It . This is Donald Trumps doing. What we are seeing is what he wanted people to see. When a desperate people in the other side of the border to see, wanted americans to see and democrats to see so they would build his wall. But is this a step too far . Donald trump said he can shoot someone on fifth avenue and get away with it. Is separating kids from their parents what he had in mind . Is this proof of what he can get away with . Or is it beyond even what his people will swallow . Good evening, im chris plaj mas in washington. President trump and his administration came under intense criticism for the socalled zero tolerance immigration policy. Resulting in forced family separations. Much of the mounting public outcry was sparkeded by images like these. Of small children looking on as u. S. Border patrol officers detained their parents. Then there are the newly released recordings sobbing children at a detention facility. Nbc news has not obtained the audio from a civil rights attorney who he said he received it from client. Lets listen. Nbc has not been able to independently authenticate that recording. The administration would continue to prosecute all criminals. Dhs is no longer ignoring the law. Were enforcing the laws as they exist on the books. As long as illegal entry replains kranl offense, dhs will not look the other way. Despite the mounting pressure, the president is also pushed back against criticism. Immigration is the fault and all of the problems that were having because we cannot get them to sign legislation. We cannot get them even to the negotiating table. I say its very strongly the democrats fault. The United States will not be a migrant camp and it will not be a refugee holding facility. It wont be. Seeking to deflect the president laid blame at the feet of democrats. Those comments contradict statements by his own attorney general. And cleave hief of staff who he champion this policy. I have put in place a zero tolerance policy for illegal entry on our southwest border. If youre smuggling a child, then we will prosecute you. And that child may be separated from you as required by law. A big name of the game is deterence. If its a family separation stands as a tough deterrent . Could be a tough deterrent. A much faster turn around on asylum seekers. Even though they say that is cruel and heartless. I think cruel and heartless, i wouldnt put it quite that way. The children will be taken care. Theyre put into foster care or whatever. But the pig boibig point is th t elected to come to the United States. There is a technique that no one hopes will be used extensively or very long. Zero tolerance which the administration rolled out back in may is the brain child of Senior Policy Adviser steefphen miller. Rolling out the policy was a simple decision by the administration. Washington post is also reporting to the president saying political advantage in all of this. According to the white house officials, the president s calculated he will gain political leverage and congressional negotiations by continuing to enforce a policy he claims to hate. Joining me right now is nbc News White House correspondent kristen welker, peter baker from the New York Times, Jennifer Ruben from the Washington Post and jacob subrov is outside of one of the largest Immigration Processing Centers in mcallen, texas. I want to start with kristen. Kristen, it seems like they said in the cowboys movies, this president is speaking with a forked tongue. One is this is our policy of zero tolerance. We believe in it. We have to separate. We have to put the parents on trial. The other statement coming out from the secretary of Homeland Security was, oh, yeah. By the way, if you want to change this, go ahead. We would like you to do that. We want to change the policy. We believe it. That makes no sense to a person listening. I think thats why this is such a growing crisis for this administration. You heard those two different messages on display in the briefing that was given by dhs secretary neilsen and then Sarah Sanders who really stressed the president hates this policy. Wants to see it changed. Is bothered by it. Secretary neilsen really dug in on the fact that this is a crisis created by past administrations. Is it a policy that this president is responsible for or not . I tried to press neilsen on that point and said the bottom line is this started when the attorney general announced that zero tolerance policy. If the president hates it, why doesnt he pick up the phone and change it . She, of course, punted. She put the blame on congress. Its becoming very difficult for them to explain this and to be on the same page. It looks to me, you know, covering politics all these years and looking at her, she did a very good job today of defending what cant be defending. Basically, they want to change the policy but theyre proud of it. Is she in detention . Is she on the line for her job . I think this is a critical test for her. We know that she was essentially picked by chief of staff john kelly, ultimately President Trump got onboard with this. But there have been some tensio tensions behind the scenes, some differences of approach. The president said descent feel as though she is securing the border enough. I think this is a critical test. That briefing whats a critical test for her. Will she be able to keep this up . Thats a big question. He undoubtedly was watching that briefing today. She faced a lot of tough questions, chris. Last question to you. This is the one i want your answer. Youre on television. You broadcast. You get the message across. I try to do the same thing. The president is very good at creating reality tv. He creates a world through television. This is a Television Show that nobody wants to watch. No american wants to watch kids and hear them crying. Kids crying when they cry at church is fine. But these kids are crying because of policy, because their parents have been taken away from them. Thats why theyre crying. How can the president defend what he knows is a lousy reality show . I think hes struggling to do it, chris. You saw that when he surprised us and came out on the north lawn on friday. And we peppered him with questions about this. The humanity of it. He got very upset. And he pointed the finger at democrats. Thats his tactic right now. To point the finger at democrats. Its a tough argument to make though because, of course, there is his own zero poll rance policy. I do think that we have seen President Trump dig in whether it comes to having a fight. He rarely backs away from a tough fight, chris. Were watching that unfold right now even though as you rightfully point oiut, these images is not what the president or the first lady wants to be watching. I think the question is will he add any point back away from this fight . Just tonight, ted cruz is introducing emergency legislation. So the pressure is mounting on this president to do something. He knows he does have the power to do it. The question is will he . Kristen, great watching you there. I love the back and forth. I think you hit them right on the rhead with the policy. A policy they claim they invented but they claim the democrats for not getting rid of it. This is crazy talk. Let me go to jacob at the reality that exists down there, not just the tv show. Jacob, tell us what you see down there, what we should know. Well, let me just also sing kristens praises. She asked the question we still dont have an answer to. Where are the toddlers . Where are the girls . Weve been given access to two 100 facilities run by health and Human Services where the separated Child Migrants are being held. Ive been in one of them. Nbcs got in another. We havent seen any girls or toddlers. What we do know and what i would like to know, what the president would react if he got to see what i saw in that facility is that 1100 young kids have been separated from their family right here in the Rio Grande ValleyBorder Patrol sector and in this building right here, the mcallen processing center, there were 1200 people last night. Whether you walk in there and there is talk of cages or not, what do you want to call them . There are cages. They look like dog kennels. Theyre not just adults or Families Together. Theyre Young Children sitting in there and increasing number of Young Children sitting in those cages because they were separated from their parents. And more are being separated every single day. It makes you sick to look at. I would like to know what the president would think if he was actu actually inside there . The secretary of home land security has been down here and inside the detention centers. Id like to know shz hae behas here since the separation policy was put in place . Has she taulked to the Border Patrol agencies . The four social workers in there last night having to deal with increasing number of children separated from parents because of the very policy. Its not a democratic policy. Its a policy put into place by donald trump. Who put together the policy of separating boys from girls and younger kids. That is sophies choice kind of thing. Did trump call that in from the bench . Who put that policy in . Letting you see the older boys. Who told them not to let you see the girls and younger boys . Who did that . The shelters are controlled by the department of health and Human Services. The facilities are run by professional, competent childcare professionals, licensed professionals, doctors in those facilities. Licensed caregivers in those facilities. By all accounts, health and hum Human Services is doing a good job of taking care of the children wlachlt is dumped on their plate by this administration, the children coming out of this building is more kids than ever before. So there are 11,000 children currently in the care of health and Human Services. Today they said only about 1,000 of those have been separated from their parents. If you extrapolate the rate at which the kids are coming out of this facility and going into that one, it will be 20,000 by august. Why dont they want to show us yet where the girls are and where the toddlers are . What the toddlers care look like . People are concerned about the Young Children. And they want to know that theyre okay. Lets talk about the heat down there. They put the kids in tents. By the way, side question wlach. What do the pr people tell you about letting you see the boys and not the other children wlach . What is the execution for that . Thats a good question. I truly believe they want to get us in the places. They have not done it yet. They tell us well get you in as soon as we open up one of the places for a tour. There is only a couple of them and bouncing around the country from one of threes to the other. This tenlt city, i believe, will be next on the list for us. Were going to try to get into that tenlt city, tent camp is the way to call it where the overflow crowds are being held right now. But, look, if i was them, id make it a priority. The American People want to know. People are contacting me on social media every day. Where are the girls . Where are the toddlers . It is something im hearing over and over. If i was them and standing behind that desk or going around the country on the site surveys tlashgs is t , that would be the first thing i do. They now know everything thanked thanks to your reporting. Theyre splating kids for pr reasons. Let me go to peter. What do you make of the front page impact here . I get the sense this is one time where trump has cut down his coalition to a smaller number. They may be against illegal immigration. But not this cutting edge stuff. Yeah. It is striking over the weekend you saw Critical Mass begin to build of criticism that wasnt just from the left but also from the right. Obviously laura bush, the former first lady, some senators like Susan Collins and Lindsey Graham and also the New York Post editorial page. I think that was why you saw so Many Administration officials starting with the president himself out there today trying to push back, trying to defend themselves. Theyre on the defensive on immigration which is a position theyre not used to being. And theyre trying to get back on the offense. Do you think theyre going to be able to pull back on this policy that they put into effect without law . They went their direction. Will they change and give it up now that the heat is on . Thats an interesting question. Any other administration probably would have done that by today just, you know, the National Political course of things. That tape you played is obviously very powerful. The pictures that have come out of the region are very powerful. Normal political reaction would be to make the pictures and audio go away. But thats not the way this president generally reacts. He doesnt like it to be pushed. Hes using this, obviously, to Push Congress to get legislation he thinks is necessary to defend the border. But if it looks like a cynical ploy, thats one more piece of criticism from people even in his own party. Thank you, peter. Let me go to jennifer. Gods children. I open with that. They are gods children. Every religion believes that. Kids are kids we get from god. They come to us. Were responsible for looking out for them. They dont decide what country to live in. And we have to look out for them when theyre here. Yet this is trumps country. He keeps winning the pr wars. Will he win this one . I dont think so. I think speaking of religions, you have really every religious group out there, catholic bishops, reformed jews, methodists. Even franklin graham. Yeah, a big trump supporter condemning this and condemning sessions for trying to quote scripture in defense of this. I think peter and the others are exactly right. The pictures and the sound are going to naw at americans hearts. Ted cruz doesnt make compromise o on policy issues, went down to the border. He had film taken of him sitting with kids and talking to parents. Now hes scared and introducing emergency legislation. You had ben sass who likes to write a tlot of facebook posts saying this policy is wicked. Will he join a policy initiative . I think youll see some movement in congress and trump will will try to take credit for it. At this point, no one cares who gets credit for it. The republicans look awful. I think mothers especially. Yes. Absolutely. I just looked. You dont have to be a genius to see the women like laura bush and milana trump are making noise about this. This is for real. Thank you. Great reporting. Great in the action fighting to get the truth in that press room. Jacob, you do this better than anybody, that on scene reporting, the best there s peter baker, i love the front page of the New York Times because of you. Coming up, well get the politics of the president s policy of separating kids from their parents doing it sneakily as we is he had tonight. Trump and the republicans are on the hook for a policy roundly criticized as immoral separating boys from girls and older from younger so it looks good . Hes doing it. Plus, long time trump associate roger stone now remembers isnt this cute remembers have a meeting with a russian pushing dird on hillary clin. He called p himself Henry Greenberg. Like a baseball player. Told the House Intelligence Committee he had zero contacts with russians but now he remembers the meeting. Remember what i told you years ago about rolling disclosure . You remember it at the appropriate time. This is set up by another trump pal. Michael caputo is going to join us. And the hardball roundtable over what is lahappening in mexico. And someone says trump lies all the time. And the party will pay the price. Finally, let me finish with trump watch. There is hardball, where the action is. With hotels. Com to give venture cardholders 10 miles on every dollar they spend at thousands of hotels. All you have to do is pay with this. At hotels. Com venture. 10 miles per dollar . That is incredible. Brrrrr. I have the chills. Because youre so excited . Because ice is cold. 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