Pelosi Fumes Over Plan to Release Immigrant Detainees in Sanctuary Cities

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) talks to reporters during a news conference a day after a bipartisan group of House and Senate bargainers met to craft a border security compromise aimed at avoiding another government shutdown, at the Capitol in Washington on Jan. 31, 2019. J. Scott Applewhite/AP Photo

After the White House proposed releasing illegal immigrant detainees in sanctuary cities, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) reacted negatively, with her office calling the idea “despicable.”

“The extent of this Administration’s cynicism and cruelty cannot be overstated,” Pelosi spokeswoman Ashley Etienne said in a statement on Friday, April 12. “Using human beings—including little children—as pawns in their warped game to perpetuate fear and demonize immigrants is despicable, and in some cases, criminal.”

“The American people have resoundingly rejected this Administration’s toxic anti-immigrant policies, and Democrats will continue to advance immigration policies that keep us safe and honor our values,” she added.

California, Colorado, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, and Vermont are sanctuary states.

San Francisco, the hometown of Pelosi, is also a sanctuary city.

She told reporters earlier on Friday that she was not aware of Trump’s proposal.

Pelosi was in Leesburg, Virginia, where House Democrats were wrapping up a 3-day retreat.

“It’s just another notion that is unworthy of the presidency of the United States and disrespectful of the challenges that we face, as a country, as a people, to address who we are, a nation of immigrants,” Pelosi said.

“If the Radical Left Democrats all of a sudden don’t want the Illegal Migrants in their Sanctuary Cities (no more open arms), why should others be expected to take them into their communities? Go home and come into our Country legally and through a system of Merit!” Trump responded to the backlash of the White House plan on Saturday morning, April 13.

Trump Singles Out California as Possible Host

Trump said on Friday, April 12, that the crisis of illegal aliens pouring in is because of “the most ridiculous laws probably we have in this country.”

“We’re getting them and we’re doing the best we can with very bad laws, we have to change the laws, but we’re apprehending thousands and thousands of people a day and the law only allows us to hold them as you know for 20 days,” he said.

Trump suggested that the problem can be fixed if the Democrats cooperate.

However, he’s considering moving the illegal immigrants to sanctuary cities if Democrats don’t want to change the law.

“But if they don’t agree we might as well do what they always say they want. We‘ll bring the illegals, I call them the illegals, that came across the border illegally, we’ll bring them to sanctuary city areas and let that particular area take care of it, whether it’s a state or whatever it might be,” Trump said.

A group of Central American migrants climb the border fence between Mexico and the United States as others try to bring it down, near the El Chaparral border crossing, in Tijuana, Baja California State, Mexico, on Nov. 25, 2018. Pedro Pardo/AFP/Getty Images

He singled out California as a possible place to send the illegal aliens: “California certainly is always saying ‘oh, we want more people.’ And they want more people in their sanctuary cities, well we'll give them more people. We can give them a lot, we can give them an unlimited supply.”

“And let’s see if they’re so happy. They say ‘we have open arms,’ they’re always saying they have open arms. Let’s see if they have open arms,” he added.

However, Trump emphasized that the alternative solution for the border crisis is to change the laws.

“We can do it very, very quickly, very easily,” he said.