Sen. Bernie Sanders hit back at President Trump for accusing Democrats of thwarting immigration reform and blasted the administration’s now-reversed zero tolerance policy, saying the United States “is not a nation which tears children from their parents.”
“Clearly, anyone who looks at the record understands that the Democrats have been serious about comprehensive immigration reform, that’s what the American people want, and a path towards citizenship for people who are undocumented,” Sanders said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union.”
The Vermont independent also blasted the White House’s zero tolerance policy that resulted in thousands of children being removed from their parents at the border.
Amid a deluge of outrage prompted by images of children being held in wire cages, Trump last Wednesday signed an executive order ending the policy after claiming over several days that only Congress had the ability to fix it.
“We have a president who’s not serious about policy, a president who lies every single day, a president who told us that he couldn’t do anything about ripping children from the arms of their mothers and it had to be in Congress and then two days later he passed an executive order,” the former presidential candidate said.
“We need Trump now to make it clear that the United States of America is not a nation which tears children from their parents.”
More than 2,000 children were removed from their parents because of the policy, which Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced in April.
Trump has been railing that Democrats are obstructing immigration votes in the GOP-controlled Congress – even suggesting that Republicans wait until after the mid-term elections in November to take up any measures.
“Republicans should stop wasting their time on Immigration until after we elect more Senators and Congressmen/women in November,” he wrote last Friday on Twitter.
“Dems are just playing games, have no intention of doing anything to solves this decades old problem. We can pass great legislation after the Red Wave!”
