Selena Gomez shared an emotional message on Instagram this week in response to the President Trump-approved Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids happening across the country. “All my people are getting attacked. The children. I don’t understand. I’m so sorry,” the Emilia Pérez star, who is Mexican-American, said through tears. “I wish I could do something but I can’t. I don’t know what to do. I’ll try everything, I promise.”
According to The Daily Beast, Gomez also “included the text ‘I’m sorry’ with a Mexican flag on her Story, which she later took down. The clip was screen-recorded and went viral on Monday morning, however, sparking mass outrage in conservative circles.” One such conservative is Sam Parker, a Republican from Utah who sought (and failed to win) election to the US Senate in 2018. “Maybe Selena should be deported, too?” he wrote on X.
Gomez replied to Parker’s threat in an Instagram Story, writing, “Oh Mr. Parker, Mr. Parker. Thanks for the laugh and the threat.”
In 2019, Gomez wrote an essay for Time about America’s immigration policies. “Undocumented immigration is an issue I think about every day, and I never forget how blessed I am to have been born in this country thanks to my family and the grace of circumstance,” it reads. “But when I read the news headlines or see debates about immigration rage on social media, I feel afraid for those in similar situations. I feel afraid for my country.”
You can see Gomez’s since-deleted video here.
