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Slotkin visits northern border facilities, plans bipartisan trip to southern border
Minors are seen as they exercise in a common area at the Homestead shelter for unaccompanied migrant children on April 08, 2019 in Homestead, Florida. The Congresswomen were denied entry by the Department of Health and Human Services, despite a new law mandating Congressional access to the facility. | Joe Raedle/Getty Images
As part of her oversight role as a member of the U.S. Homeland Security Committee, U.S. Rep. Elissa Slotkin (D-Holly) on Tuesday visited Michigan’s border with Canada.
The freshman lawmaker toured ports of entry and facilities and met with Customs and Border Protection officers. She said that the visit gave her the opportunity to “see firsthand the work they are doing at our facilities and ports of entry to keep us safe, and gain a deeper understanding for what I can do to help alleviate both the challenges they face and the humanitarian crisis unfolding at our Southern border.”
Slotkin added she was “impressed with their professionalism and willingness to answer tough questions.”
In a news release, Slotkin said she is “working to perform important oversight of the [President] Trump Administration’s policies at the border.” She added she is planning to take a bipartisan trip to the Southern border later this month.
Several Democratic members of Congress, including U.S. Reps. Brenda Lawrence (D-Southfield), Rashida Tlaib (D-Detroit) and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), have visited migrant detention facilities at the U.S.-Mexico border and blasted the conditions there, as well as U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials.
“It is sickening that human beings are being held in these conditions, and that CBP and ICE agents think it’s just a big joke,” Tlaib said. “… When a woman asked for water, she was told by agents of our federal government to drink it from the toilet.”
Immigrant rights organizations such as the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center (MIRC) and Michigan United are planning a rally on the Michigan Capitol lawn in Lansing on Friday.
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