US sticks to guns on immigration
The Trump administration defended its hardline immigration policy at the US-Mexico border as the furore grew over the separation of immigrant parents and children, amid video footage of youngsters sitting in concrete-floored cages.
Democrats blasted such treatment as barbaric, while a few of President Donald Trump’s fellow Republicans also voiced concern as the Republican-controlled US House of Representatives moved towards voting later this week on two pieces of immigration-related legislation.
Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, a Trump appointee, said at a White House briefing that the administration was only strictly enforcing the law.
“This administration did not create a policy of separating families. What has changed is that we no longer exempt entire classes of people who break the law,” she said.
The outcry over the detained children resulted from the Trump administration’s zero tolerance immigration policy, which provides for the arrest of all adults caught trying to enter the US illegally, including those seeking asylum.
Children are sent to separate detention facilities, some in remote locations, while their parents are held in jail.
Video footage released by the government showed migrant children held in wire cages, sitting on concrete floors.
Trump administration officials say the zero-tolerance policy, which was not practised by the two previous presidents, is needed to secure the border and deter illegal immigration.
Attorney-General Jeff Sessions defended the policy in an interview with Laura Ingraham on Fox News on Monday.
“We are doing the right thing. We are taking care of these children. They are not being abused,” he said.
But Democrats and some Republicans have admonished the administration for separating nearly 2 000 children from their parents between mid April and the end of last month.
“The increasing number of children being ripped away from their parents is sickening,” Democratic Senator Michael Bennet said.
House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said after visiting an immigration detention centre in San Diego: “Our message to Mr Trump is ‘stop this inhumane, barbaric policy’.”
Seattle-based Microsoft Corp, one of America’s largest businesses, said in a statement it was dismayed.
“We urge the administration to change its policy and Congress to pass legislation ensuring children are no longer separated from their families,” it said.
Trump, whose promise to crack down on illegal immigration was a major theme of his 2016 campaign, responded sharply to critics on Monday.
“The United States will not be a migrant camp, and it will not be a refugee holding facility. It won’t be,” he said at the White House.
Trump has sought to use the outrage to push through other immigration priorities that have stalled in Congress, such as funding for the wall along the Mexican border.
Meanwhile, UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said the UN refugee agency was deeply concerned over the US separating children of asylum seekers from their families, and had raised the issue with Washington.
He said the Trump administration had legitimate concerns over how to manage asylum applications, as the US had the largest backlog of asylum cases in the world. –