unclear what she was making a statement about. again, which her husband claims speaking out against the media. my question is if she was going to say anything, it should have been about the children. i wonder why she did this. thanks for watch this hour of "velshi & ruhle." right now my friend peter alexander is sitting in for andrea mitchell. thousands of kids still separated as homeland security says 500 even be reunited with their families in recent weeks. a mom and son back together but only after that mother sued the u.s. government. nbc spoke with several mother who is remain in detention. >> she says she's desperate to hear from her 9-year-old son.

she says that authorities told her she was only going to be separated from her son for 48 hours. it's now been nine days. she has no idea where he is. change of heart. attorney general jeff sessions contradicting himself in a new interview while trying to fends the trump administration's family separation policy. >> it hasn't been good. the american people don't like the idea that we're separating families. we never really intended to do that. >> i have put in place a zero tolerance policy for illegal entry on our southwest border. if you are smuggling a child then we will prosecute you. that child may be separated from you as required by law. flak jacket. what message was the first lady trying to send with those words across her back? >> i thought, okay. this is what first ladies often

do. you go to a troubled area. they see the children. they show that we care. you can't mess that up. guess what. i spoke too soon. president trump throwing in the towel on any long term immigration fix. tweeting this morning that republicans and the majority on capitol hill should stop wasting their time trying to pass immigration law after a week

imploring them to do just that. the president will address the issue again a few hours from now. he'll be at the white house speaking at an event for americans who lost loved ones in attacks by immigrants in this country illegally. for days we have been asking for access to see where young girls are being sheltered. you're in homestead, florida. we know the senator was turned away a matter of days ago. you were allowed inside without cam cameras. tell us what you saw. >> it was an interesting experience. we did actually see young female children for the first time. this is a shelter that houses teenagers ages 13 to 17. both males and females inside. in total there's over 1100

children in this facility. only about 70 have been separated legally from their parents. the others just unaccompanied across the border. inside we were given a tour of this facility. we were taken to the dining hall. eggs for breakfast. children in line. we were taken to the school area where children have six hours of instruction every day. we were taken to the dorms where 12 of the children share a room and bathroom. the females and the males obviously in separate dormitories. overall this is a very orderly, structured facilities. as they pass from building to building the bar codes are scanned so at all times they know where they are. they are assigned a case manager. that case manager is supposed to be working getting them some type of foster, reuniting with parent or getting through the system.

we were not able to communicate with the children. we did see young girls for the first time. >> the question that many american, some within the administration are trying to sort out, how they reconnect these undocumented immigrants with their parents. we heard from the dhs secretary saying the administration has plan. it's not clear what the plan is. what do they tell you on the ground about that process of unifying them with their parents? >> reporter: we did walk through one of the rooms where case managers were working. they were on the phone trying to contact next of kin, possible relatives or the child's parent who is in the united states right now. that is their best plan for trying to get these children out of this shelter and into a better situation. they say this is an emergency temporary shelter. it's only open when there's large influx of children that they need housing for. they say the average length of time spent here is about 25

days. we know the case managers are working hard. most of the children are coming from guatemala, honduras. trying to track down a parent seems like a daunting challenge. >> thank you for that reporting. i want to get to my friend kristen welker at the white house. we saw the president who is firing off more tough rhetoric about this issue illegal immigration. what can we expect to hear from him again today when he speaks alongside those family members who lost loved ones. >> reporter: we saw that human touch by the first lady sort of contrasted against the president who continues to take a hard line when it comes to imgrag immigration reform. that's what you can expect to hear when he speaks later today. he will be highlighting these

families who lost loved ones to those who are here and who are undocumented to really create a contrast to the narrative to some of the images we have been seeing at the border and to defend why he is pushing for some of these very hard line and controversial policies. i think it's going to be a speak aimed at making his case to all americans but also aimed at energizing his core supporters. this is something that was very effective when he was a candidate on the campaign trail. it does come against the backdrop of this new strategy he unveiled on twitter urging congress to wait until november to try to pass immigration reform. as you and i were reporting on yesterday they voted on one bill. that didn't go anywhere. they had postponed another vote on a compromised measure and ultimately until next week. paul ryan saying the critical thing here is to make sure that vote gets over the finish line. the fact you have the president coming out today and saying let's scrap all of it undercuts

the message that we're hearing from republican leaders. it's striking because the president hasn't been very clear about which bill he would support, what specifically he wants to see in the legislation. he has been clear for days that this problem needed to be solved by congress. now these tweets oo sharp reversal. i expect we'll hear a lot more about all of this when he speaks later this afternoon. >> the president hasn't been shy this week about his opinions on this issue. thanks for taking us behind the scenes on your trip today. robin is a staff attorney representing asylum seekers. hundreds of children across 15 states. how hard is it for legal

representatives to get these children back together with their parents? >> thank you for having me. it's a clear process. there's no clear policy or guidelines for how the families can be reunited. one of my colleagues attempted to have a mom be reunited with her 2-year-old child. we knew where the child was being held and even in that case it took weeks of hard work and persistence from my colleague chasing to get the child released. >> what information for a 2-year-old child for a toddler, in some of these cases children that are literally months old. what information do they have? how do they reconnect them? i'm told these numbers exist. numbers that are assigned to them but what happens for these children who cannot advocate for themselves? >> that's a great question. we've heard of mothers being separated from infants and

children as young as 8 months old. a colleague of mine saw a mom who was being convicted in a court in el paso earlier this week who hadn't heard where her 8-month-old baby was who she had been separated from. how can an 8-month-old baby advocate for themselves. it's nearly impossible. the problem is the administration is continuing their policy of criminally prosecuting these folks at the border. as long as they continue that policy, these families are going to continue to be impacted. >> let's try to get a better understanding of who some of these individuals are they were talking about here. i know you worked with a ton of these asylum seekers. can you walk us through some of their stories. stories that have stuck with you that our audience will bet a better sense of their experience trying to arrive here.

>> many of them are moms with young children who are fleeing violence in what we call the northern triangle of central america which is compromised of the country guatemala, el salvador and honduras. they have seen high rates of violence in the past few years. they are fleeing real violence. they are fleeing to save their lives. most of the time the parents are fleeing because they want to save the lives of their children. they are not focused on their own well being. this is a real crisis. that is why these people are fleeing. it's not just to find work as is often used in media as a

justification for why people are fleeing. it's real violence. it's conflict and no protection from their gotvernments and country. >> the president signed an executive order to try to resoever for now. these families will be kept in family residential sents. can you talk about the new challenges that will exist going forward even if families are no longer separated in the weeks and months ahead. s >> the executive order turned family separation into family incarceration. the official term for the center where the families are detained is family residential facility. i've been to all of these facilities that exist in the united states and they are priso prisons. there's no ability for the individuals to leave, to move around freely.

they are secure under u.s. law. these aren't facilities that are comfortable for these families. they are essentially prisons and changes the policy of family separation into incarcerating them indefinitely is consider concerning. our organization has long documented the very cruel and unnecessary impacts of family detention on these families that are fleeing to seek protection. >> from family separation to family incarceration. i think that's an image too many americans can now imagine. we appreciate your time very much. thanks so much. >> thank you for having me. coming up right here, decision day. major win for privacy advocates at the supreme court this morning. that's next. it's right here on andrea mitchell reports. plaque psoriasis can be relentless. your plaques are always there at the worst times. constantly interrupting you

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a major ruling for the issue freed supreme court. police is not use your phone to track you without a court order. joining me now is nbc news justice correspondent pete williams. he's outside the court. pete, this appeared to be major statement about privacy in the digital age.

walk us through the significance, what the real meaning is. >> reporter: it means the police can't use your cell phone to see where you've been. when you move around your cell phone contacts to connects to a different tower. the police thousands of times a year go to the phone company and say give us peter alexander's reports. we want to know where he's been. the supreme court said you have a legitimate expectation of privacy expectation in where you've been and those cell phone records so the police can't get it without a wrasearch warrant. they can't just use your records to sort of snoop around and see where you've been. this is the second time the supreme court has said cell phones are just different. here's the background here. the supreme court for many years said when you dial a number on that phone that you used to have

at home that was connected to the wall, you have to privacy interest in the record of the numbers you've called. that's a business record. the phone company uses it to bill you and that's nothing when the police can get it without a search warrant, that doesn't violate your privacy. the supreme court said cell phones are different. they move around. give the police much more information and for that reason the police have to give a search warrant. it's the second time really. the supreme court ruled they have to have a search warrant to search through your phone and now they are saying the police have to have a search warrant to use your phone records to see where you've been. >> the police will be disappointed by my records. they would probably see my daughter's presdochool and the neighborhood park too many times to count. let me ask you about the real impact of this. what's the take away for law enforcement and prosecutors? how will it impact their ability

to track down on crime. >> more and more it's being used to track criminals. that data is incredibly useful. that data can put someone at the scene of the crime which can corroborate the testimony of eyewitnesss. very helpful. what's important is the court didn't say that you can't yuds this information. it just said you have to get a search warrant to obtain it. in the past the prosecutors in my office come pliy complied wig law to use a court order to get the information. they know going forward they need to get a search warrant. it might be difficult to get it in every case where they could get it in the past because a search warrant requires a higher standard of probable cause that this person is involved in criminal activity as opposed to the lower standard under the court order that the information is relevant and material to an investigation. there may be some cases where they are unable to use this

information going forward. i think what's important is they will have the clarify of knowing you need a search warrant in these instances and the court made the point of saying that in exgent circumstances it's not required. one other important thing the court said they really had a narrow ruling this would only be required if the data was going to be looked at for more than seven days. in the case at hand it was 127 days. i think there was enough narrowing that will enable law enforcement to continue to yuds this technique while respecting the privacy interest of the individuals involved. >> for the little guy in our audience right now, the supreme court not done yet for this session. we know we're waiting on ruling in the days ahead. what's the big one you'll be watching out for? >> trump travel ban. also a question about public sector unions. the court could deal them a huge

blow. perhaps tuesday or wednesday will be the last day for that travel ban ruling. >> the third travel ban put out by this administration. pete williams at the supreme court. thanks very much. coming up, white flag. after imploring congress to solve the immigration crisis, president trump now telling them to give up. throwing in the towel. you're watching andrea mitchell reports only on msnbc. [ screams ] rated pg-13. i'm a tin can tied to your bumper, cause.... i don't think enough people heard about your big day. but nothing says "we got married" like a 12 ounce piece of scrap metal. yo! we got married! honk if you like joint assets. now you're so busy soaking up all this attention, you don't see the car in front of you.

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back now, we turn to the political fall out from the president's zero tolerance policy to separate children in their parents at the southern board border. on thursday jeff sessions acknowledged the damage in an interview with the christian broadcasting network. >> it hasn't been good. the american people don't like the idea that we're separating families. we never really intended to do that. >> those words are significant because they directly contradict what sessions said just last month. >> if you don't want your child to be separated then don't bring them across the border illegally. it's not our fault. >> that was jeff sessions then

and joining me now is former republican national chairman michael steel. that's not him. that's jonathan capeheart. susan page. jonathan capeheart our friend for the washington post and for us at msnbc contributor. jonathan we just saw the attorney general changing his message on immigration. we heard the president say he couldn't sigh an executive order before he signed an executive order to fix this. talk to me about the mixed messaging and why this has been so problematic for this white house. >> they don't know what they are doing. we are talking about -- really, just sheer incompetence. you cannot institute a policy especially one as amoral and

going against who we are as a country and by that i mean jailing babies, without having a process in place to actually make this draconian policy work well. work efficiently. the fact that 2300 of those children who were taken from their parents, the fact a lot of them might not be reunited with their parents, the fact the administration can't tell us where those children. the fact that kristen welker had to ask several times the homeland security secretary where are the girls. where are the children? and they don't have an answer. this is not a messaging policei. it's a policy problem and it's a problem aft hearof the heart.

>> the president is again doubling down. he's been all over twitter the last couple of days. he writes republicans shouldtae immigration. democrats are just playing games. have no intention to solve this decades old problem. we can solve this problem after a red wave. >> that's not happening. >> you're the former chair. this president in spite of this awful last week for this white house believes this is an issue that will turn on his voters not turn americans off. >> it does turn on his voters. >> is that enough for the red wave in. >> it's not. you have to look at the numbers for 2016. he got an unprecedented number of white suburban women, educated women who supported the president. the question you got to ask yourself political is with this policy, take out everything

else, but just with this policy, are those voters still with the president. clearly the action the president is taken indicates they are not which is why he took the action he did. this is twitter bravado to go out and claim a victory where this is none and stoke that crowd that he needs to turn out, that 30 something, 40 something percent. it will not be enough to survive what will come in november. >> usa today finished up a poll on this. the lesson from 2016 for democrats is you can't get too comfortable. the fear now is this a lot closer if you look at the generic ballot that it was a matter of months ago. >> this is one of the reasons the republicans are so alarmed by this immigration debate. things were looking a little less bad for the republican party. in the poll at the end of february there was a 15-point edge for democrat os on that

ballot. this poll was taken as the story was beginning to unfold. this might upset some of the gains the republicans have been seeing because the economy is good, unemployment is low. the north korean summit, a lot of people thought were cautiously optimistic. the only thing we're talking about now is this immigration. >> overwhelmingly you learned they wanted to elect a congress that would stand up to a president trump rather than support him. jonathan let me bring you back in about first lady's trip. it was overshadowed in ways by what people have referred to as jacket gate here. this cargo jacket with the words on the back that said i really don't care. do you. this, i should tell you, based on conversations with people that know the first lady, she doesn't do things by accident. they say there was no message here. what message what has she trying to send? >> i really don't care. do you. that is the message being sent. i'm glad you raised this point.

the fact that first lady doesn't do anything by accident. let's remember the first lady is a former model. she was in the world of fashion. all they care about is clothes and how they look and how they look in them and the messages they are sending through the clothes they are wearing. let's also not forget that melania trump when still private citizen trump showed up at a debate after the access hollywood tape came out in the infamous grab them by the blank was a all over the country. what does she show up at the debate wearing, a pussy bow blouse made by gucci. she's been effective trolling us, meaning the american people and the media. the idea she would wear a trench coat with i really don't care, do can you in texas where it is hot. >> 95 and humid. >> in washington where it's also hot in the 80s and humid and

wear it into her awaiting suv. wear it walking across the colonade in the white house. clearly she is sending a message. it's one that i think was very dissonant. you don't go visit jailed children wearing a coat like that. >> jonathan capeheart. michael, you were many charge of messaging at the rnc. at the end of the day, to some people this does matter and does deliver a message. >> it does matter. i think jonathan put his finger on it. the deliberateness of it. the white house is saying this was a message to the media. they very well may be. unfortunately, the context in which you are wearing that matters. you're wearing that going to see kids at a time where those kids are being imprisoned by your husband's government and your husband is really indicated through his attorney general and others that they don't care.

>> the bottom line is it's what people are talking about and not the trip. >> that distracting from the whole thing. >> thank you very much. w we appreciate it. torn apart. the story of a father sent back to el salvador without his daughter. richard will join us next right here on andrea mitchell reports. you're headed down the highway when the guy in front slams on his brakes out of nowhere. you do too, but not in time. hey, no big deal. you've got a good record and liberty mutual won't hold a grudge by raising your rates over one mistake. you hear that, karen? liberty mutual doesn't hold grudges. how mature of them. for drivers with accident forgiveness, liberty mutual won't raise their rates because of their first accident. liberty stands with you. liberty mutual insurance. my mom washes the dishes... ...before she puts them in the dishwasher. so what does the dishwasher do? new cascade platinum lets your dishwasher be the dish washer.

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. we're back now. more chaos, more confusion over how or when parents will be reunited with their children. so far the trump administration has offered conflicting messages. no clear solutions. nbc news chief foreign correspondent richard engle spoke with a father who has been separated from his daughter for almost a month. walk us through what we know about when this family may finally be reunited. >> reporter: let me set the stage for you a bit. we are in san salvador. we're in front of a processing center and waiting for another plane load of migrants who entered the united states illegally. detained by u.s. authorities and been deported back to their home country back to el salvador. we have been following the story of one man who arrived here and arrived without his daughter. he crossed into the united states with his 6-year-old daughter.

once they arooirived in texas t were arrested by u.s. border control agents. they were told they had to get on two separate buses. they said according to his account there wasn't enough room for them to go on to the same bus. he didn't have a problem with that. he didn't have a lot of choice many the matter. they got onto separate buses. when they arrived in mcallen, he looked around for his daughter and she was nowhere to be seen. the border patrol agents when they saw he was becoming quite agitated asking where she was, they said that's not our problem. nobody asked you to come to this country illegally. nobody told you to bring your daughter. good luck. it's not our problem. he hadn't seen her. he didn't see her for the next several weeks while detained in the united states. now he had returned to el salvador and still waiting to find out when he will be reunited with his daughter who

is still detained, as far as he knows, back in mcallen, texas. >> his story isn't the only one of his kind. thank you very much. i want to move where president trump keeps attacking mexico. blaming america's neighbor for failing to keep migrants from crossing into the united states. >> mexico, by the way, is doing nothing for us. nothing. they have the strongest immigration laws. they can do whatever they want. they can keep people out of mexico. they have a 2,000 mile journey up mexico. they walk through mexico like walking through central park. it's ridiculous. >> joining me now is former senior advisor to jeb bush and former chairman of the republican party of florida.

i don't know you arrived in the country as a child refugee. you lived this experience. is president trump right when he compares this experience as walk through central park, the mission to arrive in the united states? >> this is very emotion mall questi -- emotional question for me. i arrived with many others who were fleeing for their life. their parents may have been shot and killed. others had parents in prison. these children were in united states. what tears inside my heart every single day is thousands of people, young men, women, older people, children who perish in the gulf straits eaten by sharks drowning trying to get to america. imagine their despair here. you have these families with 4-year-olds, 3-year-olds, 6-year-olds traveling for a month in order to get to the border and these people are assaulted by thugs, by gangs.

some of the women are raped. it's a horrible journey. the journey that only people who believe that the worse case scenario staying home or getting your daughter raped. those are the journeys people are taking. i believe in law and order and believe people ought to have asylum hearings and say why they are fleeing. why it's important to them. why they need to save their children's life but to separate these families and make no mistake about it. this is a pre-calculated move by this administration. they changed the asylum requirements. they are moved the children from the office of refugee resettlement to i.c.e. which is a law enforcement agency. they are separated their kids from parents. this is horrific. all this president does is criticize these people. criticize hispanics, mexicans,

create a horrible mood out there without one iota of empathy or caring of what's going on for these people. >> we heard the president detail this dilemma saying it's a dilemma between heart or strength. he said perhaps i side with strength. janet i want to ask you about our colleague at msnbc. he had a remarkable conversation. he spoke with a mom who fled in november. once they got to the u.s.-mexico border. her husband and 14-month-old son went to immigration authorities. they asked for asylum. they were detained. i.c.e. separated them. it took 85 days before they were finally reunited. her husband still being held many the the u.s. here is part of that powerful interview. >> after being separated for him so long, do you hold him closer now?

>> you don't have to speak spanish to understand the emotion in that woman's voice. 85 days she was separated from her son before they recorrected. the son probably can't communicate these thoughts right now. talk about the lifelong effect. >> the depth of the trauma from this kind of separation is really hard to even calculate in terms that we could relate to. it's so damaging and harmful. these young children, babies are going to have a lifetime to have to overcome this and the point that that mother made, the point we saw with mabeline and her

father in the earlier story is it's so unnecessary. we didn't have to go down this path. the american people have really demonstrated out rage and understand that separating families should never be a part of who we are. >> the president says if we don't have laws, we don't have borders, we don't have a country. you can't just let everybody and their mother come in. >> if we need partners and allies and look at where these countries, where these people are coming from, most of them are not coming from mexico but mexico plays an important role. what is the president do? he attacks mexico for every single, every policy has been one of hostility directed at mexico. we need allies and partners to help us figure this situation out. of course, we have borders that have to be respected but what

are we doing on the bdiplomatic side to engage the countries from central america. seek ling asylum here. question have oo process that has humanity but maintain some order. right now we have incompetency and cruel and inhuman policies. >> how do we resolve this? you have to resolve it in those countries. at some point people will flee a burning building no matter what. >> exactly. this administration has been silent on that. i think the house should renew the discharge petition that was set aside taking the word of people and leadership about eventually getting that to the floor and passing it. we'll see what happens next week. that immigration bill should give all americans a sense that

we value security but look there's got to be safe zones in the northern triangle and central america. we've got to have a u.n., the oas, allies participate with us. it's complex. it's better to have safe zones where the united states contributes some. the others do as well where people who are fleeing can go to rather than travel 30 days with their families to be border in order to seek safety. there's things that can be done if you care for people. >> we have to make sure the families are being reunited. right now it's not clear that's happening. we need to make sure the families are being reunited. these children are -- it's incomprehensible that they are still separated from their parents opinion everything has to be focused on reuniting these kids. >> thank you very much. i thank both of you very much. coming up right here, family ties. how the president's wife and

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the political battle over the border crisis puts a new spotlight on the president's inner circle and the pivotal role of his own family members. among them, his daughter and senior adviser ivanka trump. joining me now, emily jane fox, seen bar reporter "vanity fair" and author of "born trump: inside america's first family." jonathan lamere, white house reporter for the associated press, friend of the show and msnbc political analyst. i want you to pull back the curtain. so much attention on a private consultations the president may have with his wife, the first lady what he may hear from his daughter. what strikes you most about the way these folks interact in rooms we don't see? >> i think what is most striking to me, particularly in these moments and there have been a number of these moments, how these private conversations often become public knowledge. i don't think that that is an accident. i think that is certainly by design. from everything i know from

reporting from the book, ivanka is a mastermind a trait she shares in common with her father. something she has pent yespent perfecting, served her and her brand well but puts her in good graces with her father. something very important to her. over the last year and a half since in her role in the white house, we have heard examples like we heard this week time and time again on more controversial things where she is seen as counseling her father behind the scenes. now, i'm sure it is true she said to him behind the scenes, look, this is a terrible thing. these horrible things that are going on, but the silence publicly from someone whose official role in the white house is to advocate for women and children is deafening. i don't know how you are an effective advocate if you're not willing to speak up. >> let me ask jonathan about this. you wrote about the silence. where is ivanka trump?

where was she? >> right. it is, as emily said. a washed-in cliche. a decision is made in the white house and afterwards we hear from anonymous white house officials or friends of ivanka trump or her husband jared kushner how they tried to influence the president. she did. we know from reporting she spoke to her father. she did talk to some lawmakers but sort of abandoned any ability to be the public face of this, to sort of step into the role where she said she wants to be a force for good in this would you, particularly in issues for women and children and she didn't. it took days of heartbreaking imagery on television. those pictures were far more driving the president to sign that executive order a few days ago than anything ivanka trump said. >> emily, how influential is melania trump right now? yesterday the first lady's communications director stephanie grisham made it clear she want add realistic view. her decision. told the president, i'm headed

to texas. how big a role does she play behind the scenes now and how frequent, i guess, is her integration on policy and topics like this with her husband, with the president? >> it's hard to say. a number of people have the president's ear. at any given moment he makes a decision based on what he wants to do. end of the day, how often melania talks to him about things, how forceful she is about things, how forceful ivanka is behind the scenes, none of it really matters. the president will do what he wants to do, but i thought it was very interesting yesterday the first lady's spokeswoman was careful to say, in the statement put out, something the first lady wanted to do on her oun without the permission of her husband. definitely a signal there was an intentional gulf between them being made. >> emily jane fox, thank you, and both of you, for your time.

and coming up, ben rhodes joins ow friend david gura with his take on the border crisis. that's next. you're watching "andrea mitchell reports." it's only on msnbc. to stay successful in business you've got to navigate a lot of moving parts. on "your business" we have your back with expert advice on topics from getting funding to creating eye-catching marketing. each week we focus on ideas for growing your business, bringing all the moving parts together. join us or connect with us anytime on all of your devices. >> announcer: sponsored by the powerful backing of american express. don't do business without it. an. an. and american express has your back every step of the way- whether it's the comfort of knowing help is just a call away with global assist. or getting financing to fund your business. no one has your back like american express. so where ever you go.

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that will do it for this edition of "andrea mitchell reports." remember to follow the show online and facebook. do it on twitt twitter @mitchellreports. follow me at peteralexander. my friend david gura up next.

handing over the reins on msnbc. how are you? >> good. have a good afternoon. good afternoon. from msnbc headquarters in new york, 500 million children reunited with parents. what about the other 1,800? the process is difficult to manage. plus, red tide. moderate republicans are scrapping together every vote they can to pass an immigration bill, and the president just lob add bomb into that process. you've heard of the blue wave. he's telling them to wait for the red wave in the midterms. and major overhaul. the white house wants to take the departments of education and the department of labor and make them one. so what would that mean for our kids' education and for the workforce? new uncertainty and confusion among migrant families separated at the u.s./mexico border. many parents don't know where their children are and when, or