “Papers, please.”

The words at the base of the Statue of Liberty are part of just another myth we’ve told ourselves.


Diane Cohen, Tarzana

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To the editor: Shame on L.A. Mayor Garcetti, Los Angeles Police Department Chief Michel Moore and L.A. County Sheriff Alex Villanueva for the manner in which they openly defied U.S. law by denouncing the recent Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids.

The people who were targeted by ICE had court orders to be removed from this country. I guess our so-called leaders do not understand the word “illegal.”


Mark E. Buchman, Los Angeles

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To the editor: Trump’s threats to conduct mass ICE raids are a prime example of terrorism, defined as “the purposeful act or threat of violence to create fear and or compliant behavior in a victim and or audience of the act or threat.”

The president weaponized fear and frightened thousands of people, including many with immigration permits, to lock their doors, miss work, not attend school and cower in fear. Americans should be appalled by this political weaponizing of ICE to promote the politics of fear and create terror in our cities.


David Altheide, Solana Beach

The writer, a professor at the Arizona State University School of Social Transformation, is the author of the book “Terrorism and the Politics of Fear.”