Jeremy Ramey: I thought that the court system, legal system, was going to be fighting for
the kids.
And I quickly found out that's not the case.
What do I love most about being a daddy?
Do we have all day?
Because I can go on and on and on.
I knew i always wanted to be a dad first of all.
That was like a non-negotiable for me.
And we grow up, I got married.
And when two guys get married it's kind of hard to have a kid!
We had friends who fostered and they had like the perfect foster story.
And so we got our foster license.
Arlem Garcia: You would think that kids that don't know who you are, coming into your house,
they're coming and meeting you, they're going to be shy and they're going to be, you know,
withdrawn.
And they just have gone through whatever traumatic thing coming into foster care.
And it wasn't like that.
They just hugged us and immediately just, just held on like they had known us forever.
And it was amazing.
That was it!
It was it was over for us then.
Like, this is our life.
Naomi Schaefer Riley: Jeremy and Arlem took in these kids.
They made them part of their family.
But these kids came to them with very difficult histories.
They had bruises and burns on them.
What should matter in terms of how kids are placed is that they are placed in a stable,
loving home where they can move toward permanency.
And we have laws in this country about that.
In the 90s, a bipartisan group of lawmakers came together and passed the Adoption and
Safe Families Act, and it said if you have been in foster care for 15 of the last 22
months, the state should be moving to terminate parental rights.
And we regularly flout this law.
For years, children in foster care spend an average of more than two years in foster care,
and in many cases they are spending three, four, five years.
Antonio Garcia-Ramey: Yeah?
Arlem Garcia: Mmm hmm.
So put it together.
Antonio Garcia-Ramey: I can't....
Arlem Garcia: It's re...
Antonio Garcia-Ramey: Ready?
Arlem Garcia: See?
You say you can't but you just did Antonio Garcia-Ramey: And gets ready for...
Arlem Garcia: Mmm hmm
Naomi Schaefer Riley: The mother wanted this child back.
Or she would say she did, but she was not willing to live with any of the conditions
that the court set.
Jeremy Ramey: I thought that everybody, the court system, legal system, was going to be
fighting for the kids.
And I quickly found out after the first time we were in court that's not the case.
Arlem Garcia: Every appointment that they had, every visit that they had, it was completely
based around the parent and whether they could make it, whether they had a ride whether they
were feeling up to it that day.
They gave her chances to go and get drug tested, she wouldn't show.
When it came to actual visits, she would go in blocks where she would see them, you know,
maybe two weeks in a row and then we wouldn't see her for two months.
And it just went on this way every time we went to court.
It was just excuse after excuse, chance after chance.
And there was never a point where someone said, "Enough is enough!
Like, you're not doing anything to actually get your kids back."
Naomi Schaefer Riley: The idea that judges regularly dismiss or don't even listen to
people who have cared for vulnerable children for a year, two years, three years is not
a recipe for success!
We need to make foster parents aware that they actually have a legal right to speak
up in most court hearings, and that the judge should be listening to what they have to say.
Arlem Garcia: So the next court date they said, you know, mom showed up for visits the
last three weeks.
All of a sudden, mom's attorney files to change the case plan.
The case plan has been severance for two and a half years.
They file based on, like, three weeks of her interaction to change it to reunification.
And the judge agrees.
I mean, I'm sitting in the courtroom and my heart sinks.
We had built this life and this family, and the system just decided to just pluck him
out of it and put him in a situation that he should never have been in.
And we should have never been in that position where they could do that.
Eventually during some visits there were some questions about mom's parenting.
And then there was one instance where finally someone outside the home called in a complaint.
And that person found something.
We don't know what it is!
We still don't know what it is.
They never said anything.
They found something.
They removed Antonio.
Jeremy Ramey: So Antonio came home.
There's so many tears.
But the thing that really hurt the most was Antonio really didn't know who we were for
a minute.
And he was a little different.
He was a little different.
Then he started talking about having to hide from the bad guys.
And it was just heartbreaking that he had to hide from the bad guys and listen to the
gunshots.
Arlem Garcia: He was just afraid of everything.
He was afraid to be left alone.
Like, if he didn't see Jeremy or I, like, visually in a room, like, he would go looking
for us.
I mean, we couldn't be in the bathroom for five minutes without him like screaming out
yelling out for us.
He just wasn't the same kid.
Naomi Schaefer Riley: Their story did end happily and they were able to bring him home.
But I think it's also important to think about the trauma that this child experienced.
To have the first years of your life be in this constant back and forth and never knowing
where your real home is and where your real family is and that you're going to be kept
safe.
Arlem Garcia: I still love you Antonio Garcia-Ramey: We're on the same team!