MSNBC "All in with Chris Hayes" - Transcript: Immigration and Puerto Rico

Interview

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HAYES: Here to discuss what the government is doing to immigrant families, Congressman Ruben Gallego, Democrat of Nevada (sic). First, respond to Attorney General Jeff Sessions that it`s these parents` fault, it`s not the U.S. government`s fault, for having, say, their 1-year-old, their 18-month- old, their 3-year-old taken from their arms and separated from them.

REP. RUBEN GALLEGO, (D) ARIZONA: Well, it`s just ridiculous. I mean, as a parent, if some thing like this would happen to me, I would just be terrified not knowing if I am going to be able to get in contact again with my son, not knowing how to get in contact, whether I`ll ever see them. And the fact that we as the United States government are doing this purposely is just disgusting.

Number two, it is entirely the Donald Trump administration`s fault. They changed the policy to actually make this happen.

And number three, the reason this is actually happening is because they actually got rid of a really good policy where people were allowed to stay in their country and apply for refugee status, instead, because Donald Trump had to fulfill this like hard on immigration campaign promise, he cut that program and now people are fleeing Central America to get here.

This is all because of Donald Trump, and this is all because they`re trying to appease their base. That`s all this is.

HAYES: I want to zero in on that last thing, because this is confusing for people, so I just want to walk through it carefully. There are two ways you can come, right, refugees -- you stay in your country. You`re in Honduras. You apply through the U.S. embassy to be a refugee. The other is an asylum seeker, which you just show up on the shores in a port of entry or at the border and say I want to be taken in, because I am fleeing violence or persecution.

And you`re saying the Trump administration actually changed the refugee process to make it more difficult?

GALLEGO: Absolutely. I think it was in August of 2017 that they changed the policy under President Obama who was trying to stem the tide of unaccompanied minors coming north that he allowed people to actually apply for this actually within their home countries, which did diminish the amount of people trying to come over.
But, you know, in order to be hard, the president ended up being stupid and pushing this type of issue that ended up creating more immigrant flows north.

HAYES: Do you feel like the administration is being forthcoming, or transparent with congress and congressional oversight about what they`re doing with these children, about what their policies are, about what their plans are for them?

GALLEGO: Not really. Like, we`ve had some warnings and at least some description what they were planning to do. But then you have the president just outright lying when the blowback started saying that because of Democratic policies, or policies under President Obama, that these types of separations were occurring when in fact, this is all under the executive order of this president. This is all what Jeff Sessions has been bragging about, it`s what Secretary Nielsen has been talking about, even Secretary Kelly and now Chief of Staff Kelly was talking about doing this in the future.

So, this is clearly a Trump administration program. And now that they`ve actually have some blowback, because Americans are good people, don`t believe a family should be separated, they`re trying to distance themselves from it. And when they`re doing that, they`re not being transparent with the American public, they`re certainly definitely not being transparent with congress and in general with the oversight that we should be conducting to keep them in check.

HAYES: Another area of congressional oversight where I feel like there`s a lot of questions to be asked is about the federal government`s response to the hurricane in Puerto Rico. We have a new Harvard study yesterday with a staggering almost incomprehensible number, over 4,500 deaths due to the storm and its aftermath, something that exceeds by above factors of 10 the official estimates.

Has the government, the federal government, been straight about what happened in Puerto Rico? And should there be some kind of investigation?

GALLEGO: 100 percent they have not been straight. I actually sit on the committee on oversight, and I asked many times questions both to FEMA, both to the U.S. government, even to the government of Puerto Rico, and every time they were trying to paint us this happy, rosy scene when we knew better. We knew people were going without water, we knew people were going without electricity, we knew people that were dying because of lack of dialysis. All these things.

And the president did not focus on Puerto Rico. If Puerto Rico had been a state, if Puerto Rico had been Texas, had been Florida, the president would have been all over it. But because Puerto Rico is not a state, because I believe Puerto Rico is filled with Democrats. The president just didn`t care, neither does this administration. Instead, what you saw was, you know, the United States allowing its citizens to suffer for months. And they still are suffering right now.

And we should have an investigation. And people within this administration should be held accountable for doing that to American citizens.

HAYES: Arizona, not Nevada, I misspoke earlier.

Arizona Congressman Ruben Gallego -- well, you know, it`s an important thing to get right. Arizona Congressman Ruben Gallego, thank you for joining me.

GALLEGO: Have a good one.

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