Actor and singer Selena Gomez posted an emotional video to her Instagram Stories speaking out about the Trump Administration's shocking immigration crackdowns.
As ICE raids and deportations have begun, including attempted raids at places like an elementary school in Chicago, Gomez took to Instagram to share her pain and solidarity with immigrants, especially those who share her Mexican background.
In the video, Gomez broke down in tears, saying:
“All my people are getting attacked, the children. I don’t understand. I’m so sorry, I wish I could do something but I can’t."
"I don’t know what to do. I’ll try everything, I promise."
The immigration raids resulted in 956 arrests on Sunday according to the BBC. Trump's border czar Tom Homan has claimed that criminals and public safety threats are the priority.
But among the people affected by the deportations that the BBC spoke to was an American citizen whose wife was deported over the weekend. She was in the process of becoming a citizen at time.
ICE agents attempted to enter a Chicago elementary school last week as well.
Despite the severity of the issue, Gomez's video was met with swift criticism and she quickly deleted it, replacing it with a follow-up message reading, "Apparently it's not ok to show empathy for people."
The response to Gomez's follow-up has been intensely negative as well, with far-right accounts flooding the replies on X to hurl xenophobic disinformation about both immigrants and the Trump Administration's actions toward them.
Meanwhile, left-wing critics have shouted Gomez down for not having shown the same solidarity for Palestinians in the past, while others excoriated her for being a rich celebrity and supposedly using the immigration crackdown to get attention.
Thankfully, the mocking and insulting responses were not the only reactions to Gomez's statement. Many others chimed in to defend her and to express solidarity with immigrants.
If you feel like doing something to actually help deported immigrants rather than spending your time screaming at a celebrity on X and calling it the moral high ground, you can donate to the National Immigrant Justice Center or Immigrant Legal Resource Center, which help immigrants with legal services.
You could also just log off for five minutes and touch grass while attempting to locate your empathy. That would likely do wonders in the long term.
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