The following article by Jacqueline Thomsen was posted on the Hill website June 17, 2018:
Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) said on Sunday that the Trump administration is using the “grief, the tears, the pain” of immigrant kids as “mortar” to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border.
“What the administration is doing, they’re using the grief, the tears, the pain of these kids as mortar to build their wall,” Schiff said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
“It’s an effort to extort a bill to their liking in the Congress. It’s, I think, deeply unethical,” he added.
Schiff was referring to a “zero tolerance” border policy imposed by the Trump administration earlier this year that separates immigrant children from their parents while the parents are prosecuted.
Schiff, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, also said that the GOP has “become the party of lies” by not calling out President Trump’s falsehoods.
“The GOP in Congress has become craven enough that they will do anything to maintain the majority, even be complicit with a president who ignores and tears down the rule of law,” Schiff said.
“They cannot maintain their integrity as a party if they follow this president,” he added.
The Trump administration has been widely criticized over the separation of immigrant families at the border.
Trump has blamed Democrats for the policy, calling on them to take action to change the law.