Democrats are exploiting illegal immigrant children for their own political purposes, President Trump asserted Thursday, seemingly preparing the country for the failure of a number of GOP immigration bills on Capitol Hill.
Mr. Trump issued an invitation to Democratic leaders to come to the White House later in the day to try to work something out — but in the meantime, said he’s afraid his efforts will be doomed.
“They don’t care about the children. They don’t care about the injury, they don’t care about the problems,” the president said during a meeting with his Cabinet at the White House.
He suggested blame for some of the violence migrants face during the trip through Mexico and across the U.S.-Mexico border lies at the feet of Democratic leaders, too.
“People are suffering because of the Democrats. It’s a whole big con job. They’ve created a massive child-smuggling industry. It’s a disgrace,” he said.
Mr. Trump spoke a day after he reversed himself and ordered his administration to keep children together with their parents when they are arrested illegally entering the U.S. at the southwest border.
The administration is still working through the ramifications of the non-separation policy, but it’s likely to require a major infusion of resources to open facilities to hold the families together in detention.
Democrats, though, say that while they don’t want parents and children separated, they also don’t want families kept in detention. They have pushed for the families to be released from custody — a move that Mr. Trump derided as “catch and release,” and said would invite still more illegal immigrants to try the journey.
“If we don’t close these loopholes, there is no amount of money in the world” to solve the crisis, he said.
House Republicans are slated to vote later Thursday on two bills to crack down on illegal immigration at the border, combined with legal status for some illegal immigrants.
Both bills are expected to fail.
Meanwhile, lawmakers in both the House and Senate are trying to craft more permanent solutions to the family separation issue. Senate Republicans have written a bill that would give the government permission to keep families together in detention, and make those cases priorities so they don’t linger.
Mr. Trump said he figures a half-dozen Democrats might join the GOP to vote for it, but that’s not enough to clear a Democratic filibuster.
“I think it’s bad politically, for them. I think it’s bad politically. We’ll see,” he said.
• Dave Boyer can be reached at dboyer@washingtontimes.com.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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