-This morning, US Customs and Border Protection
released two videos and about 45 photographs
of the insides of its two temporary processing facilities
for unaccompanied minors.
These are teenagers and children who have arrived
without their parents in unprecedented numbers
in recent weeks,
and these are the two main government processing centers
where they're holding the minors.
I think what these images show is that the government
is doing a much better job at providing humane conditions
and a more child-appropriate setting
for these teenagers and children.
There are recreation areas.
There's clearly sanitary conditions.
There are, you know, television monitors in these places.
But the thing that's unmistakable is just the extreme
overcrowding of the different partitioned enclosures
inside these tent facilities
where you see young people lying down shoulder to shoulder
with what appears to be barely any space to move around.
And in the middle of a pandemic, that has got to raise concerns.
-When you prosecute the parents for coming in illegally,
which should happen, you have to take the children away.
-I think a lot of our readers will remember
when the Trump administration allowed television cameras
into the Central Processing Center in McAllen, Texas.
Closed now and what this Donna tent facility
has essentially replaced.
And that was the facility that had the chain-linked enclosures
that became notorious as the cages,
and so the Trump administration obviously took a big hit
for allowing television cameras inside that facility.
But I should say, you know,
the approach was generally more open.
Not that it was especially open,
but there was certainly more access
because so far the media has had no ability
to see what's going on inside these processing centers.
-Now that the public has seen that, is that not a crisis,
and what conditions or situations,
what metrics would have to be in place
for the administration to call it that?
-Well, children presenting at our border
who are fleeing violence, who are fleeing persecution,
who are fleeing terrible situations, is not a crisis.
We feel that it is our responsibility
to humanely approach this circumstance
and make sure they are treated
and put into conditions that are safe.
-The administration has had a hard time
acknowledging the magnitude of the challenge its facing.
And, obviously, when you see teenagers and children
packed into very close quarters like this
in the middle of a pandemic for days on end,
far beyond the legal limit of 72 hours,
I think that that's fair to call it a humanitarian crisis
I think if it were occurring
under the previous administration.
But the administration continues to want to describe it
as a challenge and not a crisis per se,
even after mobilizing the Federal Emergency
Management Administration.
-These photos show what we've long been saying,
which is that these border patrol facilities
are not places made for children.
And so our focus now is on putting in place solutions.
-FEMA is now helping HHS.
We've seen four, five sites that are either coming online
or are in the process of coming online
that should be able to alleviate the overcrowding
in the border facilities.
The US is sending top diplomats down to Mexico City.
The Mexican government has already committed
to increasing enforcement in souther Mexico,
and its mobilized the military as well
as its National Guard and police
to try to impede the entrance of more Central Americans.
So, it's possible that, you know,
that at least in the short term,
that will ease some of the pressure
on both Customs and Border Protection
and Health and Human Services as they really struggle
with this unprecedented number of young people.