29 May 2018 - US Administration Lost Track of 1,500 Immigrant Children Last Year
US lost track of 1,500 immigrant children, but says it's not 'legally responsible'
(CNN, 28/05/2018)
The federal government has placed thousands of unaccompanied immigrant children in the homes of sponsors, but last year it couldn't account for nearly 1,500 of them.
Did the Trump Administration Separate Immigrant Children From Parents and Lose Them?
Amy Harmon (The New York Times, 28/05/2018)
President Trump over the weekend falsely blamed Democrats for a “horrible law” separating immigrant children from their parents. In fact, his own administration had just announced this policy earlier this month.
His comments followed days of growing alarm that federal authorities have lost track of more than 1,000 immigrant children, mostly from Central America, giving rise to hashtags like #WhereAreTheChildren and claims that children are being ripped from their parents’ arms at the border and then being lost.
But the president is not the only one spreading wrong information. Across social media, there have been confusing reports of what happened to these immigrant children. Here are some answers.
The Trump administration’s immigration policies are impossibly cruel. That’s the whole point.
Paul Wadman (The Washington Post, 28/05/2018)
Amid growing outrage over the Trump administration’s policy of separating children from their parents when families arrive at the border, many are asking how the administration can be so cruel as to literally tear children from their mothers’ arms. There’s a clear answer, one that runs through all of the administration’s policies on immigration:
The cruelty is the whole point.
It’s both a reflection of President Trump’s beliefs and those of his key advisers on immigration, and a practical tool they are using to reduce the number of immigrants coming to the United States. There won’t be a more humane set of policies coming out of this administration, because they have no interest in being humane.
Trump blames Democrats for his policy of separating migrant families at border
Benjy Sarlin (NBC News, 28/05/2018)
President Donald Trump's administration is implementing a new policy that will separate more children from their parents at the border, despite the president falsely blaming Democrats and an unspecified "horrible law" for their decision.
The administration confirmed this month that breaking up families was a byproduct of their new "zero tolerance" plan to prosecute everyone who crosses the border illegally, which would require minors who traveled with their family to be taken into the custody of the Department of Health and Human Services. Under the previous policy, children were usually allowed to stay with their parents in shelters while awaiting legal proceedings.