Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday called the Trump administration's "zero tolerance" policy that has separated children from their parents at the southern U.S. border "a moral and humanitarian crisis."
Hillary Clinton delivers the keynote address at the 8th Annual Elly Award luncheon, after being one three women receiving this year's award on Monday, June 18, 2018, in New York. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews)
Speaking at an awards lunch for the Women's Forum of New York, Clinton said what was happening to families at the U.S.-Mexico border is "horrific."
"Every human being with a sense of compassion and decency should be outraged," Clinton said.
The separations stem from a policy that turns all cases of people trying to enter the country illegally over for criminal prosecution. Children are not detained with their parents when those parents are facing a criminal charge, as per U.S. protocol.
President Donald Trump has defended the policy, which has taken nearly 2,000 immigrant children away from their parents.
"The United States will not be a migrant camp and it will not be a refugee holding facility," he added. "Not on my watch," Trump said Monday.
Clinton, the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee, said she had warned during the campaign that Trump's hard-line immigration stance would result in family separations.
"Now as we watch with broken hearts, that's exactly what's happening," she said.
The policy has come under increasingly strong criticism, with accounts of children kept in cages and parents not knowing where their children are.
Trump has falsely blamed Democrats, and his administration has echoed his stance by claiming it was enforcing the law, with some using the Bible as religious justification.
Clinton pushed back on all of those points, saying the separations are required by no law and grounded in no religion.
"The test of any nation is how we treat the most vulnerable among us," she said. "We are a better country than one that tears families apart."
PHOENIX (AP) — An Arizona judge declared a mistrial Monday in the case of a rancher accused of fatally shooting a Mexican man on his property near the U.S.-Mexico border.
The decision came after jurors failed to reach a unanimous decision after more than two full days of deliberation in trial of George Alan Kelly, 75, who was charged with second-degree murder in the Jan. 30, 2023, shooting of Gabriel Cuen-Buitimea.
“Based upon the jury's inability to reach a verdict on any count,” Judge Thomas Fink said, “This case is in mistrial.”
The Santa Cruz County Attorney’s Office can still decide whether to retry Kelly for any charge, or drop the case all together.
A status hearing was scheduled for next Monday afternoon, when prosecutors could inform the judge if they plan to refile the case. Prosecutors did not immediately respond to emailed requests for additional comment.
Kelly was charged with second-degree murder in killing of Cuen-Buitimea, 48, who lived just south of the border in Nogales, Mexico.
Prosecutors said Kelly recklessly fired nine shots from an AK-47 rifle toward a group of men, including Cuen-Buitimea, about 100 yards (90 meters) away on his cattle ranch. Kelly has said he fired warning shots in the air, but he didn’t shoot directly at anyone.
Court officials took jurors to Kelly’s ranch as well as a section of the border. Superior Court Judge Thomas Fink denied news media requests to tag along.
After Monday's ruling, Consul General Marcos Moreno Baez of the Mexican consulate in Nogales, Arizona, said he would wait with Cuen-Buitimea’s two adult daughters on Monday evening to meet with prosecutors from Santa Cruz County Attorney’s Office to learn about the implications of a mistrial.
“Mexico will continue to follow the case and continue to accompany the family, which wants justice." said Moreno. "We hope for a very fair outcome.”
Kelly's defense attorney Brenna Larkin did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment after the ruling was issued. Larkin had asked Fink to have jurors keep deliberating another day.
Kelly had earlier rejected an agreement with prosecutors that would have reduced the charge to one count of negligent homicide if he pleaded guilty.
Kelly was also charged with aggravated assault that day against another person in the group of about eight people, including a man from Honduras who was living in Mexico and who testified during the trial that he had gone into the U.S. that day seeking work.
The other migrants weren’t injured and they all made it back to Mexico.
Cuen-Buitimea lived just south of the border in Nogales, Mexico. He had previously entered the U.S. illegally several times and was deported, most recently in 2016, court records show.
The nearly monthlong trial coincided with a presidential election year that has drawn widespread interest in border security.
Fink had told jurors that if they could not reach a verdict on the second-degree murder charge, they could try for a unanimous decision on a lesser charge of reckless manslaughter or negligent homicide. A second-degree murder conviction would have brought a minimum prison sentence of 10 years.
The jury got the case Thursday afternoon, deliberated briefly that day and then all of Friday and Monday.
FILE - George Alan Kelly enters court for his preliminary hearing in Nogales Justice Court in Nogales, Ariz., Feb. 22, 2023. An Arizona judge declared a mistrial Monday, April 22, 2024, in the case of Kelly, accused of fatally shooting a Mexican man on his property near the U.S.-Mexico border. (Mark Henle/The Arizona Republic via AP, Pool, File)
County Attorney Michael Jette addresses jurors during closing arguments in Santa Cruz County Superior Court, Thursday, April 18, 2024 in Nogales, Ariz. Rancher George Alan Kelly accused of second-degree murder in the January 2023 death of 48-year-old Gabriel Cuen-Buitimea, who lived south of the border in Nogales, Mexico. (Angela Gervasi/Nogales International, via AP, Pool)
George Alan Kelly listens to closing arguments in Santa Cruz County Superior Court, Thursday, April 18, 2024 in Nogales, Ariz. Kelly was charged with second-degree murder in the January 2023 death of 48-year-old Gabriel Cuen-Buitimea, who lived south of the border in Nogales, Mexico. (Angela Gervasi/Nogales International, via AP, Pool)
Arizona judge declares mistrial in the case of a rancher accused of fatally shooting a migrant
FILE - George Alan Kelly exits the Santa Cruz County Courthouse with defense attorney Kathy Lowthorp after the first day of his trial in Santa Cruz County Superior Court Friday, March 22, 2024 in Nogales, Ariz. Jurors in the case of the Arizona rancher Kelly charged with fatally shooting a migrant on his property visited the scene of the killing as the third week of the trial wrapped up. The jurors on Thursday, April 11, 2024, viewed various locations at Kelly's ranch, as well as a section of the U.S.-Mexico border. (Angela Gervasi/Nogales International, via AP, File)
Arizona judge declares mistrial in the case of a rancher accused of fatally shooting a migrant
