“We don’t want kids to be separated from their parents,” Speaker Paul Ryan told reporters, before arguing that the courts were at fault and that legislation was needed to stop what critics decry as “barbaric” behavior. | Mark Wilson/Getty Images House GOP wades into family separation storm House Republicans unveiled legislation to keep migrant children and their parents together, but it’s unlikely to win over immigrant-rights advocates.

House Republicans — clearly uncomfortable with the Trump administration's policy of separating migrant children from their parents — released a bill Thursday that keeps families together at the U.S.-Mexico border.

But their solution is anathema to most immigrant-rights backers and could face criticism from moderate Republicans — potentially jeopardizing a broader GOP bill aimed at protecting Dreamers from deportation.


Speaker Paul Ryan signaled early Thursday his concern with children being split up from their parents at the border.

“We don’t want kids to be separated from their parents,” the Wisconsin Republican told reporters.

However, the measure would override existing protections for children and allow them to be held with their parents or guardians in detention centers, according to a copy of the bill obtained by POLITICO. Immigrant-rights advocates quickly slammed the proposal for “prolonging detention and hastening deportation.”

In addition, it would rework an existing human trafficking law to allow for the swift deportation of unaccompanied children from Central American countries and elsewhere, pending agreements with those nations. Currently, only unaccompanied children from Mexico or Canada are subject to the rapid removals.

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The provision is part of a more than 290-page bill to codify the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Program and resulted from weeks of negotiations between conservative and moderate Republicans. Its inclusion also underscores just how much moderate Republicans have been willing to swallow in order to get a pathway to citizenship for young undocumented immigrants.

Even some of the bill’s architects — including Rep. Jeff Denham (R-Calif.) — still aren’t totally comfortable with the GOP’s so-called fix to keep migrant families together.

“I think we still need to discuss what the future of those detention centers look like,” Denham said, noting he’s requesting some tweaks to the bill. “There’s already an issue with some of the detention centers we’ve already taken a look at.”

The hard-line provisions in the bill align with the White House immigration reform priorities and match language in a hawkish bill from Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.).

The legislation is expected to get a vote next week, but many senior Republicans say it has little chance of being passed in the Senate and becoming law. It’s still unclear if the bill — a deal brokered to head off a centrist effort to force a wide-ranging immigration debate on the House floor — even has enough votes to pass the House.

No Democrats are expected to support the bill, which mirrors a Trump-backed framework and would provide a pathway to citizenship for Dreamers; increase border security and interior enforcement, including providing $25 billion for the border wall; curb family migration and eliminate the diversity visa lottery.

Conservatives also have not said if they would support the legislation.

Under the bill, undocumented immigrants eligible for the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program would first apply for a “contingent” status in the U.S., which require payment of a $1,000 fee to be utilized for border security.

After five years in the contingent status, DREAMers could apply for an immigrant visa through a competitive system that would award points for education, employment, military service and English-language proficiency. Children of certain employment-based visa holders with 10 years in the U.S. on the date of the bill’s enactment would also be eligible for the point-based pathway to citizenship.

Even as Republicans moved to address the issue of family separation at the border, they have spent little time publicly pressuring President Donald Trump or his administration to stop the practice.

During his press conference Thursday, Ryan refused to blame Trump on the issue, arguing that the courts were at fault and that legislation was needed.

But the policy stems from the White House — part of a wider Trump administration effort to crack down on illegal immigration and what White House chief of staff John Kelly has defended as a “tough deterrent.”

Meanwhile, stories of children being pulled apart from their parents at the border — including a mother whose daughter was taken from her while breastfeeding — have continued to dominate headlines in recent weeks. The increase in family separations comes after the Trump administration’s decision to pursue a “zero tolerance” policy, prosecuting all immigrants suspected of crossing into the U.S. illegally.

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders tangled with reporters Thursday over the issue and blamed Democrats for refusing to “come to the table” on immigration. She also addressed a comment from Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who cited the Bible in justification of the administration’s border policy.

“I can say that it is very biblical to enforce the law. That is actually repeated a number of times throughout the Bible,” Sanders said.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi blasted the administration in a separate press conference Thursday and skewered Ryan and other GOP leaders for not doing more to stop it.

“The casual attitude that they’re having about this. … They could weigh in with the administration and stop it on a dime," she said about Republican leaders. "This is not normal. In fact, it’s barbaric. It has to stop."

Pelosi was asked about the potential provision in the GOP immigration bill to prevent family separations and whether that would be enough to garner Democratic votes, but she dismissed the idea as unlikely to have any real impact.

"I don’t see any prospect for legislation here," she said.

Senate Democrats, led by Dianne Feinstein of California, are pushing legislation that would stop the Trump administration from separating parents and children at the border. And Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) told POLITICO Thursday that he is looking at whether the bill is “specific enough” for him to consider supporting it.

Flake’s concern, he said, is for migrants who cross the border to seek asylum only to face the consequences of the new policy: “They’re following the law and still being separated.”

Pelosi and a group of more than a dozen other Democrats will visit the U.S.-Mexico border in San Diego on Monday. Their trip will include a visit to at least one facility housing migrant children who were separated from their parents.

Elana Schor contributed to this report.