Selena Gomez broke down in a viral raw video she posted on Instagram Stories on January 27 in reaction to the recent mass arrests as a result of US President Donald Trump’s immigration law enforcement.
“I just want to say that I’m so sorry. 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,” she managed between sobs. “I don’t know what to do. I’ll try everything, I promise.”
Dressed in black attire, the weeping Gomez appears to have shot the recording in her home. She captioned it ‘I’m sorry’ with a Mexican flag emoji. A couple of hours after she posted it, she took down the video since fans did not take it well. She dropped a note: “Apparently it’s not ok to show empathy for people (sic)."
However, she deleted that post as well. Several fan pages reposted the clip that blew up the internet.
Many ‘X’ users responded negatively. Benny Johnson commented, “Selena Gomez is American. Her mom is American. Her Mexican father abandoned them. She went from living in this small Texas home to this $5M palace in LA. She's a billionaire because of America. Yet she does not consider us 'her people'. We are over ungrateful woke victim brain rot”.
Charlie Kirk said, "'My people?' Aren't you American? Where was the sobbing over the 100,000 Americans dead from fentanyl poisoning? Where were these tears over the 340,000 children who went missing after being trafficked over our border? Why wasn't there a breakdown for Rachel Nungary, Rachel Morin, or Laken Riley? I guess those Americans weren't 'your people?'”
At the same time, some of them have responded in favour of the Emilia Perez actress. “How can people be mad at someone with Mexican heritage being heartbroken by how the US treats Latinos? That's literally her family!” an ‘X’ user posted.
Being an American citizen of Mexican origin, she identifies with the struggles of the migrants, having a similar past herself. Gomez has long advocated for the cause of undocumented immigrants. In 2019, a docu-series titled ‘Living Undocumented’ was released on Netflix, produced by the renowned actress and singer. It chronicled the lives of eight undocumented immigrant families and their uncertain fates.
The ’Love You to Lose You’ singer’s grandparents are reportedly Mexican immigrants. She credits her family for the sacrifices they made, and for making her the woman she is today. Having waited eighteen years for citizenship, her grandparents’ life was not a bed of roses. Nevertheless, she has now found herself in a place where she can take care of her family, she said.
Trump’s nationwide immigration crackdown on Sunday, January 26, led to 956 arrests by ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement), which marks the highest number of arrests so far after Trump came to office. According to BBC, the 956 reported arrests on Sunday followed 286 arrests on Saturday, 593 on Friday and 538 on Thursday.
After returning to office, Trump ordered to ‘immediately repel, repatriate and remove’ illegal aliens, claiming that America’s sovereignty was being threatened.
