I’m rubber, you’re glue. That’s the Trump campaign’s strategy when it comes to the cruelest part of former President Donald Trump’s record—and the serious concern that he intends to repeat it. During the vice presidential debate on Tuesday, Trump’s running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, refused to say whether Trump’s mass deportation plan would separate parents and children, including children who are citizens.
Instead, Vance repeatedly claimed that it was Vice President Kamala Harris who had engaged in family separation. “The real family separation policy in this country,” Vance said, “is unfortunately Kamala Harris’ wide open southern border.”
During his presidency, Trump engaged in a cruel plot to deter immigration by forcibly separating children and their parents. Some were never reunited, and the policy was condemned by Republicans and Democrats, pediatricians and pastors. Trump’s immigration plan for a second term, which is anticipated to be more draconian, would likely create another catastrophe by separating families.
Donald Trump has a plan to deport 12 million immigrants from the United States. He talks about it all the time. It would have devastating consequences for immigrants, for Americans, for communities, and for the national economy. The plan is to use the National Guard and massive detention camps. As my colleague Isabela Dias reported, it would also likely separate parents and children:
Children would almost certainly be hurt again. More than 3.4 million unauthorized immigrants have a US-born minor child. Eighty percent of unauthorized immigrants entered the country before 2010, and almost 10 million citizens or lawful residents live in mixed-status homes. One study found a mass deportation program would slash the median income of mixed-status households by almost half, plunging millions of families into poverty
This isn’t the first time Vance has left the door open to restarting a family separation policy. In August, he refused to rule out the policy when asked repeatedly if Trump would separate parents and children.
The Trump campaign touts its massive deportation plan as a housing policy, forcibly uprooting families so others can move in. But Vance would not own up to the ugly consequences of their proposal, even as the CBS moderators on Tuesday pressed him on this subject. It was Harris, he claimed, who was separating families—not the man who has literally already done it.
