Days after saying 'yu can't do it through an executive order'. President Donald Trump has backed down after widespread criticism
of an immigration policy that split families at the US border, signing an executive
order that will put
a stop to the practice.
The issue has plagued
his administration after it was revealed that at least 2,000 children had
been torn from their parents under a new “zero
tolerance” immigration policy.
Mr Trump said on
Wednesday that the zero tolerance policy would continue, but that he “didn’t
like the sight or the feeling of families being separated”.
The executive
order, he said, was “about keeping families together, while at the
same time being sure that we have a very powerful, very strong border”.
“I think the word
‘compassion’ comes into it, but it’s still equally as tough, if not
tougher,” Mr Trump added. The day before, he had accused immigrants of
“infesting” the country, and declared the US would not be a “refugee
holding facility”.
Family separations
have escalated under Mr Trump’s new zero tolerance policy, which requires all
adults caught crossing the border illegally to be referred for prosecution.
Adult immigrants facingcharges are housed separately from
their children, resulting in the separation of parents
fromchildren reportedly as young as eight-months-old.
But the president’s
new executive order states that the US’s policy is to “maintain
family unity”, except in cases where doing so would threaten a child’s
wellbeing.
In the order, Mr
Trump directed the secretary of homeland security to
house those facing prosecution alongside their family members, “to the extent
permitted by law and subject to the availability of appropriations”.
He ordered the secretary of defence to identify any existing
facilities for housing immigrant families, and to build more if necessary.
Mr Trump also directed
the attorney general to request a modification of the Flores Settlement
Agreement – a 2015 court ruling that the administration has
claimed bars them from housingfamilies together. It was unclear how the
new executive order will square with the ruling, which requires
migrant children to be released quickly from detention, or detained
in the “least restrictive conditions” possible.
The president denied
allegations that he was backing down from his strict stance on immigration,
telling reporters at the signing that the southern border was “just as
tough” as before.
A spokesman for Health
and Human Services, which oversees the resettlement of migrantchildren, told
multiple outlets on Wednesday that the more than
2,000 children already separated from their parents would not be
immediately reunited under the new order. Kenneth Wolfe, a spokesman for
the Administration for Children and Families (ACF), told the New
York Times there would be no "grandfathering of existing
cases".
But another official
later claimed Mr Wolfe had misspoken, saying the department was still
"awaiting further guidance on the matter".
"It is still very
early," Brian Marriott, the senior communications director at
ACF, said in a statement. "Our focus is on continuing to provide quality
services and care to the minors...and reunifying minors with a relative or
appropriate sponsor as we have done since HHS inherited the
program."
Still, immigrants'
rights activists criticised the order, saying it did not address the larger
issues concerning the zero tolerance policy. The executive order,
they pointed out, only solved the problem of family separations by requiring
parents and children to be detained together for an
indefinite amount of time.
“Make no mistake –
this executive order is a betrayal of families fleeing violence and
persecution,” said Denise Bell, a refugee and migrant rights
researcher at Amnesty International USA. ”Mothers, fathers,
and children must not be held behind bars for prolonged periods for
seeking safety.”
Comments
Post a Comment