HOMESTEAD, Florida — Former Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-TX) told demonstrators and the assembled media outside the Homestead Temporary Shelter for Unaccompanied Children that migrant children from Central America “had no choice but to come here” because climate change had ravaged their countries.
O’Rourke said that rising temperatures had created droughts, which made it more difficult for people to grow their own food. That, he said, forced them to undertake the arduous journey on foot to the U.S. border, and to cross illegally.
O’Rourke was the fourth presidential candidate to visit the protest outside the facility, where thousands of teenagers, most of whom arrived unaccompanied, are temporarily housed until they can be handed over to a sponsor in the U.S.
Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) was the first the protests: he was followed on Wednesday by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), and then several other candidates decided to visit as well, turning the protests into something of a presidential pilgrimate. O’Rourke was preceded an hour before by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT).
O’Rourke, who was greeted and briefed by local activists, turned his visit into a rally, spending roughly half an hour atop a ladder overlooking the fence around the facility.
Americans keep moving to Texas and Florida — but one other red state is growing even faster
China orders firms to ignore US Iran sanctions, daring US to enforce crackdown
Mamdani Berates Billionaire Outside His Residence Near UnitedHealthcare CEO Assassination Site
Minnesota off-loads fraud cases onto federal investigators due to overwhelming backlog
Oregon burglary suspect nabbed after crashing SUV during police chase: video
Rudy Giuliani out of ICU, continuing to recover in hospital: ‘He’s winning this fight’
DHS urges Wisconsin ‘sanctuary’ county to keep illegal immigrant accused in elderly sexual assaults jailed
Judge denies Fulton County bid to retrieve 2020 ballots seized by FBI
Backlash erupts over viral video of CAIR leader as Newsom funding draws scrutiny
Kentucky man enters insanity plea after admitting to beating his grandmother to death in recorded attack
California immigration judge sues DOJ, alleging she was fired for being a registered Democrat, a woman over 40
Trump’s Psychedelic Push May Open a Door Christians Should Question
Schumer’s ‘No. 1 target’ says voters will see her Democrat Senate challenger as too extreme
Leftist Influencer’s Mangione Celebration Resurfaces After He Opposes Death Penalty for Child Murderer
Justice Neil Gorsuch breaks silence on violent threats against judiciary, Supreme Court leaks
Unlike other candidates, he was not content to peer over the fence, but delivered an impromptu speech.
“He who denies the stranger or the outcast, he also denies America,” O’Rourke said, citing Robert Kennedy.
“Instead of reuniting them [the teenagers] with their families, we are incarcerating them in tents in a for-profit facility with no oversight,” he added. He demanded that the Homestead facility, and every other like it, be shut down.
In Spanish, he declared: “We must reunite every boy and girl here with their family.”
He also urged the small crowd to wave to the teenagers inside the facility, barely visible in the distance, wearing bright orange caps.
Americans keep moving to Texas and Florida — but one other red state is growing even faster
China orders firms to ignore US Iran sanctions, daring US to enforce crackdown
Mamdani Berates Billionaire Outside His Residence Near UnitedHealthcare CEO Assassination Site
Minnesota off-loads fraud cases onto federal investigators due to overwhelming backlog
Oregon burglary suspect nabbed after crashing SUV during police chase: video
Rudy Giuliani out of ICU, continuing to recover in hospital: ‘He’s winning this fight’
DHS urges Wisconsin ‘sanctuary’ county to keep illegal immigrant accused in elderly sexual assaults jailed
Judge denies Fulton County bid to retrieve 2020 ballots seized by FBI
Backlash erupts over viral video of CAIR leader as Newsom funding draws scrutiny
Kentucky man enters insanity plea after admitting to beating his grandmother to death in recorded attack
California immigration judge sues DOJ, alleging she was fired for being a registered Democrat, a woman over 40
Trump’s Psychedelic Push May Open a Door Christians Should Question
Schumer’s ‘No. 1 target’ says voters will see her Democrat Senate challenger as too extreme
Leftist Influencer’s Mangione Celebration Resurfaces After He Opposes Death Penalty for Child Murderer
Justice Neil Gorsuch breaks silence on violent threats against judiciary, Supreme Court leaks
O’Rourke added: “Donald Trump has done this; its up to change who is in the White House going forward.” However, the facility was first opened under the Obama administration, and briefly closed before re-opening in March 2018.
Gayle Bouley, of Miami, arrived with her family to join the protest, carrying a sign with a yellow Star of David and the words, “Never again is now.”
Asked by Breitbart News if she supported comparisons between the migrant facilities and concentration camps, she said she did.
“I don’t know how look at how you look at it any other way,” she said, stressing that she was both a veteran and a Jew.
Story cited here.
