Fox News anchor Chris Wallace pressed White House press secretary Jen Psaki on this week’s broadcast of “Fox News Sunday” about the Biden administration’s lack of media access to border facilities at the U.S.-Mexico border.
Wallace said, “The only way we know how bad conditions are for some 5,000 minors in his Border Patrol facilities is because of these pictures that members of Congress have released on their own. Jen, these kids are living in these conditions now. They’re not living in these conditions some indeterminate time from now when the president says everything will be fixed, so why not allow reporters and camera crews in on a pool basis based domain safely to show the American people what’s happening in those border patrol facilities right now?”
Psaki said, “Chris, we are absolutely committed to that, the president is committed to that, I’m committed to that, Secretary Mayorkas is committed to that.”
Wallace interjected, “When?”
Psaki continued, “We want to provide access into the border patrol facility. We are mindful of the fact that we are in the middle of a pandemic. We want to keep these kids safe, keep the staff safe, but we are absolutely committed to transparency and providing access to media to the border patrol facilities, and we are working to get that done as soon as we can.”
Wallace said, “But just to clarify, you allowed a camera crew in to see the HHS facilities, but we are talking about here are the Border Patrol facilities, the detention cells, you know there is a law that they are not allowed to be there for more than 72 hours, many of them are there for ten days. At this point, in terms of allowing access to Border Patrol facilities for reporters, you are being less transparent than the Trump administration.”
Psaki said, “Well, first of all, Chris, the Trump administration was turning away kids at the border, sending them back on the treacherous journey, or they were ripping kids from the arms of their parents. We are not doing that. We are committed to allowing cameras into the Border Patrol facilities, absolutely.”
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