SARA: A child in any given moment just needs to be loved
and when nobody else is there to provide it, someone has to.
And it doesn't matter who it is or how it is, they should be able to have the love that they deserve.
I have always wanted to be a foster parent as long as I can remember, from probably about 12
years old on, and my joy and my passion is children.
Ah you do match with me!
So for me, it just made sense to take care of children in the community in that way.
NICK: You know, initially, she wanted lots of kids and I wanted one. [laughs]
Little did I know then, like, I couldn't fathom that it would grow to what it is now.
I don't think that I ever went out looking to have a multi-racial family,
but I don't think that kids growing up in a multi-racial household look
at their brothers or sisters as anything different than their brothers or sisters.
NAOMI: The Multiethnic Placement Act bars child welfare agencies, adoption agencies from discriminating
on the basis of race or ethnicity in placing kids for foster care or adoption.
The idea was: Kids should not languish in foster care when there are loving, safe homes out there for them.
And what you had was a situation where there were a lot of black children in the foster care
system and caseworkers, lawyers, judges were not placing those black kids in those loving, safe homes
because their skin color did not match the skin color of the parents
willing to take them in. And so a group of bipartisan people in congress got together
and said "This is crazy. What these children need are families, and it doesn't matter whether they're
white families or black families or hispanic families. What they need is a loving, safe home."
Unfortunately, the Multiethnic Placement Act is becoming increasingly unpopular,
and I am just amazed at the way these activists from outside the system are using the foster care
system to advance an agenda of social justice that has absolutely
nothing to do with the needs of these children.
NICK: Astrid, go eat your breakfast. LILA ASTRID: Okay.
NAOMI: So, Sarah and Nick Pendleton have adopted four children. Two of the children that they adopted
were African-American, and I cannot figure out why we would care what Nick and Sarah's skin color is
when it comes to their ability to care for these children. SARA: I had just had this dream, just about a little girl with
beautiful brown skin and heart problems, and when the worker called, she said "I have a girl."
It was like, "boom." I knew she was my girl,
and she was like, "Well, i need to tell you about her." And I was like, "Okay." And she said "She's really sick
and she's got some heart defects." And the nurse came in and laid a long list of all the things
wrong with her on the table, and they were all looking at me like, "Okay you're gonna walk out too,"
because so many people had turned down this child. NICK: Even with a medical background, I wasn't
anticipating the level of care that she would need, but I think over time, our family just kind of
evolved into a family that can handle those different things when they come up.
NAOMI: She was such a part of their family. Even though they knew that her situation was terminal,
she would go in a wagon places with them; the other kids would get into bed with her and, like, talk to her.
So, Ainsley was seven when she finally died. She had been to Disney World and Lincoln Center;
she had been caving... All of these things that they did as a family together to cement their relationship with her,
and it is the kind of life that any child deserves, and especially
a child who has been through this kind of trauma.
SARA: As the mom to two black children, I see their race,
but I see them more than any skin color, hair color, hair type... I see them.
It's heartbreaking to imagine that either of those girls would still be without a family.
NICK: Astrid does not have any thought about the fact that she's living with white parents, but she does
know that she's loved, and she has permanency here, and she knows nobody's taking her away from here.
One day, will she ask me about race? "Why am I... do I have dark skin and you have white skin?"
Sure, she's gonna ask me about that, but the one thing she will not ever have to wonder is,
"Is somebody gonna come take me tonight and move me somewhere else?" She'll never have that
question, because what it comes down to at the end of the day is that she's loved and she has a place.
NAOMI: I think what the Pendletons have provided to their children
is so vital, and I think all the time about how we can find more families like them.
And what I see is a system that is working to push that away;
a system that is working to say to Nick, "You're a racist because you think skin color doesn't matter."
I think that's the opposite of where we need to be as a country, and I look at the Pendletons, and
I think they should be leading us in terms of what we're looking for in foster and adoptive families.
And whatever Nick Pendleton has to say is so much more important and so much more true than the
nonsense that is being spouted by these activists who don't even understand what these children need.
SARA: Every child deserves the same as the next. Period. End of story. And whatever it takes
to give every child a family; to give every child an advocate who thinks they hung
the moon and the stars... Whether they're going to live, whether they're going to die, whether
they can read or write, whether they can walk, whether they're even going to blink their eyes
one time on this entire earth, whether they live for one week or the rest of their parent's life...
Every child deserves to have someone who thinks that they are the greatest on this earth.