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President Trump: ‘I want the press to go in and see’ migrant detention centers

President Donald Trump said Sunday he wants members of the press to “go in and see” migrant detention centers. Asked if he would visit the US Custom...
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President Donald Trump said Sunday he wants members of the press to “go in and see” migrant detention centers.

Asked if he would visit the US Customs and Border Protection facility in Clint, Texas, that the New York Times and El Paso Times recently reported on, Trump told reporters, “What we’re going to do is I’m going to start showing some of these detention centers … to the press.”

“I want the press to go in and see them,” Trump said, adding, “We’re going to send people in. We’re going to have some of the press go in.”

The President’s comments come days after Democratic members of Congress toured two Texas border facilities, including one in Clint, and expressed outrage over the growing humanitarian crisis on the southern border.

“They’re crowded,” the President said, “and we’re the ones who were complaining about they’re crowded.”

“They’re crowded because people come up, but now thanks to Mexico it’s slowing down greatly,” he said. “But it is crowded, but we want to have the press go in and see,” Trump said, decrying the Times as “fake news.”

Last month, CNN and other outlets were allowed in the facility in Clint where at the time more than 100 migrant children were being held. In May, CNN reported on the sleeping conditions of children inside a McAllen, Texas, Border Patrol station.

A team of doctors, lawyers and advocates last month warned of what they say are major health and hygiene problems at several CBP facilities in Texas.

New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who was one of the lawmakers to tour the Clint facility and has been outspoken about the issue, posted on Twitter, “People (are) drinking out of toilets, officers laughing in front of members Congress.”

“I brought it up to their superiors,” the freshman Democrat wrote. “They said ‘officers are under stress & act out sometimes.’ No accountability.”

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