this is actually taken place on sunday gabriel it's on deforest in washington thank you well arsalan iftikhar is a human rights lawyer and senior fellow at georgetown university joins us live from washington d.c. also thank you very much for coming on the program as gabriel was saying that you know these all the actions of the past 24 hours has led to so many more questions and so much more confusion but what kind of a message that sends and does it actually act as a deterrent. as the top administration says to other possible immigrants conducting these raids or the threat of weights and arrests. well dave you know i think that donald trump thinks that the average american is not very smart you know by trying to fear and confusion and terror you know thousands of immigrant families all over the country really does nothing to address the border issue that the united states is dealing with you know at our southern border with mexico but i think what he's trying to do essentially. trying to pander to his political base i think that he is trying to put lipstick on a racist pig you know and divert

al jazeera with us from washington arsalan iftikhar who is a human rights lawyer at the burma task force nice to have you with us i think the 1st point to make is that it's good that this is being taken seriously now we. know many other media outlets have reported on the weekends for a long time and the numbers are huge but it never seems to have become a a big international issue now you get 22 countries on board. i think that this long overdue statement by 22 nations to the u.n. human rights council is a step in the right direction i think that there is still needs to be a lot more meaningful steps in terms of international pressure on china to ensure that human rights observers are given meaningful access to the region that people are removed from the camps that you know the ethnic cleansing that is going on the forced marriages and things like that there needs to be a lot more pressure and what would what's telling for me come on is the fact that out of the $22.00 nations who signed it none of them were muslim majority nations which is really quite telling because china is using thei

well arsalan iftikhar is a human rights lawyer and senior fellow at georgetown university joins us live from washington d.c. also thank you very much for coming on the program as gabriel was saying that you know these all the actions over the past 24 hours has led to so many more questions and so much more confusion but what kind of a message to send and does it actually act as a deterrent. as a top administration says to other possible immigrants conducting these raids or the threat afraid to arrests. i think donald trump thinks that the average american is not very smart you know by trying to fear and confusion and terror you know thousands of immigrant families all over the country really does nothing to address the border issue that the united states is dealing with you know at our southern border with mexico but i think what he's trying to do essentially he's trying to pander to his political base i think that he is trying to put lipstick on a racist pig you know and divert you know much needed resources from actually improving our asylum system here by beefing up asylum officers b

arsalan iftikhar is a human rights lawyer and senior fellow at georgetown university and he says the republican party is to blame for encouraging trumpet is that a phobic and racist behavior donald trump is clearly having a very racist weekend you know here he goes on a twitter tirade against for minority women of color members of congress 3 out of 4 of whom were born in the united states and told them to go back to this country to their country you know we also have to remember that this is a president who once said that he called for the total and complete shutdown of muslims entering into the united states once referred to mexicans as the replay this one started the barack obama birth or controversy and so it's really important when you see this sort of racism zina phobia massage any islamophobia coming from the commander in chief it's really important for minority communities here in the united states to act as intersectional allies to one another to ensure that he's a one term president today's republican party led by mitch mcconnell and others have essential emboldened donald t