When Trump tried to avoid Saturday’s Families Belong Together rallies at his golf resort, the protest came to him.
As tens of thousands gather in major cities across the country to protest the immigration crisis that’s separated an untold number of refugee families from their children, Donald Trump headed to his New Jersey golf resort to ride out the storm. When news broke that the president wouldn’t be watching the protests from the White House, a number of protesters took it upon themselves to head to Bedminster and bring the marches to him.
According to USA Today, more than a hundred people lined Route 206 a few miles away from Trumps club, waving signs and chanting, “Where are the children?” Weekly protests have been staged outside the club, but this is the largest turnout yet, coordinated with the nationwide “Families Belong Together” rallies. The Saturday protests saw tens of thousands of people in major cities across the country organize against zero-tolerance immigration policies that incarcerate refugees crossing the border. On June 20, Trump signed an executive order to stop the separation of families at the border while adults go through criminal processing. Six days after the order was signed, only six children had been reunited with their parents, leaving more than 2,500 still in limbo.
Thousands poured into Lafayette Square opposite the White House in Washington, D.C., chanting “We care” and “No Trump, No KKK, No Fascist USA.” Thousands more walked across the Brooklyn Bridge in New York City, while hundreds gathered in El Paso, Texas, Dallas, Los Angeles, and even more conservative areas of the country, like Appalachia and Wyoming. The rallies were funded by the American Civil Liberties Union, MoveOn.org, the National Domestic Workers Alliance and The Leadership Conference.
From New Jersey, Trump tweeted on Saturday morning that the U.S. would never do away with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. “The Democrats are making a strong push to abolish ICE, one of the smartest, toughest and most spirited law enforcement groups of men and women that I have ever seen. I have watched ICE liberate towns from the grasp of MS-13 & clean out the toughest of situations. They are great!” he tweeted, adding that “The radical left Dems want you out. Next it will be all police.”
