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Today, Congressman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Committee, delivered the following statement, as prepared, on the House floor about H.Res. 990, a non-binding and politically-driven resolution introduced by House Republicans concerning Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE):
"Mr. Speaker, this resolution is the legislative equivalent of fiddling while Rome is burning.
"Our President takes to the world stage to side with a hostile foreign power over his own intelligence services authorities. Here at home, he engages in government-sponsored child abuse, in the form of a family separation policy that continues to terrorize children as young as six months.
"This non-binding resolution would do nothing to bring about a fair and just immigration system. In fact, it would do nothing at all. It is just a meaningless political stunt to change the subject from the international and domestic shame unleashed by President Trump.
"The President imposed a family separation policy, and his Administration never even considered how to ensure that the children would eventually reunite with their families. Now, nearly 3,000 children remain separated, and they do not know when—or if—they will ever see their parents again. Many of these children were ripped from the arms of their mothers and fathers, and their anguish is unimaginable.
"But this bill would do nothing to reverse this disastrous and cruel family separation policy.
"It would do nothing to ensure that parents and children are accurately tracked, so that families can be reunited.
"And it would do nothing to address the horrendous conditions separated children are being subjected to. For example, 14-month old Baby M was separated from his mother for 85 days, and he returned so full of dirt and lice that it appeared he had not been bathed the entire time he was in federal custody. His mother Olivia says he is not the same since they were reunited, and he cries whenever he does not see her, out of fear that he might be left alone again.
"Mr. Speaker, this is a humanitarian crisis. We do not have the time to waste with political stunts while the moral fiber of our country is torn apart. I will be voting present on this bill because I have no desire to play the Republicans’ immoral games right now. We have much more important things to do.
"I reserve the balance of my time."
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