Scott Shuchart, a native of the Kansas City Jewish community, was honored April 15 along with two others as co-recipients of the 2019 Prize for Truth-Telling.
In addition awards are also given in the categories of courage, book and documentary film and recognize those “who persevere in acts of truth-telling that protect the public interest, promote social justice, or illuminate a more just vision of society.”
According to the Ridenhour Foundation, “this year’s awards come at a time when truth-telling and fact-based journalism are under siege. The Ridenhour Prizes memorialize the spirit of fearless truth-telling that whistleblower and investigative journalist Ron Ridenhour reflected throughout his extraordinary life and career. Fifty years ago, Ridenhour exposed the horrific My Lai massacre during the Vietnam War to Congress and to the public. Today, the Ridenhour Prizes continue to honor his important legacy of speaking truth to power, to protect the public interest, promote social justice, and illuminate a more just vision of society.”
The Ridenhour Prize for Truth-Telling is presented to a citizen, corporate or government whistleblower, investigative journalist or organization for bringing a specific issue of social importance to the public’s attention. Shuchart shares the 2019 Truth-Telling prize with Dr. Scott Allen and Dr. Pamela McPherson. The co-recipients are sharing the $10,000 stipend and have chosen to donate it to organizations helping migrant families in the Southwest.
Shuchart publicly resigned his job as a senior advisor for the Department of Homeland Security’s Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties when it became clear to him that the department’s family separation policy violated the civil and human rights of migrants and asylum seekers. Allen and McPherson, medical doctors who serve as subject matter experts for the DHS’ Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, exposed to the Senate Whistleblowing Caucus the serious health risks to children who are separated from their parents and detained as part of the U.S. administration’s zero tolerance policy at the southern border.
All three whistleblowers were featured Nov. 25, 2018, on “60 Minutes.” The broadcast graphically illustrated the harm that child and family detention and separation have caused countless thousands.
“We are honored by Ridenhour Prize’s recognition that informing Congress and the American people of the trauma that their government has inflicted on children and parents in their name is not only an ethical, humanitarian obligation of our professions but a critical patriotic duty,” the co-winners said in a joint statement. “Telling this story has been an important step, but more needs to be done by those in and out of government to ensure that we are all responding to the needs of children caught up in trans-national violence and our complex immigration system.”
In describing this year’s winners, the selection committee stated, “Unlike any other time since Watergate, this nation needs courageous whistleblowers whose fidelity to truth outweighs their own financial interests. Today three such individuals have emerged to alert us to the abuse that children and families are experiencing as a result of policies and practices on our borders. We honor all three for their patriotism and integrity.”
Shuchart is senior director for legal strategy at Kids in Need of Defense, Inc. (KIND) and was until April a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress. From 2010 to 2018 he was the senior advisor to the Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), where he worked extensively on immigration enforcement, detention and custody, and border security, with an emphasis on data-driven analysis to identify civil rights and civil liberties violations. While at DHS, Shuchart led efforts to ensure that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Secure Communities initiative and other programs respected civil rights and avoided racial profiling. He is a graduate of The Pembroke Hill School, Harvard, Oxford and Yale Law School. From 2003 to 2004, Shuchart clerked for Judge Marsha S. Berzon on the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. He taught at the Yale Law School Supreme Court Advocacy Clinic from 2008 to 2010, which won several important cases, including the landmark asylum case Negusie v. Holder. Prior to joining the federal government, he was a litigator in San Francisco and in New York. He is the son of John and Stevie Shuchart, who recently moved from the Kansas City Jewish community to Bethesda, Maryland.
At the awards presentation Shuchart noted that thousands of families and children have come to our country in recent years fleeing crime, poverty and seeking safety in a situation that lacks easy answers.
“But as we now understand, senior members of this administration hoped that by further traumatizing these people, word would spread that this country is such a cruel place that no one should come to us to ask for protection from us and then people would stop coming,” he said.
He continued, “I think the country should be proud of the immediate public revulsion to that idea. Family separation did not end with the executive order that ended the zero-tolerance policy. Families do continue to be separated by the border agencies for other reasons. Please do not let this become another story that passes from the front page, that passes from memory the moment that it’s not something we’re hearing about every morning.”
As he concluded, Shuchart said three honorees were grateful for the honor of this award.
“But in accepting it, I think we all want to emphasize that the truth that is really told in this process during the acute phase of family separation was the truth that was told by the American people that we all know better than to hurt someone’s child to make a point.”