Pelosi Remarks at Press Availability After Visiting San Diego Immigration Detention Facilities

Leader Pelosi.  Thank you very much Congressman Vargas for welcoming us all here, for arranging for this visit for the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and other Members of our Caucus on this heartbreaking, barbaric issue that could be changed in a moment by the President of the United States rescinding this action.

I am honored to be here with Members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and the Chairwoman of the Congressional Asian Pacific Caucus and I want to go around and have everyone say their names nice and loudly so that everyone can hear.

Congressman Cárdenas. Congressman Tony Cárdenas, I represent Los Angeles.

Congressman Gomez.  Congressman Jimmy Gomez, I represent the east side of Los Angeles.

Congresswoman Barragán.  Congresswoman Nanette Barragán, Los Angeles.

Congresswoman Velázquez.  Congresswoman Nydia Velázquez, New York.

Congresswoman Davis.  Congresswoman Susan Davis, central San Diego.Congresswoman Chu.  Congresswoman Judy Chu, San Gabriel Valley, California.

Congressman Kihuen.  Congressman Ruben Kihuen from Las Vegas, Nevada.

Congresswoman Torres.  Congresswoman Norma Torres, San Bernardino and LA County.

Congresswoman Lujan Grisham.  Congresswoman Michelle Lujan Grisham from Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Congresswoman Roybal-Allard.  Congresswoman Lucille Roybal-Allard, Los Angeles.

Congressman Costa.  Congressman Jim Costa, Fresno, California.

Congressman Correa.  Congressman Correa from Orange County, California.

Leader Pelosi.  At the same time, within a 24 hour period, as we are gathered here, there was a delegation who went to the border in Texas.  They met with children, they even held some of the children in their arms.  It's just so heartbreaking, it so challenges the conscience of our country that it must be changed and it must be changed immediately.

Today, there was another delegation at the Texas border and yesterday there was a group that went to a detention center in New Jersey.  We will be persisting in getting the information that we need to make sure the American people understand that their values are on the line.

Our colleague, Mr. Vargas, a devoutly religious person, he heads up our prayer breakfast every week in Congress and he quoted the Bible and I will too. In Matthew 19:13-14, it says, ‘People brought little children to Jesus to place his hands on them and pray for them.  Jesus said: let the little children come to me and do not hinder them for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.  And then he placed his hands on them'

What is t that they are thinking?

Maybe – I am a mother of five children and grandmother to nine.  I know that these people in Congress and the administration are parents they understand the damage that was done when stress that is exacted on children when they are separated from their families.  They think that these children deserve less than their children do in terms of care and love.

So, this is not an immigration issue, this is a humanitarian issue.  It's about the children.

It's also about people seeking asylum.  We have had the American Evangelical Association come and testify before us in saying, ‘the U.S. refugee resettlement program is the crown jewel of American humanitarianism.'  What are we doing but rejecting that now?

Don't take our words for it, the American Catholic Bishops said, this is ‘immoral.'  In fact, today another letter opposing the legislation that the Republicans are putting forward.  The Evangelical Immigration Table has said this is ‘horrible' and opposes this dividing of children and their parents.

Children, family, there's a sanctity to it that this administration has chosen to ignore.  And rather than taking responsibility for their actions, which some of them are – the Attorney General and the Secretary of Homeland Security – how horrible is that?  But the President says it's not my fault I didn't do it.

No but you did do it!  You did it to the Dreamers and now you're doing it to the children.  You can rescind this action in a moment.

So, the important point to know is that overwhelmingly the American people are opposed to separating families, they understand the importance between the relationship of children and their families.  They know the stress that can be added to children's brains by the separation, the list goes on.

But also, the fraud of the Republicans saying they're going to correct this in their bill, when what they have in their bill makes matters worse for children.  And those bills must be rejected.

And with that, I am, again, honored to be with my colleagues here, they have a lot to say on all of this.  They have a lot to say, I know you'll be hearing additionally from some of them.  I'm very honored to yield the distinguished Chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, from New Mexico, Congresswoman Michelle Lujan Grisham.

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Q: What was the facility you all visited today?

Congressman Correa.  South West Keys.

Q: Lou, can you paint a picture of what it looked like, tell us what you saw?

Leader Pelosi.  Well, I think it's really more important to focus on the policy because, when my colleagues were speaking, I was reminded of conversations I had with the administration where they would say these parents were irresponsible to take their children across a desert.  And so, we have to take the children away from these parents because they endangered the lives of their children.  Understand their basic premise.

The fact is, as Mr. Correa and others have said, they had no choice.  It was a matter of life or death.  They couldn't stay there.  So, for this Administration to say, as they have said, we know better.  We are going to take children away.  We're going to put them in foster homes.  We're going to take them away from their parents, who broke the law.

There's just something fundamentally wrong with their reasoning except when you understand that they're doing this, as Congresswoman Torres said, to get other bad immigration policies.  But, as I said, this isn't an immigration matter.  This is a humanitarian, this is a family matter.

And I say to the President, we have zero tolerance for your neglect and for your policy of separating children from their parents.  We have zero tolerance for your having this number, the administration said today that number could go up to 30,000 children by August.  30,000 children.  Do you have tolerance for that?  And we have zero tolerance for the bills in Congress that they are touting as being positive in this regard which make matters worse.

So, understand it's not a question of facilities, that's a whole other subject.  It's a question of policy, humanitarianism, abandoning the principles of our country in terms of respect for individuals and the sanctity of family.

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Q: So, what is your message to President Trump?  At this point we're debating semantics.

Leader Pelosi.  Our message to Mr. Trump is, stop this inhumane, barbaric policy, rescind your actions and take responsibility for it instead of blaming it on other people.

Q: Why would he listen, he hasn't listened so far? 

Leader Pelosi.  Well, if you want to psychoanalyze the President, there aren't enough hours in the day for that.

But, I will say that the more the public speaks up about this because as we said, this isn't about immigration.  This is about humanity.  It's about family.  It's about who we are as a country.

And it is such a departure from President Obama, President George W. Bush, President Clinton, President George Herbert Walker Bush, President Reagan.  They all understood that respect for people in our country, but not this president.

Q: But wasn't the president elected, in part, on his anti-immigration platform or immigration reform platform?   Isn't this an example of that?

Leader Pelosi.  But we have fought to do comprehensive immigration reform with the President.  That does not include ripping children out of the arms of their parents.  Telling them you're going to give them a bath and taking them away in the car.

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Q:  Secretary Nielson this morning said they were seeing an increase in people at the border pretending to be family units, did you see those comments this morning?

Leader Pelosi.  I think she should resign.  I think she should resign.

Q:  But do you have –

Leader Pelosi.  I think we want to hear from some other people.

Q:  Don't you want to respond to her comments?  She implied that people are using children as a get-out-of-jail free card.

Leader Pelosi.  And that's exactly what the President of the United States is doing.  He is using these children to advance a bad policy and to enflame his base, this is red meat for his base. But I think he underestimates the dignity of his base when he goes to the most extreme place at the border and that extreme place is taking children away from their parents, that's not the American way.

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Q:  Is it fair to say they are in the centers but different bedroom areas or how would you describe –

Congressman Vargas. So the situation is that there is a fairly large facility where the boys are held but this is also where they have the medical units and a lot of the clinical help these children need.  There is where you have the boys.  The girls are in two separate houses.  They don't have as many, frankly, clinical facilities, medical facilities, so they do so they do come and reunify in the larger institutions, but they live separately in these houses.  Again, I am not trying to knock the group, they are doing the best they can in a very difficult situation with these girls and with these children but they are held separately.  They do reunify sometimes.  The boys are in the larger facility.  It is the same center but they live in separate houses, again, a very sensitive population.

Leader Pelosi.  What's important about that is that sometimes the girls are siblings to the boys.  So, what some of their questions were how do they get to see each other and the rest.  So, we raised the concerns that probably you have.  That of course my four daughters have, where are the girls and how are they being treated?

And, you can understand why they would be separate, but if they are siblings how are they brought together because it just comes back to the same word.  It comes back to family.

We can have debates and the policy and the this or the that, which is wrong.  But, the fundamental unifying principal for our country is this is about family and they cannot undermine family as the American way and expect that it will have any regard for how we regard them.  So, this is very, for us, it's not political.  It's very prayerful as a matter of fact, but we do know that the answer lies with the stroke of a pen from the President of the United States.

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Leader Pelosi.  I just want to say one more thing and I will yield.  Congresswoman Torres is from Guatemala, her family is from Guatemala, when she was there – you were asking how things were and the rest – I think it would have been wonderful if you could have seen the reaction to her when she asked who was from Guatemala, so many hands up, ‘This part of Guatemala, this town, this town, this town.'  Obviously, she spoke to them in Spanish as did many of the Congress people, so did Congresswoman Nydia Velázquez, and her message to them was, ‘We are with you.  We are with you.'  They were happy – happy at that moment to hear we are with them and they are not forgotten.