Introduction

“Mommy, does Trump want to kill us?”

An 8-year-old biracial girl who lives in California asked her Filipina mom this question and told her that the kids were talking about this on the playground.

The young girl, whose father is Latino, was also scared that their family was going to have to leave the country and that the U.S. might bomb Mexico.  In Maryland, an 8-year-old Muslim American child asked his father, “Is Trump going to kill us?  Will we have to leave the country?”

These young kids should be playing outside and carefree, not worrying about the safety of themselves and their families.

We are a group of academics, pollsters, psychologists, lawyers, and activists who are concerned about the impact the hateful language during and after the election has had on our children. Rather than just get upset, we want to provide a framework for how to deal with this.

We hope parents, teachers, school bus drivers, school administrators, playground monitors, godmothers and godfathers, and all of us who love and care for our children will benefit from our work.

Lee-Or Ankori-Karlinsky
Anna Basallaje
Ina Breuer
Allison Briscoe-Smith, Ph.D.
Juan Cartagena
Abigail Dusseldorp
Allison Elgart
Rachel Godsil
Michael Harris
Sara Jackson
Celinda Lake
David Mermin
Constance Moore
Manuel Pastor, Ph.D.
Eva Paterson
Professor john a. powell
Jennifer A. Richeson, Ph.D.
Favianna Rodriguez
Linda R. Tropp, Ph.D.
James F. Thrasher, Ed.D.

Next section: The problem