Each morning, the Pledge of Allegiance emanates through the speakers of many schools in the United States, and the words that have lost all their weight are echoed back by students in unison: “liberty and justice for all.”

Over the years, the ideals of hope, equality and opportunity that encapsulate what it means to be an American have cracked. Instead of solving issues like cost of living and access to healthcare, politicians choose to weaponize skin color and language, using immigrants as scapegoats to explain why many Americans cannot afford to put food on the table.

The promise of a country that welcomes immigrants, refugees, asylum seekers and dreamers with open arms is disintegrating.

What was once a nightmare of family separation and detention has become the new normal for many immigrants in the United States, grappling with a nation to which they pledged faith and allegiance that has since turned its back on them.

Our national identity is our diversity — living in a country defined by a kaleidoscope of ethnicities, religions, languages and cultures is what unites us. Spanish is spoken by over 41 million people and is integrated into many schools through immersion programs. You can find pockets of culture in cities across the U.S. and Los Angeles, from Chinatown to Little Tokyo.

But our diversity, something that used to be celebrated, has been sold out to satiate politicians’ pursuit of power by scapegoating people of color.

In the White House sits a president hellbent on vilifying the people who truly make our country great: immigrants. Instead of honoring their contributions, both culturally and economically, this administration bites the hands that sewed the fabric of a country others were lucky enough to be born into.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids have sown fear into every corner of the U.S., escalating in violence and scale with each city they touch. Routine immigration hearings at courthouses like 26 Federal Plaza in New York have transformed into sites for “deportation traps,” with ICE agents lying in wait for individuals to leave the buildings.

Our democracy is backsliding into a government that paints children as young as five years old, like preschooler Liam Ramos, as a threat, while giving federal agents the license to shoot first and ask questions later, and quelling one of the most American things you can do: protest.

Ordinary people have demonstrated what we used to expect from our elected officials — the courage in their conviction to advocate for what they know in their heart is right.

To America, who gets to be human? Is it the students who avoid attending school, fearing that ICE agents will detain them on campus? Is it the mothers forced to leave their children behind in the U.S. while they return to a country they left for a better life? Is it the people who protest injustice where they see it, only to be assaulted by law enforcement?

Maybe it’s the Capitol insurrectionists that Trump pardoned. Or maybe it’s Charlie Kirk, whose divisive words the right-wing force has memorialized in the name of free speech. Maybe it’s our seemingly untouchable president — a man who paints himself as a peacemaker, though it’s something he will never be.

This administration employs a strategy of division and confusion, scapegoating minority communities, and manufacturing fear for others to fire.

In a time where we are creeping closer toward becoming a country governed by polarization, hatred and apathy, we need humanity more than ever.

While our politicians offer sympathy to those who uphold America’s exclusionary view of who deserves humanity, we must learn to see past the hate we are taught.

Humanity exists in the fruteros vendors throughout the streets of L.A., in Dearborn, Michigan’s mosques and in the steadfast voices of protesters risking their lives to demand justice. Humanity exists in all the people this administration tells us to fear.