Migrant deaths: Trump blames Democrats

WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump claims that two Guatemalan children who died in US custody were already ill, yet both young migrants passed initial health screenings by border officials.

As Democrats criticised Trump for tweeting on Saturday that Democratic immigration policies were responsible for the deaths, homeland security secretary Kirstjen Nielsen visited medical officials and border patrol agents at the Arizona and Texas southern borders amid promises of additional wellness screenings for migrant children.

In Guatemala, the mother of eight-year-old Felipe Gomez Alonzo, who died on Christmas Eve, told AP that her son was healthy when he left with his father on their journey hoping to migrate to the US.

“When he called me, he told me he was fine. He told me not to worry,” Catarina Alonzo said from the family’s home in the remote Guatemalan village of Yalambojoch, her stepdaughter Catarina Gomez translating her indigenous language Chuj into Spanish.

Catarina said the last time she spoke with Felipe he was in Mexico at the US border and said he was eating chicken.

Their village is in Nenton municipality in Huehuetenango province, about 400km west of Guatemala City.

Trump, whose administration has faced widespread criticism over the deaths, pointed on Twitter at Democrats “and their pathetic immigration policies that allow people to make the long trek thinking they can enter our country illegally”. He also said that both children “were very sick before they were given over to Border Patrol”.