good move today. we'll always be fair and balanced, not the destroy trump media, we promise. let not your heart be troubled, the news continues. laura, she calls meehanity, ingraham, is at the border crossing outside san diego i was there in san diego at the border and there was a tunnel that had been dug from mexico, up into an office building, a particular office, that i saw. how you doing on the road? >> laura: fantastic, sean. big show tonight to report. you had a fantastic show as always. thanks so much. >> sean: have a great, safe trip. >> laura: good evening from the border trip, i'm laura ingraham, just south of san diego. "the angle" is here so you can see for yourselves what is really going on here. during this emotionally charged crisis over children, some of whom have been separated from their illegal immigrant parents, we're going to show you how the trump administration is actually

trying to protect these children, and give you a look at their real living conditions. we'll also get the inside story from active border agents putting their lives on the line and cracking done on the human smugglers who are also putting these children in grave danger. and meanwhile, democrats give away their game, this is great, by turning down legislative fixes. who would want to fix this, proving they'd rather hurt the president than help the children. plus newt gingrich taps into his historical knowledge, reveals why the left is so willing to jump to hysterical comparisons to the holocaust. and the tragedy of separating mirn families a father shares the agony of losing his own son, brutally gunned down a few months ago in california, by an illegal. but first, protecting america, protecting the children. that's the focus of tonight's "angle."

>> laura: the president has described what we're seeing on the border as a crisis and it is. today he explained the legislative trick bag he's in, due to a tangle of at times conflicting immigration laws on the books. >> president trump: we can either release all illegal immigrant families and minors who show -- [>> laura: there were family detention centers, but a 2016 court ruling effectively shut them down. a decision kwheered by international migration activists who consider all detainment to be a human rights violation. and due to the settlement, a minor can't be held in custody for more than 20 days. the administration is left with few choices. it's either enforce the law and arrest the border crossers, separating the families, or let

everybody with a child into the country no questions asked. now, that also would include human traffickers, drug cartels and others exploiting the children that they're traveling with. so, do you see how irresponsible and even cruel it would be for the administration to just wave all family units in without vetting who these people are? predictably, liberals have attempted to focus attention on images of children, heartbreaking for sure, separated from their parents at the border. i have a question. where were they, just a few years ago, when barack obama faced a similar surge at the border? i don't recall the same type of wall-to-wall media outrage then or the nasty charges that obama opened concentration camps for illegal kids. as some one who has spent a lot of time, myself in central america, i know how desperately hard it is for the children there. and the terrible abuses that

they endure both at home and in some cases when they come to the united states, that long trek that entire way. we're all really concerned about the well being of children and keeping children with their parents of course is always the ideal. but the truth of the matter is, the homeland security secretary said it right yesterday, of the 12,000 kids in u.s. custody, it's 2,000, not 12,000 but 2,000 of them have been separated from their parents. the rest basically were abandoned. they had no family. lost in the easy scapegoating of donald trump, of course is a bush-era law that got us into the crisis we're seeing at the gore der. while it's well intentioned, this flawed piece of legislation was designed to curb human trafficking and had a slew of unintended consequences. it was called the wilbur force trafficking victim protection act of 200. .

that does not allow the government to immediately deport minors from any country other than canada, and mexico. so no noncon contingentous countries. according to the "new york times" the legislation requires that they have an immigration hearing. an advocate and counsel. it mandates they're turned over to health and human services, and placed in, quote, the least restrictive setting in the best interests of the child and to explore reuniting those children with family members. that's exactly what the trump administration is doing. these kids are placed in one of about 100 refugee resettlement centers that are the, quote, least restrictive setting for the child. far from the cage kids kinna drchlt sold to us on television, this is footage that hhs has provided to a number of meeld why outlets -- media outlets in el cajon, kas sa san diego.

they're perfectly clean classrooms, medical clinic, walls adorned with super heros and religious cards. and the kids, thankfully, are given hot meals every day. there's an outside area for the 65 children housed there to play and recreate. not ideal, but it's not a concentration camp, don't say that. according to the staff at casa san diego, only 10% of the kids there were separated from their parents. 90% of those residents were trafficked, sent across the border alone. this house is similar to casa padre in texas, a government -- the largest government contracted immigrant youth center in the nation. one of the dozens funded by you, the u.s. taxpayers. once a former walmart, npr witnessed boys at casa padre shooting baskets, kicking soccer

because, playing video games, watching a movie, sitting in classrooms where they were taught about u.s. government, and they were even learning tai chi and they got a meal of chicken and vegetables. that's npr's description. now, for those centers, do they look like dacao, auschwitz? it cost the u.s. taxpayer about $35,000 a year to keep each of these children housed and cared for in these facilities. but do not confuse the temporary central processing center in mcallen, texas complete with fencing and my lar blankets, with the h.h.s. run refugee centers for young people. they are not the same thing. but the media are maliciously trying to confuse the two, and make people believe that children are being shuttled into cages to languish for months and months.

the online virtue signallers, of course want to keep eat motional heat on this story. turn it up high and smudge the hard facts surrounding it. but the funny thing is, that most of those claiming to have this upper hand and compassion toward those seeking a better life have never been to central america. and they've never actually witnessed what really helps the kids there. i'll tell you the best option, not to lure them on a dangerous journey north with their families or alone. but to give them and their families assistance on the ground and support organizations, many of them faith based embedded among the people that provide them with aid, self sustainability, and real development possibilities. i've seen it first hand. it's amazing. it's inspiring work, food for the poor and others. it certainly didn't come from the government. i've been with these people in

remote villages in guatemala, elsewhere. you know what? most of them want to stay home. given the opportunity, they would. that said, congress needs to change our laws so that immigrant families can remain together. allow the reinstitution of family detention centers so genuine asylum seekers with await trial without exclusion from their children. border agents shd be allowed to turn back family units from all countries. we simply do not have the manpower or the money or the resources to stay in the international foster care business investigating the relations of every child that enters the u.s. illegally and housing them throughout the entire lengthy process. in the meantime, the president is in kind of impossible situation. he has a moral obligation to protect the american people and these children now in our care even as the current law puts those obligations sometimes in

conflict. it's time for members of both parties to stop playing politics at the border. [helicopter sounds] stop playing politics with the border and the immigrants and act. if you really care. do the right thing. that's "the angle." >> laura: let's bring in our first guest, hector is vice president of the national border patrol council and border patrol agent, president of the local 1613 chapter of the national border control. how are you. >> good to see you. >> laura: you know, you heard what i just said, we've been hearing a lot of stories about how horrific it is, for the families crossing the border. they cross illegally, a harrowing journey. but you guys are understaffed, overwhelmed, ditto for the hhs folks trying to do their best.

>> we see on a daily basis, laura, these kids being abused on the mexican side. some of these female children come across, we know their parents send them with plan b medication, they're expected to be raped along the journey when it comes to mexico and central america. that's horrific. our number one goal as agents is we have to take care of these peep when they come into our custody. that's what our agents do. we treat these people with dignity and respect. and of course we have to protect the border. we need to help them, change the laws that are allowing these loopholes to continue. >> laura: terry, you patrol this whole area, this part of the border, right into the ocean, the border fence goes right into the ocean. tell me how significant the burpd here is, for border patrol, even with this pretty significant fencing? >> for us it's pretty significant. it takes away the resources that we have. we have limited resources. there is a legitimate way to do it. what the port of entries are there for. any time some one crosses in an

area other than the port of entry that's where we work. the border patrol, we work in the dirt. we don't work in the clean, pristine ports of entry. when you come into those areas it takes the resources away. that's where the cartels win. what they want to us do, take our resources away, so that they can get their billion dollar entry going and keep the product coming across to the united states. >> laura: sman how it is that a 15-year-old boy from honduras, manages to find his way to mcallen, texas or rio grander in one of the sectors, east from here, imperial beach. how do they get there? they get here with the help of the cartels? >> the mexican cartels are orchestrating the activities. they want to tear up our resources. while we're catching these 15-year-old kids there's dangerous weapons, dangerous narcotics, cocaine being smuggled. you name it. all organized by the cartels. we have to make sure to stop it.

woe can't be tied up with that intoof work. >> laura: there's a ten-fold increase in the number of yesterdayible fear claims among those entering the country, oftentimes with children but not always with children. it was one in 100 back in 2011, now it's one out of 10. is that an indication that you have, terry, people know the script? >> absolutely. that's one of the blessings and the curse of the internet. as soon as somebody gets across and find out what works, what they do is get on facebook, they send an e-mail, they get on their cell phone and talk to the people at home and tell them it's trial and error, this is what worked, this was our script, the script that was gave to us, tell them these exact words and you know they'll stick to that script no matter what you ask them. we have found people with the script on their person. >> laura: they have it printed out. >> printed out. >> laura: it's obvious, you can't have a ten hive fold increase in a few years. a former border patrol agent had

this to say about the job of separating children from their parents. she basically said that you should be literally, you know, there's no schools for these agents to not literally lay down their guns and badges and say this is unlawful. she was border patrol agent for a number of years. she said you all should refuse to do this. lay down your arms, lay down your badges. >> what is unlufl, laura, is allowing these criminal cartels to use the children for the criminal activities. the other thing is the cartels will get the kids and pair them up with people they're not even related to. >> laura: how do you tell who's who? if some one says this is my child, i mean, who are you to say it's not their child. i don't understand how you do your job in that regard. >> so those cases our agents have to conduct extensive interviews of the parties. sometimes it's difficult but sometimes it's easy. sometimes you can tell when somebody is can family unit or

not. you see the abuse of the immigration system. >> laura: do you see children who come here who, themselves, are afraid of the adult they're with? >> that's happened many occasions. look, we are parents, a lot of our guys and gals are mothers, fathers, we have kids of our own. so our instinct is to protect that child. make sure that that child is safe. that's what this, what we're trying to do. is it a bad situation, maybe. but we're doing the best we can, with what we have. and our main objective is to make sure that that child is safe. >> laura: terry, you said before the show started for people to understand the flavor of what's happened here at the for der, mexico -- border mexico has a sewage pipe, i've been covering this issue for the sewage pipe for years, pumps raw sewage into the pacific ocean, goes northward to the beaches up obviously to la jolla, del mar, off the coast where the navy seals train as well.

you have seen it, just an environmental disaster at the border. >> the news spin to that is with what they built up, the companies going to mexico, now we have pesticides, heavy metals, things on top of the sewage that's coming across. that's what our agents are working on, every single day. >> laura: when you guy are dealing with this issue day in and day out, then you hear people, mostly on the left but not always, claim that you guys are tantamount to nazi concentration guards by shuttling the kids into, quote, cages. >> that's very inaccurate. our agents through their best every day to treat people with respect and dignity. we take care of, even if we have to take care of the kids in our custody, we provide support for them, bring in toys for them. and this is all things that our agents do on their own. we don't have any policies on how to bring toys to kids. >> laura: you bring heart, that's hard. like me you're both parents.

>> right. >> laura: thank you for doing what you do for this country. great stuff. turning a blind eye to the law just encourages the human smuggling that puts these kids in terrible danger. let's expose the harsh realities of the seedy underworld with the human trafficking expert, former i. i.c.e. agent claud arnold, vast experience. claud, you just heard from terry and hector. it is a heartbreaker. nobody wants to see this type of trafficking of children which is, it is a widespread problem, it's not just children hopping on a train and having a nice ride up to the border. that's not how it works. from your perspective with your years of experience, what is the gritty truth that the american media refuse to reveal to the viewers about what really happens at the hands of the cartels? >> well, the fact is they're criminal organizations. it's driven by the drug trafficking organizations, laura.

and these people for them, not just the children, they're commodities. they represent money. they represent revenue. and for, as the border patrol agents pointed out for the drug cartels it's two-fold. helps them divert resources so they can engage in lucrative drug trafficking operations. but it's also making money by collecting fees for people being smuggled through the border. so of course they don't really care about the people. they're willing to exploit the children. that's why they are doing things like pairing children up with adults who are not their children. they're willing to stick them in tractor trailers and unsafe conditions. there have been several media counts of that recently. again, they're just a commodity to that. it's no different. >> laura: what would be the most, claud, from your experience, what would be the most humane path for ending this nightmare with the kids at the border, as much as we could end

it? what would be the best path given your experience? >> well, you need to close the loopholes in the la, of course. that's what has to be done. look, let's not take the responsibility 2306 the parents. i'm hearing a lot of people blaming the u.s. government, blaming border patrol agents. but these parents know that there is a chance that they're going -- they know they will be arrested for illegal entry. though know there's a zero tolerance policy. like they knew they would be admitted and be able to escape over. but they have that information as the agents pointed out, on facebook the next day. so they are, the ones putting their children in this predicament, subjecting their children to danger and subjecting their children to being separated from them. they know they will be arrested. >> laura: one of our border agents from texas last night, revealed that he's seen on many occasions when border patrol approaches a, quote, family

unit, the so-called parent who ends up not being the rnt pa, drops the child and runs. he said we see that all the time. i think people have to remember when the cartels are involved, there are all sorts of competing interests, the kids are caught in the crosshairs but we have to remember that these kids become prime targets for msn recruitment. i want to reveal something to the viewers, more than one-third, more than one-third of the 274ms-13 members and affiliates from that operation matador were unaccompanied minors. that's one-third 26900-plus, not an insignificant number. they're prime targets for recruitment. yet another way their lives are in peril because of the ridiculous government policies. claud, thank you so much. stay right there, we have just the man to analyze the real story behind this crisis, newt gingrich joins news a minute

with his solution.

>> laura: welcome back. coming to you from the u.s. mexico border south of san diego. this border crisis touches on so many issues.

humane treatment of children and all border crossers. how much illegal immigration our country can sustain. how the ultimate and final idea, how can we figure this out, the solution will affect the mid-term elections. and our nation's future. to cover all of these bases we're joined by historian and former house speaker newt gingrich from virginia tonight. newt, you're also the you are a authorize of the just published number one best seller on amazon, trump's america, the truth about our nation's great comeback. congratulations. it's terrific to have you on tonight. it is amazing to me, newt, that with republicans in control of the house and the senate, and the president willing to find a solution on all of this, that we're still sitting here with this separating children from adults and all the predictable media hysteria surrounding the images that are, indeed, troubling. >> i think it's pretty clear

that the president has two obligations not one. he has an obligation to be humane toward the children crossing the border. but he has an obligation to the american people and the people who have lost loved ones, to gangs like ms-13 and other people who are illegal. the president i think is trying to balance both of those obligations. the answer ips pretty simple. the answer is a very narrow bill that provides for safety for the children and safety for the border. and it's pretty clear that the democrats in the senate are going to basically try to stop this. they have introduced a bill that verges literally on being crazy. senator feinstein introduced this bill written so badly it would cover about 80% of the population, virtually every federal government official of any kind, it would cover americans as well as people trying to come to the country

illegally. it's one of those things where people wanting to do public relations sat down and banged out a bill. i think a number of democrats will find it very hard to defend when they get back home. it's also clear that senator schumer would rather use this as an issue to attack donald trump than help children. let's be clear, where the phony, heartless policy is. it's in the democratic caucus in the senate. >> laura: and, newt, we just showed some images of mcallen, texas where the immigrant processing center is. and, yeah, there are fences and it looks like cages. but where the children were, hhs takes the kids, you know, it's not cages, it's not -- they try to humanely take care of them. it's not an easy situation. 12,000 kids, 10,000 of them coming by themselves, trafficked across the border, 2,000

separated from their parents. but they do, offer them instruction, they offer them lessons, movies, sporting events outside. i mean they're trying to do their best. but they're not kept in cages indefinitely. i want people to understand that. the processing centers are unpleasant and we need to move people through them quickly. this is what some of the people mostly on the left have been saying about, again, the images that you just saw. let's listen. >> the children are being marched away to showers, i know they're being marched away to showers, are there -- being told they are, just like the nadz is -- nazis said they were taking people to showers and never came back. >> donald trump is turning this nation into nazi germany and turning them into concentration camps. >> we can't find a solution to the problem without harming children? without putting them in concentration camps? . the nadzis had it correct, they

declared us an illegal people. that's how it began. >> laura: newt, dacao, auschwitz, concentration camps, casa padre. >> let's be clear, it's be clear, there are people on the left who despise and hate the united states. they enjoy smearing the united states. they're happy for the entire world to listen to their despicable, dishonest, and immoral statements. there is zero comparison. to anybody who has been, we filmed at auschwitz, a movie about john paul ii. anybody who went to one of these camps understands how utterly, totally outrageous it is that people on the left feel they can smear america with terms like that.

there is no comparison of any kind. on the other hand, what would they do, have totally open borders? have 100 million people come to the u.s. next year? wring their hands as american civilization drowns? the fact is, if you're going to have borders, you of have to police them. if you police them you have to do something with people. remember, they're deliberately breaking the law. a part of this is not a question about victimless people who magically show up. the cartels, the drug cartels, actively recruit and send people north and do so partially to try and flood our system so they can bring the drugs in easier. partially to make money. they charge for doing this. and for some of the cartels, have gotten in the people business as a major source of e revenue. it's really disturbing to have people on the left who hate their own country so much that, they would use this kind of

language, smearing us, all across the world, in a way that is simply, absolutely false. >> laura: yeah, yeah, $35,000 a year for the taxpayers, per child, who crosses the border illegally. and we take, i think, pretty good care of them considering the difficulties they've been through. newt, this is a congresswoman who spoke earlier today, with even more colorful language than chuck schumer. >> mr. president, have a heart for a change. take that (bleep) pen of yours and do away with this horrendous, inhumane policy of yours that rips children from the arms of their parents. >> laura: i didn't mean to demote her to the house of representatives, she's a senator, obviously. >> well, first of all, if the president could do with it a single motion of the pen he would.

there are two court decisions that block it. the law itself blocks it. but the president, i any, is prepared. and eager, to sign a very narrowly drawn bill. let me be clear, what the left wants to do is get everybody emotionally upset and then pass the kind of bill which guarantees millions of people who come ploo flooding into the united states. i think is that total disservice to every american who wants to live peacefully and wants to live with neighbors that they can trust. i think, let's have a head-on debate about this. those people favor totally open borders, make them explain what they would do when 100 million people show up. as gallop survey, 165 million people would like to come to the united states. that's over half our population. but second -- >> laura: newt -- >> what she's saying is totally false. >> laura: newt, i mean, newt the

hypocrisy and the selective moral indignation is beyond stunning, disgusting, anyone with a brain can see it, it's transparent, and we really appreciate the historical perspective andior legislative expertise. thank you so much. what about the americans permanently separated from their families?

>> laura: welcome back. coming toll from the u.s. mexico border, just north of tijuana. dr. jeffrey mazim and his wife know what it's like to be separated from their son. 27-year-old alexander was shot and killed in february just miles from here. the suspect is illegal alienor necessary co-martinez who is still on the loose. thought to be perhaps in mexico. dr. jeffrey mazin joins us to share his story. i want to give you a hug. >> thank you, bless for the

opportunity to be with you. >> tell me about what happened to your son. we've been hearing about, we are e like dacao and auschwitz, like newt gingrich said a lot of people hate this country. the pain of the families that have suffered at the hands of cartels, hit-and-run, dui, is ignored by the left and most of the media. i refuse to ig these stories, i want to hear about alexander. >> alexander was a very, very special individual. he was fitness oriented. he was a very ridgeous young man. he loved his god, he loved his country, quite the patriot. quite the patriot. he was a small businessman. he was a good heart, if you would. and this gentleman, the young man, alexander, was everybody's model if you would.

he had been dating a lady for a few months and he was working out at the gym on one beautiful sunny morning. came out from the gym and there was a man waiting for him in the parking lot. came behind him, shot him in the back. my son fell on the ground, face up. the man straddled him and pumped four more bullets into his chest. my son died there in the parking lot, like a rat in the street. obviously, every time i tell it, the emotion pours out of me. >> laura: did you ever hear from any of the major politicians in the state, nancy pelosi, dianne feinstein, any of the major figures, jerry brown? >> none, none. however, kristin gaspar, one of our local representatives, is truly awesome, took alexander's

story to the president, directly. and presented it to president trump. and president trump's reaction was really amazing. he grimaced, tears coming down his face, shaking his head, upset. you could see the uncontrollable upset. >> laura: nancy pelosi went to a border facility yesterday, gave a big speech afterwards, telling president trump how dare you, basically, do this to these kids. and, look, nobody wants children to be separated from the families. but you really have been separated from your son, from a lacks border policy, much an individual who was already -- of an individual already deported once, voluntary deportation, and came back again. maybe it was up the fence a way, we don't know. . he also had a history of having murdered another man in mexico. so this man is a serial killer,

a serial murderer. i call them a mass murderer, he not only murdered by son, he murdered me, my wife, he murdered my other son, he murdered the family, murdered the community because the outpouring of upset from the community from our son's death has been overwhelming, really overwhelming. >> laura: what do you have to say to the politicians who are spending an enormous amount of their political energy and emotional, i think a lot of it con injured up, politically convenient emotions, for the current situation of separating families. what message do you have for them tonight? >> well, first of all, i wouldn't want to say it on-air. but i'll clean it up a bit. if one of their loved ones were to have died like my son died, i

wonder if their ideas and their ways of presenting things and thinking would be different. i just wonder. it's easy to sit back and say, oh, well, these poor children. how about we poor citizens and how my poor son? because he's been permanently separated from us. >> laura: now your wife couldn't come on tonight, i know. she was just too overcome. i want to tell penny and your family how much we really are so sorry for your loss. i'm going to do everything in my power to help you and help this country and get through this thing. this can't keep going on. >> well, i thank you for that. bless you for that. >> laura: thank you. god bless you. >> thank you so much. >> laura: and chuck schumer, ends up slipping up, gives away the democrats' real agenda.

i don't think chuck schumer called you either. how concerned is he about the immigrant children? we're going to show you.

>> laura: well come back to "the ingraham angle." chuck schumer let it slip that democrats aren't that concerned about separated immigrant kids. they prefer to keep the issue alive rather than work with the president to solve it. couldn't give him credit. asked why the democrat reject the gop bill, the senator said, quote, legislation is not the way to go here when it's so easy for the tonight sign it. what? heaven forbid democrats work with the gop to fix the crisis without leaving the border wide open. we're going to de great immigration policy in a moment. first another update on the separation on the border from rodney, chief border patrol agent of the san diego sector.

great today you, how are you, thanks for being with us. >> thank you for having me. i hear there's a birthday wish we should pass on. >> laura: i decided to celebrate with you guys. i have to celebrate the birthday the border patrol. >> thank you. >> laura: thank you so much i was here in 1997. i used to work for another network, i was here covering option gatekeeper the clinton-era double fencing that was really worked, really successful. now, it's 21 years later. what's changed? >> well, coincidentally i was there as well. >> laura: maybe you should me around. >> i start mied career in 1992 in this park and it was complete chaos. systematically over 26 years i've watched the border, law and orderer be restored. it's been a mix, the technology, the infrastructure, the access, roads, effective prosecutions using the fools tools that we have available to us as well. you can see behind me, i would never have sat this close to the

border with my back to it, years and years ago. significantly safer than it was before. but we're not done yet. >> laura: what about the media coverage over the last couple of weeks. we have this crush of family units, some of them posing as family units, then we have unaccompanied minors, similar crush as we had in 2014, 2013. and the characterization of what you were doing and your men are sdoing and women are doing, it's horrific. it's like you guys might as well be in nazi germany, you know, members of the s.s. >> the misinformation that's going out -- >> laura: that's a nice way of putting it. >> i'm trying to be polite. it is frustrating and extremely insulting. a lot is flat-out lies. family separation being policy is a lie. we're leveraging the prosecution, the tools that we have in place for years, leveraging them better than before. and that requires when some one

goes to jail they're separated from society, to include their family. the allegations that we would actually put people in dog cages is a lie. >> laura: those images are the temporary processing facilities, right, when you processed in, that's a temporary thing. we keep seeing the cages. like mcallen, texas. those are the cages. but they aren't the long-term holding facilities for children, that's a different scenario. people keep mixing up the images, drives me crazy. >> i couldn't agree more. farther than that, they're looking at chain link fence. the same chain link fence around the school yards, most of the viewers probably send the kids to school. same type of chain link fence around basketball courts, tennis courts, every play yard. then they're referring to that as a dog cage. where is the equitybilt in that. it's not a dog change. it's one of the most cost effective ways to keep a visual of all of those kids, the families, to maximize their safety. if those walls were solid and i

couldn't see through them it would require 20 times the agents to maintain safety and security in that area. that is the right tool at the right place, they are processing centers. >> laura: heard from other agents tonight oftentimes people show up at the border with a prewrit yep script, as has been reported, they're illiterate, not -- don't speak english. many of them rudimentary education in their own country they come with a script, oftentimes with a sponsor name, off that's an illegal immigrant. >> correct. so what gets lost in the conversation is we're dealing with very sophisticated, organized smuggling. so when these people arrive at the border they have a script, sometimes they're provided to a child to exploit loopholes in the system. based on american values, we bent over backwards to make sure families are kept together, no

good deed goes unpunished, the smugglers watch everything i do and identify every weakness, leverage it as a way to get their client -- >> laura: 90% never show up for an immigration hearing. >> that's correct. >> laura: thank you for your perspective, really needed, the misrepresentation. >> thank you for your time. >> laura: the current crisis is part of a bigger problem. here to debate from up the road immigration attorney esther valdez and democratic strategist michael starr hopkins. michael you've been watching this show tonight. your perspective on this debate. i know we have democrat and republican. but let's just focus if we can on the facts, the laws that exist, the court decisions handed down. i'm interested in your perspective. >> absolutely. i want to take the labels away and say that i think we're conflating two different things. when the trump administration put in their zero tolerance policy, what they did was make it harder for people who were trying to claim asylum to cross

the border legally. so now what you are seeing is everyone who's crossing the border is crossing illegally. which messes up the status of what is going on. what could have been a civil infraction is now going to be a criminal misdemeanor. >> laura: esther? >> absolutely not, that's incorrect. i've been a practicing immigration attorney for 14 years here at the border, this is my hometown. i'm also the daughter of mexican immigrants. what we are seeing is a two-fold process that the trump administration is highlighting. why the laws don't work. not only a loophole for mothers with children but we have fake families being presented at the border, and also criminal prosecution. which that's how the la has read for approximately 20 years. nothing new under the sun but for the fact we're saying mom and dad if you come in we'll prosecute you. as a misdemeanor, or as a felony. naturally, in america, we don't incarcerate families. we treat children humanely, separate them. i have had the honor to visit

children and rement children and win successfully asylum cases in mexico over seven states. the detention centers are not cages, they're happy, they'd rather avail themselves of things in america than in mexico with rape, pillage, and trafficking. >> why they're leaving their country. >> exactly right y we treat them better and they want to be detained here. while they go through judicial process and due process. all of the women that i represent, which are mostly women and children, rather avail themselves of american laws, they understand they will be protected, to undergo the asylum process. unfortunately, takes many years. that's why ted cruz's legislation is wonderful. he's proposing making it more expeditious and making it more rapid so the families aren't detained and/or separated. >> but ted cruz's legislation -- >> laura: i'll jump in here, the frustrating thing here is that

there were family detainment centers. however, they were delicensed by court order. this is happening in texas, and there were two major detention centers that were for family units. border activists, international activists, i dweeted out one of the big groups today, celebrating the family detainment centers being closed because they want all of the families released into american society. i understand that. but then don't complain when family unit can't be held together because all of these places have been shut down. i guess we have to figure out a way to open them again. michael? >> only 2,000 children are being separated from their families. i have children 2 to 10 years old, approximately only 2,000. the other 10,000 are with their families. the 2,000 separated most of them -- >> laura: michael, ten seconds to close it out, i'm not being fair to you. >> no problem, i want to say we have prosecutorial discretion

here and we can decide whether to prosecute under civil or criminal. here when we need to make sure we're doing is not conflating criminals with people trying to seek asylum. painting in broad strokes does not work. >> laura: thank you, got the point, thank you so much.

>> laura: welcome back. coming to from the u.s. mexico border, just north of tee juan a when you think about it, there is a solution for a lot of the suffering unaccompanied immigrant minors. it's a really humane one. one i know a lot about. called adoption. joining me now from washington is chuck johnson shall. and ceo of the national council for adoption. one of my favorite people. chuck, great to have you on tonight. you and i have been so frustrated about what's happened in the adoption world over the last several years. specifically not only is it hard to adopt domestically, harder because of abortion and all of that, adopting internationally especially from central america, chuck. why has it become nearly impossible? 15 years ago we had about 2,380 or so children available for adoption. last year, one. what's going on? >> yeah, over the last ten years

we've seen nearly 80% decline in the number of international adoptions happening in the u.s. we believe that part of the reason for that is a bias against enter country adoption by career people in the department of state. >> laura: and, chuck, particularly annoying is the fact that international human rice advocates claim that enter-country adoption is bad for kids often times. people who want to help the kids, and i think they do, put up legal barriers for actual adoption w russia you have the problem with putin, which is really annoying. but some one like gaut ma la, my daughter is from guatemala, i adopted her 10 year ago, it was hard to adopt her, hard to get her out of the country. so many american families were stuck in limbo. of all of the children coming to the border every day, i bet we

could find a lot of american families who would be willing to adopt them, legally adopt them. you know them, these are some of the kids and the villages that i have had the great privilege of getting to know over the years. some of these kids still have their families others are living with extended families, very little opportunities. there is a way to do it. your reaction to that? >> there is a way, laura, to do this. we have implemented the hague convention on enter-country adoption ten years ago, created a new process of checks and balances and oversight for enter-country adoption. we have created policies and other barriers that have not allowed us to use much more better system. so we're going to continue to see the decline in the number of international adoptions until we see significant change in the policies at the department of state. we're hopeful -- >> laura: why is this happening, chuck, why is it happening. what does president trump need to know? i want to break the logjam as best i can.

i think it's really important for all of these people who say they care about the kids, we need them to help on this issue of adoption. we have tens of thousands of american families who would be absolutely love to take in these children. as legally part of their families. what does president trump need on do, is there one particular person at the department of state that we have to work on or what? >> well, everything we know about the president, and things he has said recently about adoption if you look at the vice president, he has a strong record as a member of congress supporting adoption. we need them. and we need the secretary of state to look at this bias that's happening at the department of state. >> laura: well we're going to get to specifics and get a stand on this issue. chuck, thank you.

>> apparently tonight the dhs secretary was driven out of a mexican restaurant. protesters. apparently she can't eat at a mexican restaurant now, that's really nice. i hope this has been a

clarifying hour for all of you, it's been a clarifying hour for me, our country, our sovereignty, all of it. for a securitysomex issue and many of you think it's simple and easy to do but you saw the great men and women tonight at the border patrol. part of what we have attempted to do is bring you some of the stories for the people fighting and affected by this issue. that's it for us. we will be back in washington tonight but for now we will turn it over to shannon bream and the great fox news at 19. >> shannon: we begin with the fox news alert. a wild night here on capitol hill and across washington. secretary nielsen, you heard laura talk about this, confronted a restaurant near the white house. they were screaming near the presidents face today on capitol hill and tensions boil over as the fallout over separating illegal immigrant families intensifies. plus, new late-breaking details from the president's lawyer, rudy giuliani and the fbi