Protests continue over the Trump administration’s controversial immigration policies

World Today

In the U.S., there are reports the U.S. Navy plans to house as many as 25,000 undocumented migrants at military sites across the country. It’s an effort to find detention facilities where children can stay with their parents. The move comes after the administration reversed its policy of separating families, as they arrive at the U.S. border. 

 

CGTN’s Toby Muse has more on this controversy.

Various protests were held Saturday to oppose the government’s handling of the migrant crisis, especially the separation of child migrants from their families. Some 2,300 children have been taken from their families since May, and there are fears that some of them may never see their families again.  Scenes of children locked in cages ignited protests across the U.S.

“We should not be separating children from their families, and now that we have, we must return the children to their families,” said one woman at a demonstration in front of the White House. “This is unconscionable. They’re not thieves, they’re not criminals. They’re people who should not be incarcerated and their children should not be spending unlimited periods of time in prison.”

A group of 25 Democratic lawmakers visited an immigration facility in McAllen, Texas, and described what they found.

“There were just mounds of silver mylar,” said Representative Jim Himes of Connecticut, “and we asked to speak to somebody who was there, and as they opened the door, these twenty or thirty mounds of silver mylar became little girls. They stood up, they were scared–some had been crying.”

After initially defending the policy, President Donald Trump reversed course on Wednesday, signing an executive order to keep families who illegally cross the southern border together. But it’s not clear what that will mean going forward.  Trump says the U.S. will continue its zero-tolerance policy of prosecuting all those who enter the country illegally, in hopes of deterring additional migration from Central America.

But court decisions prevent law enforcement agencies from keeping children in jail. Trump has blasted U.S. immigration laws, calling them the “dumbest” and the worst.” Republicans have been trying to push an immigration bill through congress, but division within their own party has kept them from getting enough votes to get one passed.