Protests continue in US against family separations
Protesters continue to rally in cities across the US to demand the administration of President Donald Trump to reunite undocumented families who have been separated by US border agents at the US-Mexico border.
The demonstrations held Saturday were focused in states that border Mexico, including Texas, Arizona, and California. Protests were also held in the state of Florida, which shares a water boundary with Mexico.
On Friday, a coalition of immigrant rights groups rallied against family separations outside the White House and the US Department of Justice and Homeland Security.
Heartbreaking images and audio of children separated from their parents and crying for their loved ones while being held in chain-link fence cages have stocked outrage across the political spectrum in the United States and abroad.
The Trump administration announced plans in April to prosecute all immigrants caught along the southwest border with illegally entering the country. Parents were jailed and children taken to government-contracted shelters.
More than 2,300 children were taken from their families in recent weeks under a Trump administration “zero tolerance” policy in which people entering the US illegally face being prosecuted.
Parents and children were being detained separately. But after public outcry, Trump on Wednesday ordered that they be brought back together.
Now, the administration says it will continue with prosecutions and seek to detain families together during their immigration proceedings.
About 9,000 such family units have been caught in each of the last three months, according to US border authorities.
The US government said Saturday it still had 2,053 children in its custody who were separated from their parents.
The Department of Homeland Security said it had a "well coordinated" process in place - in the face of criticism from lawyers for parents and children who have said they have seen little evidence of an organized system.
A total of 522 children had already been reunited with parents, the agency said in a statement.
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