For many families, the trauma of former President Donald Trump’s family separation policy is something that will take time to heal. But freshman congresswoman Anna Paulina Luna, from Florida and Mexican-American, isn’t against the policy that overwhelmingly impacted her own community. In fact, Rep. Luna even admitted she wants the policy to return.
Luna made the claim during a House hearing on immigration, defending former President Trump’s policy of family separation of migrant families. She went as far as to question whether any real trauma took place, and referred to parents affected by this policy as “quote unquote parents.”
The suggestion that these children were being trafficked was met with laughter by Cato Institute Associate Director of Immigration Studies David J. Bier, a witness in the hearing. Luna confronted the witness and during a back and forth that had Bier trying to explain this wasn’t the case, Luna reaffirmed “the reason why we want family separation until we can confirm if they are their actual biological parents…”
Bier seemed shocked that Luna actually wanted the policy to return.
Trump’s family separation policy saw at least 2,000 children separated from their families at the southern border and placed in the custody of Health and Human Services (HHS). Years later, many families have still not been able to locate their children and those who have been located suffer deep trauma from the forced separation.
Bier suggested Representative Luna should read a 2021 report from the Office of the Inspector General that confirms former Attorney General Jeff Sessions knew migrant families would be separated by the “zero tolerance” policy and still proceeded to push for it.
Representative Luna later went on X, formerly known as Twitter, to defend her call for family separation. She offered no apologies and said that “human trafficking” was at the center of her want to separate families and that “biological confirmation saves lives.”