'Send them back': Hillary says wave of illegal immigrant children should be 'reunited with their families'

  • Hillary Clinton stunned a CNN audience on Tuesday by saying that the US should deport thousands of unaccompanied minors who have flooded the American border
  • 'They should be sent back as soon as it can be determined who responsible adults in their families are,' she said
  • 'Just because your child gets across the border, that doesn't mean the child gets to stay,' she warned parents south of the border
  • A wave of children, mostly from Central America, has streamed across the US-Mexico border in recent months
  • Border patrol authorities process them and then release them to the Department of Health and Human Services
  • HHS says it reunites 85 per cent of them with family members in the US, but those adults' own immigration status is a question mark

By David Martosko, U.s. Political Editor

Published: 17:59 EST, 17 June 2014 | Updated: 00:37 EST, 18 June 2014

Hillary Clinton said Tuesday that the American government should deport thousands of children who cross the border illegally into the United States.

Pressed by Christiane Amanpour during a televised CNN town hall event, the former secretary of state and possible 2016 presidential candidate bucked her political party by insisting that letting unaccompanied minors remain in the U.S. is the wrong policy to embrace.

'They should be sent back as soon as it can be determined who responsible adults in their families are,' Clinton said, 'because – there are concerns about whether all of them can be sent back, but I think all of them that can be should be reunited with their families.'

Moments later, Clinton articulated a bottom-line policy that disagrees sharply with President Obama's observable priorities.

'We have to send a clear message: Just because your child gets across the border, that doesn't mean the child gets to stay,' Clinton said.

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Tough love: Clinton said the US should send unaccompanied illegal immigrant children back to their home countries

Tough love: Clinton said the US should send unaccompanied illegal immigrant children back to their home countries

The former secretary of state participated in an hour-long 'town hall' meeting on CNN

The former secretary of state participated in an hour-long 'town hall' meeting on CNN

Not romper room: Illegal immigrant children have flooded across the US-Mexico border, fueled by misinformation suggesting that a 2012 Obama White House policy limiting deportation of some resident aliens will apply to them

Not romper room: Illegal immigrant children have flooded across the US-Mexico border, fueled by misinformation suggesting that a 2012 Obama White House policy limiting deportation of some resident aliens will apply to them

'So we don't want to send a message that is contrary to our laws, or we'll encourage more children to make that dangerous journey.'

She acknowledged that 'it may be safer' for children for violence-prone nations like El Salvador and Guatemala to remain stateside, 'but that's not the answer.'

Clinton also said that the U.S. should help Mexico secure its own southern border, which abuts Guatemala and Belize, as a way to prevent under-18s from making the trip to America.

But 'first of all,' she cautioned. 'we have to provide the best emergency care we can provide. We have children 5 and 6 years old who have come up from Central America.'

The CNN audience, gathered at the Newseum in Washington, D.C., was hushed as Clinton outlined a policy that she hinted she would implement if she were

president.

 

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Many of her other pronouncements drew wild applause from what appeared to be a partisan crowd that CNN hand-picked for the occasion.

She tried to dodge the question at first with claims that she had worked as secretary of state 'to deal with the violence in this region, to deal with border security.'

But Amanpour pressed her three times for an answer.

Through its budget for the Department of Health and Human Services, the Obama administration has tacitly acknowledged that the problem is growing quickly.

In 2011 HHS took custody of 6,775 children who entered the country illegally without accompanying parents.

That number was 13,625 in 2012 and 24,668 in 2013. The government's budget for 2014 provided for 60,000 such young border-crossers, but most estimates far exceed that anticipated number.

National shame: Hundreds of children are turning themselves in every week along the Arizona, Texas and New Mexico borders, knowing that they will be processed and then allowed to stay in the United States while their immigration cases are sorted out

National shame: Hundreds of children are turning themselves in every week along the Arizona, Texas and New Mexico borders, knowing that they will be processed and then allowed to stay in the United States while their immigration cases are sorted out


The federal government will spend more than $1 billion this year feeding, clothing and otherwise babysitting the children until suitable adult guardians can be found.

HHS claims 85 per cent of them are reunited with family members, but those are guardians in the United States, not in their home countries. The agency has not responded to requests for information about how many of them are themselves illegal aliens.

Few of the children are expected to return to face immigration judges, according to the nation's largest border patrolman's union.

In 2012 President Obama announced a policy intended to delay the deportation of illegal immigrants who were brought to the U.S> as children before 2007.

But in a transnational game of 'telephone,' that policy has been misinterpreted – in some cases willfully so, by 'coyotes' who make a living secretary transporting immigrants into the U.S. – to suggest that it would apply equally to newly arriving minors.

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Yes. Agreed. My family and i went through the proper way to come to the states 15 yes ago from Europe and everyone should do the same. The rules are there to be followed not disregarded.

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Ha ha! Someone wants to get elected President! For once, I agree with Pantsuits!

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What she says and what she does as President would remain to be seen. Obama made a lot of similar promises and failed to deliver too.

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She is right for once.. they travelled their alone they can travel back home alone Send Obama to Mexico too...

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Wasn't it just months ago that she was singing O's praises on his amnesty act? Hmmmm, wonder why the sudden change of heart so close to her presidential campaign?

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She says this in the full knowledge that these minors will never give information leading them to be reunited with their families back in their own countries. When she says they should be reunited with their families, she is in fact saying that the families of these minors should be brought to the US to live off the taxpayers and swell the ranks of the Democrat voters.

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She's about as transparent as glass....hmmm, let me see what Americans are wanting so I can look like I'm behind them....what she is is a wolf in a really cheap sheep costume!

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Oh wow...... even when she says the same as you, you people can't just swallow it. Seriously, take a breath

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She says that because it's the consensus of the American people and she wants to be elected President. But, if elected, make no mistake, she would be doing the same dammm thing Obama is. She lies.

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How desperate you think their parents are?, nobody wants to send unaccompanied sons and daughters to another country illegally. You have no idea what they are going trough that they have to take such extreme measures. They are only children, put yourself in their shoes for once.

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Finally Someone see this through the childs eyes and not what it is as a political issue......Thank You and bless your kind spirit!

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I absolutely agree, they should immediately be reunited as families ....in the country they illegally came from.

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