“Divided,” Part 1: How Family Separations Started

[0] From the New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro.

[1] This is The Daily.

[2] Today.

[3] The policy began in secret.

[4] The government denied there even was a policy.

[5] And when it finally acknowledged what was happening, chaos ensued.

[6] Only now, the full picture of what happened and why has started to become clear in the U .S. government's separation of migrant parents and their children.

[7] It's Tuesday, August 21st.

[8] I don't think I ever saw this coming.

[9] I mean, it's more like I never thought they would actually do it.

[10] So as a result, I never even imagined what the reaction to it might look like, you know, what the country might think of it, because it just seemed so unlikely.

[11] Today is the deadline date by which the government is supposed to have reunited children with their families.

[12] Instead, what we know is true is that hundreds of family members have not yet been reunited.

[13] And where is your child?

[14] There's no way, there's no way that the government can reunify every single child by the deadline today.

[15] And that's because they never had a plan to put these families back together in the first place.

[16] Nobody chooses to be separated, unlike what this administration is saying.

[17] And I can guarantee you, the facts are just the opposite.

[18] The likelihood of most of these 463 deportees ever seeing their kids again is virtually non -existent.

[19] When?

[20] That's the question I get from parents.

[21] When are the parents going to see their children again?

[22] When, when, when?

[23] And that's what we all need to be asking.

[24] When?

[25] All of this starts with a woman called Ms. L. My name is Caitlin Dickerson.

[26] I'm an immigration reporter here at the Times.

[27] So I'm going to call, I have to call one woman to ask her about a couple of cases of specific children.

[28] And back in February, I get a phone call from a lawyer at the ACLU.

[29] He wants to talk on background, and he says he's about to file a lawsuit on behalf of this woman.

[30] Ms. Elle came from the Congo with her seven -year -old daughter, who's called SS in the lawsuit.

[31] He said they spoke Lingala, and they didn't know any English, but they didn't know any English, but they, They knew enough Spanish to be able to get into Mexico and then explain to border agents there that they were seeking asylum.

[32] So he said they spent about four days in what they thought was kind of a motel.

[33] Then at one point, she's in a room next door to her daughter, and she hears her daughter screaming.

[34] And her daughter saying, no, I don't want to leave my mom.

[35] I want to stay with my mom.

[36] Mazzle starts to panic.

[37] She doesn't know what's going on.

[38] And the next thing she knows, her daughter is taken away.

[39] So this attorney says he's about to file a lawsuit to try to force the government to reunify Ms. L. and her daughter.

[40] But he also tells me this isn't the only case.

[41] This is happening all over the country.

[42] Let me get to some other sensitive homeland security issues while I have you.

[43] Now, when he tells me this, it's not the first time that I'm hearing about separating families at the border.

[44] I'd actually been following that issue for months way before the ACLU ever called.

[45] Are you, the Department of Homeland Security, considering a new initiative...

[46] Since March of 2017.