Sheila Jackson Lee: “I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. I want to join both Congresswoman Jayapal and Congresswoman Lee on just…”

“I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. I want to join both Congresswoman Jayapal and Congresswoman Lee on just reinforcing the devastation and the dastardliness of child separation from their parents. I would just like to very briefly say that this sad commemoration should equate to a commitment of zero tolerance for separating children from their families. We should end the migrant policy that includes child separation, the position of remaining in Mexico as you seek asylum, the losing of your space, or your bed, if you are in a shelter and have to be sent back to Mexico when you actually apply for asylum. All of these migrant policies, which included child separation, clearly can devastate the families. So I want to emphasize just one point that included my many trips to the border, including the time we had the opportunity to travel together, and I want to focus on the psychological and maybe irreparable damage that is being done particularly to children in the understandable period. That is not a technical term. I am not a sociologist or a psychologist, but in that period where the child may be somewhere between 4 and 15, or 4 and 12. Those are really years when, whether it is a boy or girl, they are bonding with mom. People must realize that those children traveled thousands of miles or 1,000- plus miles with that parent and mostly that mother, and it has been a dad.…”