MSNBC "The Rachel Maddow Show - Transcript: "Vice President Pence to visit Miami Tuesday."

Interview

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

MADDOW: This is Veronica Escobar. She is a new Democratic member of Congress from El Paso, Texas. When Beto O`Rourke gave up his seat in the House to run for Senate against Ted Cruz, a race he came close to winning which launched his presidential bid, it was Veronica Escobar who ended up running as the Democratic nominee to succeed Beto O`Rourke for that seat. It was a six-way Democratic primary for Beto O`Rourke`s seat and Veronica Escobar won it running away with 61 percent of the vote. On election night in 2018, she became the first woman to ever represent that district in El Paso. District is majority Hispanic. It`s right on the border, in El Paso. When she was campaigning to win her seat in the summer of 2018, you might remember a national -- a moment of national attention during that campaign. Then-candidate Veronica Escobar helped lead the protests in Tornillo, Texas, where the Trump administration had started holding kids in tent cities, kids that they had taken away from their parents, in the Trump administration`s zero zero-tolerance policy. Now, that zero-tolerance policy of taking kids away from their families, taking kids away from their moms and dads, that supposedly was ended by the Trump administration, but as we all now know, even though they named --they ended that policy in name, they kept taking kids away from their parents. The ACLU obtained documents in court as recently as last week that showed that the Trump administration did discontinue that policy in name, but they have absolutely kept separating kids from their moms and dads. And the physical conditions in which the Trump administration is holding people on the border, and holding kids on the border, if you`re somebody like Victoria Escobar representing Greater El Paso, I mean, it`s impossible not to see. I mean, obviously, this is a national interest. This is something we will all have to answer for one day to our makers, right? But in her case, taking care of her district means dealing with some of these facilities and people being treated this way in the part of the country that she represents in Washington. For example, there was this report last month from the inspector general of the department of homeland security, report about a facility called the Paso del Norte processing center which is in El Paso, and what the inspector general reported was that that facility has a maximum capacity of 125 persons. When the I.G. sent people there to look at the facility, though, they were not at their maximum capacity of 125 people. That facility, instead, was holding 900 people. Capacity for 125, holding 900. One cell, alone, a large cell that was designed to hold 35 people, it was stuffed with 155 people instead. To get air, to get breathing room, people were standing on the toilets in that facility because, of course, the toilets are out in the open in that facility, or at least they`re out in what would have been the open had there been room for open space at all between all of the bodies crammed into it. Congresswoman Escobar responded bluntly to that I.G. report. Quote: Today`s report is alarming. It publicly confirms what I have witnessed firsthand for months. The conditions of our processing facilities stripped migrants of their dignity and represent a serious danger to the health and safety of migrants and agents. Well, that I.G. report was last month. Now, over the past several days, another facility near El Paso, this one is just outside Escobar`s district in the city of Clint, Texas, it has become the source of just unimaginable reports from witnesses, from lawyers, who along with doctors and interpreters, have been able to get inside. These are lawyers who all but stumbled upon a brand-new Trump administration crisis when they found a facility holding kids that nobody had said was holding kids.The border patrol station in Clint, Texas, is not designed to hold kids. Historically, it has been an adult facility and everybody thought that`s what it still was. But when lawyers trying to monitor compliance with government rules about how kids are supposed to be treated in border patrol custody, when those lawyers learned that there were kids being held at this border patrol station that wasn`t designed to hold kids, that was only designed to hold adult men. And those lawyers followed that news and they got themselves in there to see the conditions, what they found was both almost describable and something they felt needed to immediately be described to the public because we needed to know this was happening.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WARREN BINFORD, WILLAMETTE UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR OF LAW: Well, we saw children who were being forced to live in horrendous conditions that no child should ever have to live in. You`ve mentioned the influenza outbreak where children were put into isolation. You`ve mentioned the lice infestation in one of the rooms that resulted in the border patrol guards moving all bedding from the cell that the children were being kept in and forced to sleep on the cement ground. Many children reported that they regularly were forced to sleep on the cement including infants and toddlers and preschoolers. We heard about -- we saw the children who were dirty and some of them smelled. We saw their clothes were stained. There was no soap. They were infrequently allowed to brush their teeth or take a shower. Even then, it was only for a moment or two. They were being fed Franken food that isn`t suitable to give children especially on a daily basis and given the same breakfast, same lunch, same dinner day after day. We`re talking about instant foods. We`re talking about Kool-Aid. We`re talking about frozen burrito burritos. It is not a way to care for children who are our responsibility as a nation. We did not even into this border patrol facility on our radar when we were planning our trip, this inspection. We had heard the week before we left that there were children that were in recent weeks being moved to this facility so we showed up in not sure how many children were going to be in this facility with maximum capacity of 104. There were over 350 children, Chris, and we scanned the list and immediately we saw zero, zero, one, two, four, five. They were all ages. They were infants, toddlers, preschoolers and we couldn`t figure out where they were keeping them. So, we talked to the chief officer and he indicated they had recently expanded the facility but we couldn`t see an expansion. So after we were done with interviewing on the first day, we drove around the facility and the only thing that we could see that appeared to be new was a metal warehouse with no windows and we couldn`t fathom that the American government would truly be keeping hundreds of children in a metal warehouse. And, yet, in fact, when we came back the next day and we asked the border patrol and we asked the children, that was, in fact, where many, many of the children were being kept.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MADDOW: One of the lawyers who has become now for us as a country one of the key witnesses describing what has been happening under the Trump administration on the border, which we otherwise wouldn`t know had these lawyers not been able to get in there. I mean, that we are hearing about these conditions at this facility, I mean, again, you can -- you can tell there from the way the lawyer`s telling the story, that happened because of a few different things coming together that very easily might not have come together. I mean, by happenstance, the lawyers reviewing compliance of government rules, holding kids in border patrol facilities and facilities like this, they happened upon this facility where nobody knew kids were being held. By chance they discovered, basically followed leads as they could find them. This discovered this undeclared, undisclosed new warehouse where apparently hundreds more kids have been held -- again, a facility that nobody knew about. The lawyer we just heard from on my colleague, Chris Hayes` show, she told NPR the reason she and her colleagues have witnessed conditions, have been able to speak out, is because they essentially decided amongst themselves that they had to, even though they never speak to the media about their site visits, they decided that in this instance, this is a life-threatening situation. This is such an emergency that it has to be addressed separate from ongoing litigation about the conditions in these places. People need to know this is happening now. And so they have come to the press. They never go to the press. In this case, they decided they needed to. So, that story, in particular, about that border patrol facility in Clint, Texas, that has broken over just the last several days. As I mentioned, that facility in Clint is just outside El Paso, just outside the bounds of Veronica Escobar`s congressional district. Today, Congresswoman Escobar was the first to let the world know that presumably in response to this burst of publicity, the Trump administration has now quietly started taking all the kids out of that place and moving them somewhere else. Quote: This morning, my office was informed that only 30 children remain in the Clint border patrol station in El Paso County. Last week, lawyers found 255 kids in beyond alarming condition in the same station. Many questions remain to understand what happened and the Trump administration should answer. How many children in Clint were separated from their parents? What is the administration doing to reunite these families? Who will be held accountable for these atrocities? Children do not belong in detention and Donald Trump`s failed policies are only harming children and promoting needless and cruel family separations. This must end. Joining us now is Congresswoman Veronica Escobar of Texas. Congresswoman, thank you so much for being with us tonight. I really appreciate it, especially at this busy time.

REP. VERONICA ESCOBAR (D-TX): Hi, Rachel, thank you for having me.

MADDOW: Let me first just ask you if I accurately summarized what we have come to learn over these last few days and let me ask you if we have any further news as to how this is developing tonight.

ESCOBAR: Well, we have no further news. This morning, as you mentioned, we learned that many of the kids in that facility had been moved from the Clint facility probably to another station in El Paso, maybe other places. But we are doing our best to keep on top of all of this information. These atrocities are shocking and horrifying and really should be a wake-up call for the country. And you mentioned it during your summary of what was going on, but family separation is still happening in the United States of America. And the Trump administration its in efforts to criminalize asylum seekers and to erode the protections that asylum seekers have, looks for other ways to criminalize people and when they do criminalize adults with children, frequently, they separate children them and that`s why in part family separations are still occurring.

MADDOW: One of the things that was so horrifying and so I think morally wrenching to the country when we first learned that the Trump administration had gone ahead with this policy of taking kids away from their mothers and fathers and instead holding them alone, one of the things that was so, I think, disturbing in an ongoing way is when we learned in detail including in much later detail in court cases down the line that the Trump administration hadn`t really made any effort whatsoever to track parents, to track family members and kids after they were separated. They hadn`t created databases. They hadn`t linked these kids administratively at all to their families, making it essentially a matter of luck and extraordinary effort by advocates to try to get these kids reunited. Them not setting up a system when they were taking these kids away was just horrifying. Do we know if they learned at least that lesson, if kids are still being taken away now, and you`re reporting that they are and we`ve had these reports that they are, do we at least know if they are tracking them?

ESCOBAR: We don`t. And we don`t know what the plan is for reunification and that`s what I ask in part in a letter that I sent late last week after the news broke to the CBP commissioner and to the Border Patrol chief, what are they planning on doing to reunite these families? Many of these children, Rachel, should not have, been separated in the first place. Many of them have family members. They shouldn`t be in these conditions at all. In some respects, things are worse today than they were a year ago when it comes to the conditions for these kids because a year ago, the country was paying attention. The country thought at some point that it was going to end. And then as the news broke that families were starting to be reunified and that lawyers and activists were helping track folks, I think for a lot of the country, people thought, OK, it`s over, now we just need to reunify them. Well, it`s not over and we don`t believe that the system has gotten any better. And part of what is also really heart wrenching about this is that many of the separations are absolutely needless. They don`t have to happen. It`s a decision by the Trump administration to do it.

MADDOW: Do you think that -- I mean, my sense in reading this stuff, my sense in looking at the footage of these lawyers trying to basically alert the country, saying it is not our job to do this, we don`t make public reports on our site visits, we`re breaking our own rules in order to tell you because we`re so horrified. Looking at the news coverage first in the "Associated Press," NPR, "Washington Post," ABC news has done amazing reporting on this, seeing this start to build as a national story that`s getting bigger and not smaller, over the course of these last few days, I feel like America`s moral conscience has been hit again by this and that people are worked up and upset about this. Do you foresee that people are going to be out protesting at these facilities again? I mean, I know you helped lead protests at Tornillo when we first learned kids were being taken there. I know that in El Paso, there has been marches in support, and demonstrations. Do you think that`s where this is going?

ESCOBAR: I do, and I have to tell you, we need to sustain that outrage. We need to sustain that sense of desperation because this is not changing. It`s not getting any better. Part of what is happening that`s so deeply troubling is that as -- as HHS, the health and human services agency, runs out of bed space, the border patrol is having to hang on to kids longer. And I do want to say, Rachel, that it is not just incredibly heart wrenching and horrific and atrocious for the children, but I do want to say, I have heard from many agents who are distraught, overwhelmed, just completely beyond themselves, with what is happening. And what they are being tasked to do. And so I do want to say that. That it`s impacting absolutely everybody. The communities, my community has been generous and kind but is absolutely worn out, the fact that we face this day in and day out. But, you know, I get asked frequently from other folks, what can we do? Should we protest? What -- how do we react to this? And we really -- we have to figure out as a country how we deal with this. Congress is going to do everything we can, every step of the way, in the House, where we have a majority to be a check and a balance on this administration. My colleagues and I are constantly working, looking for ways to prevent the administration from doing what it`s doing, to, you know, I passed an amendment to end zero tolerance. Colleague after colleague after colleague is working on legislation. But the general public needs to stay in tuned with what`s happening, not lose our sense of humanity and compassion and have to demand change. Keep pushing on Congress. Keep pushing on the administration. Do not let these lives, especially the lives of the most little and vulnerable among us, go unnoticed as they have to live through what they`re living through right now at the hands of the American government.

MADDOW: Congresswoman Veronica Escobar from Texas, from the great city of El Paso -- thank you so much for joining us tonight.

ESCOBAR: Thank you, Rachel.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source