Former Vice President Joe Biden Joe BidenFormer Pence aide: White House staffers discussed Trump refusing to leave office Progressive group buys domain name of Trump's No. 1 Supreme Court pick Bloomberg rolls out M ad buy to boost Biden in Florida MORE falsely claimed during the third Democratic primary debate Thursday evening that the Obama administration did not separate immigrant families.

“We didn’t lock people up in cages, we didn’t separate families,” Biden said, drawing a distinction between former President Obama’s immigration policies with those of President Trump Donald John TrumpFederal prosecutor speaks out, says Barr 'has brought shame' on Justice Dept. Former Pence aide: White House staffers discussed Trump refusing to leave office Progressive group buys domain name of Trump's No. 1 Supreme Court pick MORE.

Joe Biden just said the Obama admin did not “lock kids in cages or separate families.”



This is one of the most sickening lies I have ever heard on a Presidential debate stage.



Here are dozens of photos of Obama/Biden admin locking kids in cages.



SHARE!https://t.co/TuznkUQaJ1 pic.twitter.com/HGrsololLa — Benny (@bennyjohnson) September 13, 2019

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The Obama administration did not separate families as a matter of policy, as the Trump administration did as part of its “zero tolerance” border policy in 2018, but separations occurred on a case-by-case basis for parents being prosecuted on more serious charges than illegally crossing the border or in cases when an adult was suspected of not being a child’s parent, according to CNN.

Children were also placed in cages in some cases under the Obama administration, and Obama-era images of children in such structures have been mislabeled as occurring under the Trump administration on several occasions.

The Hill has reached out to the Biden campaign for comment.