ONE DOLPHIN IS TOO MANY

The Author's Edition

Originally published in The Columbus Dispatch and subsequently featured in The Conversation section on July 28, 2026.

(This edition reflects the author's complete text and subsequent revisions.)

On an evening earlier this month, I watched a father walk out of the Butler County Jail and, two and a half hours later, embrace his wife and young children after more than six months apart.

That should never have taken so long to resolve. For that family, it was a day of overwhelming joy. For me, it raised difficult questions about how our immigration system is functioning.

This is not an argument against enforcing our immigration laws. Every nation has the right and responsibility to secure its borders and remove individuals who genuinely threaten public safety. I support that.

But government also has an equally important responsibility to exercise its authority wisely, fairly, and constitutionally.

The question is not whether we enforce the law.

The question is what good stewardship of governmental power asks of us.

Government earns the public's trust not simply by enforcing the law, but by demonstrating the judgment to distinguish between those who threaten our communities and those who have become part of our communities.

The father I watched reunite with his family came to the United States from Cuba, settled in Grove City with his wife and children, worked, attended church, and appeared for every immigration proceeding while his asylum case moved through the courts.

Then, just days before Christmas, ICE officers arrested him.

He remained in the Butler County Jail for more than half a year while his wife worked full time, cared for their children and, uncertain of the future, desperately tried to hold her family together.

An independent federal judge ordered his immediate release earlier this month, concluding that his continued detention violated his constitutional right to due process.

Whether one agrees with every aspect of the court's legal reasoning is beside the point.

The point is this:

Our courts exist because governmental power cannot be limitless.

When an independent federal judge concludes that someone should not have remained in detention for six months while his legal case proceeds, we should all pause and ask how we got there.

I have often heard the saying,

"Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."

Over the past several months, I have found myself reflecting on a different thought.

Power reveals.

It reveals what we value. It reveals the judgments we make.

And ultimately, it reveals whether our institutions can exercise authority without losing wisdom, restraint, and humanity.

Over the years, I have come to believe that good government begins not with certainty, but with curiosity. Before deciding what should happen next, we owe one another the discipline to ask whether we have understood enough, listened enough, and learned enough.

Curiosity is not weakness. It is the beginning of wisdom.

As I reflect on this case, I keep returning to four questions that I believe every public servant and every citizen should ask.

Was he a danger to the community?

The court pointed to his lack of criminal history, steady employment, family ties, and consistent compliance with the legal immigration process.

Was he likely to flee?

Again, the court concluded the evidence said no.

What did six months of detention accomplish?

Taxpayers paid to house, transport, guard, and litigate his detention.

His employer lost a dependable worker.

His wife carried the full weight of raising two young children alone.

Those are real costs, regardless of where one stands on immigration policy.

And finally...

If this happened to one family, how many other cases deserve another look?

I don't pretend to know the answer.

But I do know this.

Most Americans understand that law enforcement sometimes has to cast wide nets. We all want dangerous criminals removed from our communities.

But when a fishing net catches a dolphin along with the tuna, responsible fishermen don't simply cast a bigger net. They improve the net. That isn't weakness. It's precision. It's professionalism. It's accountability. It's good government.

I cannot rewrite federal immigration law, but I can ask whether our enforcement resources are being directed where they make Americans safest. I can ask whether scarce detention space should first be reserved for people who truly threaten public safety.

And I can ask whether we are honoring one of America's oldest constitutional principles: that liberty should not be taken away without due process of law.

I watched two young children run into their father's arms that evening. No statistic, policy paper, or political talking point can fully capture what that moment meant.

Securing our borders and protecting constitutional liberty are not competing goals. They are complementary responsibilities. A nation is measured not only by how humanely it enforces its laws, but also by how humanely it restrains its own power.

I don't ask every reader to reach the same conclusions I have.

I simply hope we remain curious enough to ask these questions together, because the way our government exercises its power belongs to all of us, not only to those temporarily entrusted to exercise it.

Our government belongs to all of us.

So does the privilege, and the responsibility of leaving it better than we found it.

The measure of self-government isn't whether we avoid difficult decisions.

It's whether we remain curious enough to reason together in search of the next right thing.

Because even one dolphin is too many.