Democrat President Joe Biden’s border crisis is rapidly spiraling out of control as new reporting on Tuesday evening indicated that the number of unaccompanied children being held in detention facilities is more than 300 percent higher than previously known.
CBS News host Norah O’Donnell said Biden’s border crisis was “growing larger and more dire by the day.”
“Tonight, we have got the stunning new numbers,” O’Donnell said. “Sources tell CBS News more than 13,000 migrant children who entered the country without their parents are now in U.S. custody. The government says even more adults are being turned back every day.”
In a tweet, O’Donnell noted that the 13,000 unaccompanied minors, which is significantly higher than the roughly 4,200 that were reported in U.S. custody at the start of the week, “are being held in U.S. custody for an average of 120 hours, far longer than the 72 hours allowed by law.”
CBS News has learned that 13,000+ unaccompanied minors are being held in U.S. custody for an average of 120 hours, far longer than the 72 hours allowed by law.
More migrants are attempting to cross into the U.S. now than in the past 20 years, according to @DHSgov Sec. Mayorkas pic.twitter.com/zEmm4YzI03
— Norah O'Donnell 🇺🇸 (@NorahODonnell) March 16, 2021
“Migrant children are being forced to sleep on gym mats with foil sheets and go for days without showering as the Border Patrol struggles to handle thousands of young Central Americans who are surging across the southwestern border, some of them as young as a year old,” The New York Times reported this week. “Many of the children interviewed by … lawyers in recent days said they had not been allowed outdoors for days on end, confined to an overcrowded tent.”
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki was pressed on the issue during a Monday press conference by a reporter who asked how it was acceptable for the Biden administration to be keeping the kids in those conditions after promising to be “humane.”
Psaki responded by blaming former President Donald Trump for the situation by claiming that Trump dismantled the system when it was actually the Biden administration that dismantled many of Trump’s policies on the border that stemmed the flow of illegal immigration into the U.S.
“And I understand the idea of these facilities not being desired by children, but children being hungry, sleeping on the floor, not being allowed outside for days at a time, why is that acceptable to go on, even for one more day?” the reporter pressed. “Why is that something that’s not being outlawed right now? How is the administration not stopping that today?”
“It’s not acceptable,” Psaki responded. “But I think the challenge here is that there are not that many options.”
Former Acting ICE Director Tom Homan said last month that the Biden administration “designed” this border crisis.
“They’re bringing millions of people into this country who will now be counted on the census because Joe Biden overturned that, which leads to seats in the House [and] Electoral College in elections,” Homan said. “This is power over public safety, the quest for power over protecting American citizens.”
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