First lady launches 'Be Best' initiative for kids' wellbeing

First lady launches 'Be Best' initiative for kids' wellbeing

US FIRST Lady Melania Trump has hit back at her husband’s hard line approach to immigration as she called to end the policy of separating children from their parents.

Mrs Trump’s statement comes after nearly 2000 children were found to have been separated from their families at the US-Mexico border across a six week period.

Her spokeswoman Stephanie Grisham said the first lady believes “we need to be a country that follows all laws,” but also one “that governs with heart”.

Ms Grisham said Mrs Trump “hates to see children separated from their families” and hopes “both sides of the aisle can finally come together to achieve successful immigration reform”.

According to a Department of Homeland Security spokesman, between April 19 and May 31, 1,995 children were separated from 1,940 adults who were being held by US border patrol.

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The tough approach means adults who try and cross the border face custody and even criminal prosecution for illegal entry.

The policy has seen minors locked up in detention centres and kept away from their parents, but the spokesman insisted minors were held in decent conditions.

“We have some of the highest detention standards in the world for children,” he said.

About 1500 boys are being held in a former Walmart supermarket in Texas, and the government is erecting tent structures near the border to house the increasing number of migrant children, including unaccompanied minors, in custody.

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Mrs Trump’s comments follow a front page by the New York Daily News, featuring a harrowing image of a crying toddler, that slammed the Trump administration’s controversial policy.

The picture, taken by Getty photographer John Moore, shows a two-year-old girl crying as her mother, a Honduran asylum seeker, is detained at the US-Mexico border in McAllen, Texas.

The Daily News does it again.

Saturday's cover.

This needs to get non-stop coverage everywhere until it stops! pic.twitter.com/g4b5vsDkSr — Amy Siskind (@Amy_Siskind) June 16, 2018

The tabloid ripped into Mr Trump, labelling him a “lying coward”.

“The only thing worse than the nauseating cruelty of President Trump’s immigration policy — captured perfectly by the agonising stories of young children forcefully being separated from their parents at the border — is the craven dishonesty with which he attempts to sell it to the American people,” the editorial read.

The US President tried to blame the separation practice on a law passed by Democrats, but it’s unknown what law he was referring to.

“False. False. False,” the editorial reads. “A bipartisan 2008 law merely gave the government flexibility in processing border-crossing immigrants.

In a tweet on Sunday, the US President called for a bipartisan approach to create new immigration laws.

But according to the BBC, critics of Mr Sessions’ “zero-tolerance” approach have said congressional action is not required to appeal or amend the policy.

Democrats can fix their forced family breakup at the Border by working with Republicans on new legislation, for a change! This is why we need more Republicans elected in November. Democrats are good at only three things, High Taxes, High Crime and Obstruction. Sad! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 16, 2018

A top White House adviser also tried to distance the Trump administration from responsibility regarding the tragic immigration issue.

Kellyanne Conway told NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday that “nobody likes” pulling apart families.

Ms Conway rejected the idea that Trump was using the kids as leverage to get Democrats to negotiate on immigration and his border wall.

But she said “if the Democrats are serious, they’ll come together again and try to close these loopholes and get real immigration reform.”

Asked whether the president was willing to end the policy, Ms Conway said “the president is ready to get meaningful immigration reform across the board.”

Democrat Adam Schiff said the administration was “using the grief, the tears, the pain of these kids as mortar to build our wall. And it’s an effort to extort a bill to their liking in the Congress.”

Mr Trump plans to meet with House Republicans on Tuesday to discuss pending immigration legislation.