It is a "sad fact" that children die entering the United States every year, former acting ICE Director Tom Homan said Wednesday, and that's why he pushes for Congress to close loopholes that entice people to come to the United States under false pretenses.
Further, Homan, now a Fox News contributor, told "Outnumbered Overtime" that parents who send their unaccompanied children into the United States should be shamed.
"They do not qualify for asylum, so let's push in the measure so that they stop paying criminal organizations to smuggle them," Homan, said, while commenting on the news that an 8-year-old Guatemalan boy had died on Christmas Day while in custody after coming into the United States.
Homan said he can't answer if the death could have been prevented, but added that many people, adults and children, die after making the long, dangerous journey to the United States.
"They are coming from third-world countries, and when they make the dangerous journey, they are not in good shape and some of them die," said Homan.
Meanwhile, there are many children who are coming to the United States on their own, after their parents "chose to hire a criminal organization to put their kid in a trunk of a car and have their child smuggled into the United States by themselves," said Homan.
And when that happens, "shame on the parents" for putting their children in harm's way, he said.
"It is horrible, but to do so knowing that they are going to then end up on the other side and who will be there to take care of them? Taxpayers?" Homan added.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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