42 karma · joined June 18, 2018
a) every arrival be prosecuted instead of just deported (or even any arrival)
b) Trump end community detention programs for immigrant families, which were very successful and far cheaper than prison under Obama
So no, there are no laws mandating this. People like you are choosing to do it because they think it will deter people from arriving here. That's not a legal mandate, it's a moral choice.
- families presenting themselves at the border are being separated
- the vast majority of families being separated under this policy are first time arrivals, because what Trump has done is order prosecution of ALL arrivals
- international law says you can claim asylum after having arrived without a visa, it does not make you a criminal to do so
- under Obama, families doing so were actually released into community detention and almost universally did show up to their immigration court dates. Trump ended this program, in favor of jailing them all separately. That, just like instructing ICE to arrest and charge first time arrivals, is a policy decision and requires no change in the law for them to go back to the previous system.
Citations for all these: https://www.aclu.org/blog/immigrants-rights/immigrants-right...
Sounds exactly like the USA at the time of their founding, and is in no way describable as "the opposite".