Martin O’Malley — the former Maryland governor and presidential candidate who on Wednesday had a heated exchange about immigration with President Donald Trump’s acting Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security, Ken Cuccinelli — spoke to Salon on Sunday about his advice for Americans who want to stand up to Trump officials on immigration issues.
“I think silence in the face of the cruelty of caging children on our southern border is irresponsible,” O’Malley said. “We cannot be silent in the face of this. The biggest threat to our American freedom is not dictatorship. It’s our own public passivity and acceptance of cruelty and institutional violence practiced in our name and with our permission. We all have an obligation to speak out, to call it like it is.”
The confrontation between O’Malley and Cuccinelli occurred on Wednesday night at a Washington pub called the Dubliner during an unofficial meetup for alumni of Gonzaga College High School. The former Baltimore mayor criticized the Trump administration’s policies of separating migrant children from their parents and of detaining immigrants in chain-link enclosures, later telling The Washington Post in a text message that Cuccinelli is “the son of immigrant grandparents who cages children for a fascist president.” His actions were praised by progressives like New York Times columnist Michelle Goldberg, who on Thursday tweeted “God bless Martin O’Malley.”