Melania Trump Speaks Out Against Child Separations

The outcry over children being separated from their parents at the Mexican border may have caused a rift in another family: the Trumps. Melania Trump "hates to see children separated from their families," the first lady's office said Sunday in what the Guardian describes as "a rare statement at odds with her husband's policy." The first lady did, however, also say that she "hopes both sides of the aisle can finally come together," which is in line with Trump's claims that a law created by Democrats is responsible for the family separations, not the "zero tolerance" policy his administration introduced this spring, the New York Times reports. Melania "believes we need to be a country that follows all laws, but also a country that governs with a heart," her office said.

The first lady was far from the only Republican—or Republican first lady—to speak out against the policy Sunday. In an op-ed at the Washington Post, Laura Bush denounced the policy as "cruel" and "immoral." Images of children being "warehoused" in converted stores "are eerily reminiscent of the Japanese American internment camps of World War II, now considered to have been one of the most shameful episodes in US history," she wrote, blaming the separations on the administration's "zero tolerance policy for their parents, who are accused of illegally crossing our borders." Leading Democrats also denounced the policy Sunday, including Bill Clinton, who tweeted that on Father's Day, he was "thinking of the thousands of children separated from their parents at the border. These children should not be a negotiating tool." (Kellyanne Conway says that as a mother and a Catholic, she doesn't like the policy.)