Trump Dismisses 'Torture' of Migrant Children at Border

The conditions at Border Patrol facilities holding migrant children are far worse than anyone realized. Reports have emerged in the past week that detail dirty, hungry children who are often forced to sleep on concrete floors. Infants are being cared for by children only a few years their elder. Diapers are not being used. Lice combs are being shared. Mothers do not have the ability to wash their children’s bottles. A medical declaration obtained by ABC News compared the conditions to those of “torture facilities.”

President Trump made clear on Sunday that he sees the issue as a political game. A day after he informed Democrats that he was giving them two weeks to essentially solve the border crisis before going ahead with previously announced mass deportations, Trump essentially dismissed the plight of migrant children while speaking with Chuck Todd on Meet the Press. “This has been happening long before I got there,” the president said when pressed about the conditions. “We’ve ended [family] separation. Under President Obama, you had separation. I was the one who ended it.”

“We’re doing a fantastic job, under the circumstances,” he added.

None of this is true.

Families attempting to cross the border under President Obama were separated only in rare circumstances, such as when there was concern for the safety of the child, or when the adult could not be confirmed to be the child’s parent. Last spring, however, the Trump administration instituted a “zero-tolerance policy,” holding that every adult crossing the border would be prosecuted, and thus separated from their child or children. A leaked Department of Homeland Security memo revealed that family separation was an intended consequence of the policy, with authorities hoping it would deter other families from attempting to cross the border.

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