Vice President Mike Pence, right, shakes hands with Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, next to Acting Director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Ronald Vitiello. | Jacquelyn Martin/AP Photo White House to honor ICE 'heroes' after family separation fiasco

The Trump White House is planning an event next week to honor federal immigration agents — even as more than 500 migrant children remain separated from their parents after being separated at the border.

The “Salute to the Heroes of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs [and] Border Protection" is scheduled for Aug. 20 in the East Room, an administration official confirmed, in the latest signal that the Trump administration anticipates the midterm fallout from its zero-tolerance border policy very differently from its critics.


The ceremony is ready-made to provoke ire from opponents of the zero tolerance policy, some of whom have called for ICE's abolition.

“Only this White House would give medals for taking thousands of immigrant children from their parents," said Tom Jawetz, vice president for immigration policy at the left-leaning Center for American Progress, "and continuing to detain hundreds of orphaned kids in defiance of a court order.”

But many immigration advocates believe the family separation drama of recent months is more likely to hurt rather than help congressional Republicans in November.

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Frank Sharry, executive director of the pro-immigration America’s Voice, said initially he worried Trump and the Republicans would broadcast their hard-line immigration views in the run-up to the midterms. Now, he said, he feels "nearly gleeful" in welcoming it.

“At this point, I’m like, 'Keep doing it,'” Sharry said. “Americans are concerned with health care costs, education for their kids and retirement for their parents, and he’s having a pep rally with ICE agents.”

Trump reiterated Thursday his belief that immigration will be a winning political issue. During a televised Cabinet meeting, he said Democrats' refusal to back his hawkish policies will “hurt them very badly at the polls.”

Plans for the ICE salute are being made even as the administration struggles to fulfill a federal judge’s late-June order to reunite migrant families split apart at the border. From April to June, thousands of families were separated forcibly under Trump’s zero tolerance border strategy, which subjected all suspected crossers — including parents and asylum seekers — to federal prosecution.

A Quinnipiac University poll in late June found that two-thirds of voters opposed the policy. But a second Quinnipiac survey weeks later found that 76 percent of Republican voters backed Trump’s handling of the situation — even as a strong majority agreed that the families should be reunited.

Tyler Moran, managing director of the D.C.-based Immigration Hub, said the White House plans to honor ICE and CBP agents are “a ploy to use culture wars to divide people.”

Trump touted the work of ICE officers at the Cabinet meeting Thursday, saying they “have been absolutely abused” and have done an “incredible job” combating MS-13 and other gangs.

“They are tremendous people,” the president said. “They’re brave, they’re strong, they’re tough and they’re good. … Do you think you’re going to send just regular people in to take care of MS-13 and these gangs? Not going to happen.”

Jessica Vaughan, director of policy studies for the restrictionist Center for Immigration Studies, cheered the planned White House event for ICE and CPB officials. “They don’t get enough recognition, and I don’t think there’s enough public awareness of the dangers they face,” she said.

Trump also appeared to be trying to pressure Congress to take action, Vaughan added. “The president is doing as much as he can,” she said, “but Congress needs to get into the act also.”