Byron York’s Daily Memo: ‘The cruelty is the point’

‘THE CRUELTY IS THE POINT’ In 2018, Democrats, the press, and the political world rose up nearly as one to condemn then-President Donald Trump’s brief policy of separating children and parents detained while illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border. The uproar was at times hysterical, with overwrought commentators comparing the Trump policy to Nazi Germany. On June 16, 2018, for example, General Michael Hayden, the former CIA director and one of the most irresponsible voices of the anti-Trump Resistance, tweeted a photo of the Birkenau concentration camp with the message, “Other governments have separated mothers and children.” Hayden was far from alone in his intemperance.

The Trump policy was brief because the president bowed to his critics and put a stop to it. The policy was in effect from early May until June 20, 2018, when Trump signed an executive order ending it. By the broadest count, it resulted in the separation of about 2,800 families. Most were ultimately re-united; by the end of last year, advocates said 545 children had never rejoined their parents.

One of the more notable criticisms of the Resistance was that Trump administration figures actually enjoyed inflicting pain on helpless immigrant children. “The cruelty is the point,” some critics said.

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Now, under President Joe Biden, more children have been separated from their families than under the short-lived Trump policy. On Tuesday, the Washington Examiner’s Anna Giaritelli reported that “5,767 unaccompanied minors were being detained inside cells at Border Patrol facilities near the U.S.-Mexico border.” That is more than during the Trump policy, and more than a later surge under Trump, in 2019, when 2,600 children were in custody.

On Tuesday, after weeks of barring the press from photographing conditions under which the children are being held, the Biden administration finally allowed the public to have a look. The overcrowding was as bad or worse than anything seen in the Trump era.

At one particularly overcrowded U.S. Border Patrol facility in Donna, Texas, an official told reporters: “The capacity for this location for COVID purposes is 250. Previous to COVID, the total capacity was one thousand. Now, we’re holding over 4,100 subjects in this location alone. So you do the math. We’re way over capacity.”

The short version: Families are separated and there are thousands of young people jammed into holding pens awaiting processing.

There is no doubt that President Biden’s policy is behind the latest surge. The president and his administration have made clear that the U.S. will accept unaccompanied children but not family units, and not individual adults. At his news conference last week, Biden said, “We’re sending back the vast majority of the families that are coming.” Even though that is not entirely true, the U.S. message to would-be migrants, from the mouth of the president himself, is: If you come as a family, we will turn you away. If you send your children by themselves, we will take them. Biden’s policy has given those families a clear incentive to self-separate in the interest of at least getting their children inside the United States.

So Trump, briefly, separated families. Biden is now encouraging families to separate themselves. In both situations, families are separated. And in both situations, the policy that led to the separations was intentional. Trump officials knew what they were doing. Biden officials know what they are doing.

What is remarkable is that, starting at the top, the Biden administration’s family self-separation policy was crafted and is being enforced by the same people who strongly denounced the Trump policy. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, whose we’re-better-than-that message has set the tone of the Biden policy, recently said, “We will not expel young, vulnerable children.” In addition to stating policy, Mayorkas’ statements are also a clear signal to would-be border crossers: Send your children. Separate your families.

Of course, the Biden policy has set off nothing near the outrage of the spring and early summer of 2018. It is hard to exaggerate the frenzy of emotion over the Trump policy during those months. Now, not so much. Indeed, some in the press are putting a gloss of morality on the Biden policy. At the president’s news conference, a reporter actually said to him, “The perception of you that got you elected — as a moral, decent man — is the reason why a lot of immigrants are coming to this country and entrusting you with unaccompanied minors.”

Perhaps the commentators believe the Biden administration has better motives. It doesn’t intend to separate families, they would say. The cruelty isn’t the point. But what if cruelty is the result? A predictable result, one officials knew or should have known ahead of time? What then?

For a deeper dive into many of the topics covered in the Daily Memo, please listen to my podcast, The Byron York Show — available on the Ricochet Audio Network and everywhere else podcasts can be found. You can use this link to subscribe.