Scott rejects separating kids

Governor blames issue on ‘bipartisan inaction’

Breaking with President Donald Trump’s administration, Gov. Rick Scott said Monday he does not support separating migrant children from their parents trying to cross the U.S. southern border.

Scott, a Republican candidate for U.S. Senate, blamed the separations on “bipartisan inaction and failure from our federal government.”

“They have failed to secure our borders, which has resulted in this chaos,” he said in a statement. “Let me be clear — I do not favor separating families. Washington is to blame for this by being all talk and no action, and the solution is to secure the border. Anyone seeking to enter our country illegally needs to be sent back, with the exception of those who are truly seeking asylum from an oppressive regime.”

Scott did not refer to Trump by name, and he did not call for an immediate end to the practice, as many Democrats and former Republican Florida Gov. Jeb Bush have.

The separations are the result of a “zero tolerance” policy implemented by the Trump administration. The policy has resulted in everyone who is apprehended entering the country illegally — in-

cluding those seeking asylum — being charged criminally. That generally results in children being separated from their parents.

Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen defended the separations, saying her department is enforcing the laws on the books. Previous administrations have separated families at the border, although at lower rates, and children in detention facilities are provided meals, education, medical care and television, she said.

Nielsen said families seeking asylum at ports of entry — such as airports or seaports — are not being separated, but those who try to enter illegally into the United States across the border will be charged criminally.

“If an American were to commit a crime anywhere in the United States, they would go to jail, and they would be separated from their family,” Nielsen said. “This is not a controversial idea.”

Trump ratcheted up his position Monday, a day before he is set to go to Congress to push for a tougher immigration law. He vowed that he would keep the United States from becoming “a migrant camp.”

But critics say the policy of splitting up families is inhumane.

The investigative news website ProPublica released a recording Monday from a detention center of children crying and calling for their mothers and fathers. A border agent is captured on the recording joking, “We have an orchestra here.”

Democratic U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson — who is seeking to retain his Senate seat — has co-sponsored a bill that would prohibit the practice of separating children solely as a deterrence to prevent people from migrating to the United States.

In a joint letter to Trump, Nelson and other senators called separating families at the border “unethical, ineffective and inhumane.” Nelson said he will meet with officials today at the Homestead Temporary Shelter for Unaccompanied Children, referencing reports that as many as 1,000 migrant children are being held there.

Republican Sen. Marco Rubio wrote on Twitter that he favors changing “the law to allow families to be held together at family facilities & shorten detention with expedited hearings.” A Rubio spokeswoman did not respond to a question asking whether Rubio would support the legislation co-sponsored by Nelson.

Bush — who faced Trump in the GOP primary in 2016 — called on Trump to “end this heartless policy.”

South Florida Democratic members of Congress have blasted the administration and its policy.

U.S. Rep. Alcee Hastings, DWest Delray, wrote on Twitter, “Separating children from their families and holding them in cages is government-sanctioned child abuse.”

U.S. Rep. Lois Frankel, D-West Palm Beach, is planning a news conference today in West Palm Beach to condemn “the policy that is cruelly ripping families apart at the border.” She will spotlight a Jupiter resident whose 5-year-old granddaughter was separated from her family at the border, and the family has had no contact with the child in at least 20 days.

At an event Monday, U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, DWeston, said she has “never seen a policy more vile, more revolting.”

The congresswomen say they plan to travel to Texas this week to examine the issue firsthand.