The Trump administration policy
of separating families at the border.
It has rightfully outraged
pretty much every decent human being and Ted Cruz,
and now it looks like even the man who made the policy
is tired of the backlash.
Some breaking news. The president,
President Trump has signed the executive order
that ends the practice
of separating families, children from their parents.
We're signing an executive order.
I consider it to be a very important executive order.
It's about keeping families together.
Hooray.
Our hero.
You know, Trump right now
is like if Superman threw a meteor at the Earth
and then stopped it himself.
Everyone would be like, "Thanks, I guess?"
Yeah, so, on its face,
it seems like President Trump has decided to back down,
which, to be honest, isn't totally surprising.
Because every day the family separation stories
have gotten worse and worse.
The outrage has grown.
First we found out that the kids were being snatched
from their parents at the border.
Then we learned they were being kept in cages.
And yesterday we were reminded,
oh, yeah, they have toddlers, too.
The Trump administration is sending babies
separated from their parents
to at least three facilities in South Texas
known as "tender age" shelters.
I'm standing outside of Casa Presidente.
It is one of the three "tender age" shelters
that The Associated Press reported on.
Inside there, there are children--
as they define "tender age"-- ten years and younger.
Sweet Lord. "Tender age" shelter.
That's a hell of a fancy way to pronounce "baby jail."
That's a real euphemism.
It's like calling a cross burning
a meatless barbecue.
(laughter)
And so, yesterday people found out
that the federal government was snatching children
as young as eight months from their parents.
And people were rightfully outraged--
not just at Trump,
but also at his Homeland Security secretary
and Cinderella stepsister Kirstjen Nielsen.
The face of the Trump administration's
controversial family separation policy,
Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen
blasted by protestors overnight
while trying to eat dinner
at a Mexican restaurant in the nation's capital.
PROTESTORS (chanting): Shame! Shame!
Nielsen tried to ignore the shouting
before finally leaving.
You know, this is the one time someone actually wanted
a mariachi band to come to their table.
She was like, "Guys, you can get over here?
Play that song. Play it louder."
(singing mariachi music)
And look, I get why it's not a good look
to torment Latino kids
and then go and get your Taco Tuesday on,
but let's be honest:
there's no place that she could have gone to eat
without looking bad.
I mean, when you're locking kids up in cages,
forget about eating at Golden Corral, right?
Carl's Jr. just makes us wonder
when he'll be reunited with Carl Senior.
(laughter)
And you might think, "All right, fine. Hooters.
You can go to Hooters." But can you really, Kirstjen?
After you've ripped these babies from their mothers' breasts?
I don't think so. I don't think so.
I'm just saying, if you're in charge
of an evil, family-destroying policy,
maybe just pop in a Lean Cuisine for the night.
That's what you should do. Stay in.
People have been outraged all week about this story,
and it didn't help when Trump's friend
and part-time advisor Corey Lewandowski headed south
of the decency border.
WOMAN: Former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski
on defense right now after appearing to mock reports
of an undocumented ten-year-old girl with Down's syndrome
being separated from her mother.
I read today about a ten-year-old girl
with Down's syndrome who was taken from her mother
-and put in a cage. -(mockingly): Womp, womp.
I read about a-a... Did you just say "Womp, womp"
to a ten-year-old with Down's syndrome
-being taken from her mother? -What I said is you can pick
-anything you want to... -How dare you!
-...but the bottom line is very clear. -How dare you!
Yeah, did he just say, "Womp, womp," which is funny
because that's what he's gonna hear in the afterlife.
"Wait. I'm in hell?" "Yeah, you are. Womp, womp."
(laughter)
(applause and cheering)
Look... right now...
Right now, no one really knows
how Trump's executive order will actually work.
It has loopholes that could allow separations to continue.
It says nothing about the kids who have already been taken.
And the whole thing might not even be legal.
Plus, when they released the text, they spelled--
and this is completely true-- they spelled "separation" wrong.
(laughter, groaning)
Guys, this is America. Speak English!
(applause and cheering)
Come on!
(applause, cheering, whistling)
But I mean, at least there's some hope.
There's some reason for people to be hopeful, you know?
In a way, I feel like now we can breathe.
People stood up. They fought.
70% of the country was against this,
and now there's been some sort of a result.
Which I guess is a relief, because this week,
we weren't just horrified by seeing kids in cages.
I know I wasn't the only one who was horrified with the fact
that people were trying to defend this practice.
And some people were shocked by the rhetoric,
but the sad truth is we shouldn't be.
We know from history that people have always found ways
to defend just about anything.
For instance, last week's big story was
when Attorney General Jeff Sessions quoted a bible passage
to justify the family separation policy,
which is a crazy thing to say, but it's not original.
WOMAN: Most folk who defended slavery were justifying it
on the grounds of Christianity.
MAN: From the 1830s onward,
Southern politicians began to construct
an argument that slavery
truly was ordained by God.
Yup, that's what they used to say.
Slavery was ordained by God.
Make it sound like God was like,
"Look, I don't want black people to suffer,
"but I got to get blues music somehow,
so you guys got to take one for the team."
And in the last few days, people were also shocked
to hear Trump and his supporters fearmongering
that a lot of these adorable little kids
would one day become hardened MS-13 hombres.
You know, they'd be like, "They come in as kids now,
but it's only a matter of time before they join a gang."
They always say it as if, like, joining a gang
is just part of Latino puberty. You know he'd be like,
"Mom, my voice just cracked."
And it's like, "Well, now it's time to deal crack, yeah."
(laughter)
But again, but again, this is nothing new!
They're just dusting off xenophobia
from way back in the 1930s
when Jewish children needed to come to America
to escape Nazi Germany.
MAN: In 1939, a bill proposed special sanctuary
for 20,000 children outside the quota.
The Wagner-Rogers Bill would become a litmus test
for how Americans really felt about Jews.
A cousin of the president,
Laura Delano Roosevelt, commented,
"20,000 charming children would all too soon grow
into 20,000 ugly adults."
(audience groaning)
Now there's a life hack for you.
If you're gonna say something atrocious,
pose with as many puppies as possible.
(laughter)
Yeah. That's what Paula Deen should have done.
She would have been fine, yeah. Would have been fine.
Until she deep fried one of them and ate them,
but before that, fine.
(laughter, groaning)
And then, of course, you've got the argument that was parroted
by the secretary of guacamole herself.
(laughter)
The argument defending the conditions
that these kids have been living in, like this.
Children in DHS and HHS custody are being well taken care of.
We have high standards. We give them meals.
We give them education, we give them medical care.
There is videos, there's TVs.
Wow. Meals, education.
What's anyone even complaining about?
Except you see again, this is the same type of excuse
that they used in the '40s
to defend America's Japanese internment camps.
(mocking stilted narrator voice): Oh, yes.
They're merely dislocated people.
Yes. "Who dislocated them again?"
(in stilted voice): "That doesn't matter, not important."
(laughter)
So look, today's situation isn't the same,
but the excuses sure sound familiar.
In fact, they're as old as America itself,
which, unfortunately, makes them too old
to be locked up in a tender age shelter.