What to Know
- Cuomo tweeted VP Pence Tuesday welcoming him to NY, while urging him “to look at the Statue of Liberty and remember all that she represents"
- His tweet included a letter where he opposes the current administration's policy of separating families at the border
- Cuomo called the policy "inhumane" and a "moral outrage"
The scenes of migrant children being separated from their parents at the southern border due to the current administration’s child separation policy have taken over the political landscape, with Gov. Andrew Cuomo being one of the most recent politicians to voice his opposition.
The Democrat tweeted at Vice President Mike Pence Tuesday, welcoming him to New York while urging him “to look at the Statue of Liberty and remember all that she represents.”
“As Governor and as a father, I urge you to end your Administration's inhumane policy separating families at the border,” Cuomo said in the tweet, which included an open letter to Pence condemning the mistreatment of immigrant families.
“I write to you as the Governor of New York but also, like you, as the father of three. I cannot bear to imagine the pain and suffering the parents at the border face when their children are taken from them,” a portion of Cuomo’s letter reads.
He also urged Pence to end the policy: “If the parents’ anguish does not compel you to end this policy, then the children’s plight must.”
He called it “a moral outrage and an assault” of American values.
“This policy makes it very clear you have forgotten what made America great,” Cuomo says.
Under the current policy, all unlawful crossings are referred for prosecution — a process that moves adults to the custody of the U.S. Marshals Service and sends many children to facilities run by the Department of Health and Human Services.
Under the Obama administration, such families were usually referred for civil deportation proceedings, which did not require separation.
Nearly 2,000 children were separated from their families over a six-week period in April and May.
This is not the first time Cuomo has stood up in support of immigrants. Earlier this month, Cuomo asked for a federal investigation into the conduct of immigration officials after an Ecuadorean pizza shop worker was detained while trying to make a delivery to an Army garrison in Brooklyn.
Local
Pence was in New York Tuesday to attend an event with Republican Congressman John Katko and tour the Nucor Steel plant in Auburn. Across the street from the Katko event, Pence was met with dozens of people protesting the separation of immigrant children at the U.S.-Mexico border.
In a conference call following his open letter post, Cuomo said the state is intending to bring a lawsuit against the federal government regarding the policy contending that there is a violation of the constitutional rights of the parents, there is a violation of the 1997 Flores settlement that underscore family unity and that the government conduct is "outrageous."
