Live coverage: House Oversight examines Trump family separation policy
The House Oversight and Reform Committee is holding hearings Friday on alleged abuses committed against migrant minors in the aftermath of the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” policy, which resulted in at least 2,800 family separations.
Four members of Congress will testify before the committee on conditions they’ve witnessed in visits to migrant shelters and detention centers on the southern border.
The scheduled witnesses include Reps. Veronica Escobar (D-Texas), whose El Paso district has been ground zero for much of the humanitarian crisis at the border, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.).
A second panel will include current administration officials Jennifer L. Costello, the acting inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and Ann Maxwell, assistant inspector general for evaluation and inspections at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), as well as Elora Mukherjee and Jennifer Nagda, lawyers who’ve visited the shelters.
The second panel will also feature Tom Homan, the former director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), a staunch Trump ally whom Trump earlier this month floated as a possible border czar.
Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.) pressed Costello, from the DHS office of inspector general, on whether conditions have improved since emergency funds were approved.
Costello said there had not been enough time to execute the funds or finish research on what improvements are needed, which Krishnamoorthi found “unacceptable.”