http://thehill.com/latino/393158-trump- ... xas-report
The Trump administration is reportedly operating three "tender age" detainment facilities in Texas, where undocumented babies and toddlers are sent after being forcibly separated from their parents.
The Associated Press reports that at least three facilities housing hundreds of children are already operational in Combes, Raymondville and Brownsville, Texas, while a fourth in Houston is being planned.
http://thehill.com/latino/393171-michig ... months-old
Michigan's Department of Civil Rights says immigrant children as young as three months of age have arrived in the state for temporary foster care placement after being separated from their parents at the U.S. border.
In a statement on Tuesday, the Michigan Department of Civil Rights denounced the Trump administration's zero tolerance immigration policy, which has resulted in the separation of migrant parents and children. The statement also assured that the department was working to make sure children arriving in the state are well taken care of, are properly resettled and have their civil rights represented.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/17/us/i ... rents.html
'I Can’t Go Without My Son,’ a Mother Pleaded as She Was Deported to Guatemala
As a growing number of families are separated as part of the Trump administration’s attempt to control illegal immigration, some parents are being deported before recovering their children.
As the federal government continues to separate families as part of a stepped-up enforcement program against those who cross the border illegally, the authorities say that parents are not supposed to be deported without their children. But immigration lawyers say that has happened in several cases. And the separations can be traumatic for parents who now have no clear path to recovering their children.
http://thehill.com/latino/393114-trump- ... -immigrant
The Trump administration is planning to pay a single nonprofit $458 million to house immigrant children detained after crossing the border.
The Texas nonprofit, Southwest Key Programs, operates a series of facilities housing detained migrant children, including a former WalMart in Texas that has become the focus of national attention amid the outcry over President Trump’s “zero tolerance” policy.
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... -criticism
President Trump issued praise for Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen on Tuesday amid a storm of criticism surrounding the administration's "zero tolerance" policy on illegal immigration.
In a tweet, the president touted Nielsen's performance at Monday's White House press briefing, during which Nielsen fielded questions from reporters over whether DHS's treatment of detained children seeking asylum constitutes child abuse.
...."Homeland Security @SecNielsen did a fabulous job yesterday at the press conference explaining security at the border and for our country, while at the same time recommending changes to obsolete & nasty laws, which force family separation. We want “heart” and security in America!" Trump tweeted.
Another soulless bastard in the Trump administration blames the parents for having their kids taken from them:
http://thehill.com/latino/393113-ice-ch ... eparations
The country's top immigration enforcement official said Tuesday that undocumented parents who enter the U.S. illegally are to blame if they're later separated from their children.
Speaking on CNN, Thomas Homan, the acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), defended the Trump administration's policy of zero tolerance for illegal border crossings.
"The parents need to make a clear choice: Enter through a port of entry, you won't be separated," said Homan. "If anybody's to blame for that child being taken away, it's the parent that chose, 'I'm gonna break the law rather than go to a port of entry."
I don't have a report to link to at the moment, but there are reports that hundreds of people have been camped out in front of legal ports of entry for weeks, trying to do just that, but the Trump administration is refusing to process more than a handful of claims. And some reports claim that even some parents entering through those ports have had their children taken away.
Not to mention the nonsense of claiming that a poor family escaping violence in Honduras or El Salvador is going to be spending their evenings watching cable news and know this before they enter.Some of the kids who have been incarcerated don't even speak Spanish, much less English.
And this new policy has been going on for weeks (and to a lesser extent for months or longer?), but the Trump administration has been keeping it quiet until now, presumably to avoid the public relations nightmare it's now facing.
Edit: Mulvaney also lines up to be a loyal little Trump supporter too and show what he is. This guy is the budget director. He didn't have to speak up.
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... ditions-at
White House budget director Mick Mulvaney on Wednesday defended the Trump administration’s controversial “zero-tolerance” immigration policy that has led to the separation of thousands of migrant children from their parents. Mulvaney said Wednesday that the Trump administration was merely enforcing laws that apply to U.S. citizens and rejected claims that migrant children have been kept in cages and inhumane conditions.
btw, his statement also suggests he should go for an eye exam.
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing- ... -with-down
Former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski on Tuesday dismissed a story from a Democratic strategist who shared about a 10-year-old girl with Down syndrome being separated from her family while illegally entering the U.S.
“I read today about a 10-year-old girl with Down syndrome who was taken from her mother,” Zac Petkanas, who formerly served as the rapid response director for Hillary Clinton's campaign, said during an appearance on Fox News opposite Lewandowski.
Lewandowski interrupted, mockingly interjecting, “womp womp.”
Democrat Schumer is also contemptible:
http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/3930 ... der-crisis
Senate Democratic Leader Charles Schumer (N.Y.) on Tuesday dismissed a legislative proposal backed by Republican leaders to keep immigrant families together at the border, arguing that President Trump could fix the problem more easily with a flick of his pen.
“There are so many obstacles to legislation and when the president can do it with his own pen, it makes no sense,” Schumer told reporters. “Legislation is not the way to go here when it’s so easy for the president to sign it.”
Asked if that meant Democrats would not support a bill backed by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) to keep immigrant families together while seeking asylum on the U.S. border, Schumer said they want to keep the focus on Trump. “Again, the president can change it with his pen,” he said, warning that Republicans would likely try to add poison-pill provisions to any immigration bill that came to the floor. “Unacceptable additions have bogged down every piece of legislation we’ve done,” he said.
Quite possibly he's right about the latter, but he's refusing to try for a bipartisan agreement, just to get political points.
More governors are withdrawing members of the National Guard from the border, or announcing that they will not send them in the future, in outrage over the family separations.
http://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch ... o-separate
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing- ... nce-policy
The American Medical Association (AMA) on Wednesday condemned the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” immigration policy, which has resulted in the separations of migrant families at the border.
And normally I wouldn't condone things like the following, but considering the language I used last night when a Trump spokesperson was on the radio (and normally I don't swear much, beyond the occasional "damn"), I can't throw stones. In fact, I think that at this point, the best thing for the decent people of this country to do would be to ostracize anyone who publicly defends this outrage. And hit the Trump dynasty the only place it hurts, in their wallets.
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing- ... at-mexican
Liberal activists disrupted Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen's dinner at a Mexican restaurant in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday night amid growing outcry over the Trump administration's "zero tolerance" immigration policy.
(DHS tried to spin this as a positive thing today:
http://thehill.com/latino/393172-dhs-pr ... ut-current
A Department of Homeland Security spokesman said that the protesters who confronted DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen Tuesday evening at a Washington, D.C. restaurant "share her concern" over the "current immigration laws" that have created a "crisis" on the southwest border.
“While having a work dinner tonight, the Secretary and her staff heard from a small group of protestors who share her concern with our current immigration laws that have created a crisis on our southern border,” DHS spokesperson Tyler Q. Houlton wrote on Twitter.
“.@SecNielsen encourages all - including this group - who want to see an immigration system that works, contributes to our economy, protects our security, & reflects our values reach out to Members & seek their support to close immigration loopholes that made our system a mess,” Houlton added
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing- ... at-capitol
A heckler hurled an expletive at President Trump as he arrived at the Capitol on Tuesday.“Mr. President, f--- you,” the person can be heard yelling in a clip shared by NBC's Frank Thorp V.
...According to an NBC News reporter, the woman who yelled the remark was a congressional intern.
However, things like this are more admirable
https://www.theverge.com/2018/6/19/1747 ... -tolerance
A Facebook fundraiser is set to raise $5 million in under five days in response to the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” policy on immigration and the separation of thousands of children from their families at the border.
Charlotte and Dave Willner started their fundraising campaign after seeing the viral image of a two-year-old girl crying as her mother, an asylum seeker from Honduras, was being searched and detained at the US-Mexico border. The initial goal of $1,500 was meant to help cover bond fees for the one person, but it rapidly grew in scale.
Over 83,000 people have contributed to the cause on Facebook so far.
Another expression of anger:
http://thehill.com/policy/technology/39 ... s-with-ice
Dozens of Microsoft employees are calling on the company to cut ties with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) amid growing outcry over the Trump administration’s "zero tolerance" immigration policy.
More than 100 employees signed on to an open letter to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, which was posted to an internal message board and obtained by The New York Times on Tuesday. “We believe that Microsoft must take an ethical stand, and put children and families above profits,” the letter reads. The letter demands that Microsoft end its $19 million contract with the agency to use the company’s Azure cloud product for sensitive data processing.
http://thehill.com/policy/technology/39 ... e-contract
Microsoft executives are rushing to contain employee backlash over the company's contracts with Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
http://thehill.com/homenews/news/393170 ... -democrats
Republican strategist Steve Schmidt, one of the GOP's loudest critics of President Trump, renounced the party early Wednesday and announced that he will begin voting for Democrats.
... 29 years and nine months ago I registered to vote and became a member of The Republican Party which was founded in 1854 to oppose slavery and stand for the dignity of human life. Today I renounce my membership in the Republican Party. It is fully the party of Trump.
— Steve Schmidt (@SteveSchmidtSES) June 20, 2018
It is corrupt, indecent and immoral. With the exception of a few Governors like Baker, Hogan and Kasich it is filled with feckless cowards who disgrace and dishonor the legacies of the party’s greatest leaders.
,,,“This child separation policy is connected to the worst abuse of humanity in our history,” Schmidt wrote. “It is connected by the same evil that separated families during slavery and dislocated tribes and broke up Native American families. It is immoral and must be repudiated. Our country is in trouble. Our politics are badly broken.”
Oddly enough:
http://thehill.com/homenews/media/39316 ... ld-migrant
Fox News primetime host Laura Ingraham has not seen any of her advertisers publicly boycott her show despite a backlash on social media following a controversial comment she made about migrant shelters, according to a Tuesday evening report in the Hollywood Reporter.
Ingraham sparked controversy by calling housing for migrant children separated from their parents "essentially summer camps" during her Monday program.
btw,
this is what Trump supporters actually care about, An FBI agent has been hounded out because he committed the cardinal sin of not supporting Trump - he exchanged anti-Trump comments on his work email during the presidential campaign, which made the department look bad after Republicans made a huge fuss over it. Sure, he should technically have used his personal email, but who hasn't said something personal to a colleague on a work email?
http://thehill.com/policy/national-secu ... nal-review
FBI counterintelligence agent Peter Strzok was escorted from the building amid an internal review of his conduct, his lawyer confirmed Tuesday.
Strzok, who had a central role in the FBI investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server while serving as secretary of State, was reportedly escorted from the FBI building on Friday amid an internal review of his conduct.
"Pete has steadfastly played by the rules and respected the process, and yet he continues to be the target of unfounded personal attacks, political games and inappropriate information leaks," his attorney Aitan Goelman said in a statement Tuesday.
...Strzok became a target of President Trump and conservatives after it was discovered that he had exchanged private text messages with former FBI lawyer Lisa Page that disparaged Trump and other political figures.
Note that Mueller already removed Strzok from the investigation of Trump, long ago, to avoid an appearance of impropriety, and the Inspector General report clearly said that his personal views of Trump did not influence his work.
But Trump has to get his revenge.
EDIT:
Had to share some quotes from this opinion piece, posted on The Hill, to show just how low Tump's defenders have sunk. I won't point out the obvious lies. Anyone with a brain knows that US administrations haven't been ripping children from their parents for 11 years. It's by this person:
Jen Kerns has served as a GOP strategist and writer for the U.S. presidential debates for FOX News. She previously served as communications director and spokeswoman for the California Republican Party, the Colorado Recalls over gun control, and the Prop. 8 battle over marriage which went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.
http://thehill.com/opinion/immigration/ ... ading-into
As the nation vigorously debates the fate of children detained at the southern U.S. border, it is no surprise that former first lady Laura Bush — a doting mother and grandmother — felt the need to wade into the national immigration debate.There is just one problem: The former librarian should have checked out a history book first. It was her own husband, President George W. Bush, who signed into law in 2008 a comprehensive immigration reform package including a policy pertaining to unaccompanied minors at the border. ...For the former first lady to critique the Trump administration over a policy that her husband approved is the epitome of hypocrisy.
The internment camps of the 1940s were perpetrated against actual citizens of the United States, who were rounded up from their private homes, arrested, and thrown into concentration camps. Contrast this to the border crisis today which pertains to actors who aren’t citizens of this country
Sadly, the Republican former first lady’s rhetoric is no different than the attempts by Democrats to suggest that today’s border crisis is just like the Jewish Holocaust and compare the Trump administration to Nazis in 1940s Germany. Never mind that the perpetrators of the referenced incidents were left-wing leaders — President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the case of U.S. internments, Adolf Hitler regarding the Holocaust