The Department of Homeland Security is transporting illegal immigrant children smuggled into the United States to their illegal immigrant parents living in the United States “every day,” according to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent.
In an interview with The Daily Caller Thursday, the president of the union representing more than 7,000 Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers and staff, Chris Crane elaborated on a recent court order out of South Texas.
In the Dec. 13 court order, a federal judge chastised the Department of Homeland Security for transporting illegal immigrant children smuggled to the U.S. and detained at the border to their illegal immigrant parents living in the country — noting that the court had had four such cases in “as many weeks.”
“The DHS policy is a dangerous course of action,” U.S. District Court Judge Andrew S. Hanen wrote.
According to Crane — who has been speaking out vocally on behalf of his union about the dangers of the Senate immigration bill and the lack of immigration enforcement under the Obama administration — Hanen’s order was “spot on.” The practice, carried out by ICE agents, is commonplace, Crane said.
“Down at the border right now we are overwhelmed with the number of juveniles — well people coming across period — but kids are coming across that border by the thousands,” He said, explaining that a good portion of the influx can be directly traced to talks of “amnesty.”
“Now our agents are babysitters, and they are literally changing diapers — they are so small — and transporting them all over the country,” he said.
“The spike in juvenile entries has been dramatic since talks began about amnesty and the DREAM Act,” he said. “They have just gone through the ceiling. Unaccompanied juveniles in particular, children coming here all by themselves or in the arms of smugglers.”
Crane noted that the border-crossing portion is the most dangerous part of illegal immigration and stressed that many of the crossers are coming for “amnesty.”
“These individuals are literally showing up here and saying “I’m here for the DREAM Act,’ ‘I’m here for amnesty,'” he said.
According to Crane, there is no real “department” to deal with juvenile entrants.
“I think everyone out there just kind of takes this for granted that there is some kind of juvenile system to turn kids over to and be taken care of. We have nothing. So when these kids they just keep getting piled on us we don’t have any facilities for this,” he said.