From Nazi-era family separations to ICE detentions, one cartoon exposes how state power still tears children from their parents

I got the idea for this cartoon after hearing reports about ICE making arrests at airports. In the cartoon, an ICE officer pulls a crying child away from a parent. My first thought was: How traumatizing is this?

It also brought to mind images from Nazi Germany, when children were separated from their families and sent to camps. The more things change, the more they seem to stay the same. ICE has been accused of acting like Trump’s personal army. This reinforces that perception.

Those feelings became the foundation for this cartoon.

I created it as a split screen. On the left, under the word “Then,” a Nazi officer pulls a sobbing child away from his mother. On the right, under the word “Now,” an ICE officer stands in an airport immigration setting as another crying child clings to a parent in distress.

The child’s plea changes from “Mama!” to “Mommy!” But the fear is the same. The only thing that has changed is the setting. The horror has been updated.

This is not to say America is identical to Nazi Germany. Rather, it is about recognizing the visual and moral echoes that emerge when governments separate families and normalize cruelty.

When policy becomes trauma

The emotional center of the cartoon is the child. He is a symbol of panic, helplessness and loss. Adults can argue about immigration law, border enforcement and detention policy. Children live the terror of these policies.

Too often, stories about immigration arrests are told in bureaucratic terms. Officials use words like “processing,” “detention” and “removal.” Those terms may sound administrative, but they conceal a brutal reality. A child is still watching a parent being taken away. A family is still being shattered in real time. Children live with that trauma.

The backgrounds in the cartoon are significant. The left panel evokes the camps, fences and industrial machinery of Nazi terror. The right panel uses the familiar architecture of a modern airport immigration area. One atrocity belongs to the past. The other belongs to the present. But both scenes ask the same question: What happens when a society gets used to seeing some families as disposable?

Why I wanted the image to disturb people

Political cartoons are not meant to be neutral. They are meant to provoke thought, spark outrage and strip away euphemism. I created this because the public is too often asked to view family separation through the language of procedure instead of humanity.

The ICE officer is shown from behind, with his face partly obscured. He is less an individual than a representative of a system. Systems carry out harsh policies while hiding behind the claim that they are simply enforcing the law. History is full of examples in which legality and morality move in opposite directions.

If this cartoon makes viewers uncomfortable, then it has done its job. Some images remind us that history’s darkest lessons are wasted when we fail to recognize them in the present.