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Last summer I got a call
from a woman named Ellie,

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and she had heard about
the family separations

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at the southern border, and wanted
to know what she could do to help.

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She told me this story

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of her grandfather and his father.

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When they were kids in Poland,

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their father,

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fearing for his son's safety,

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gave them a little bit of money
and told them to walk west,

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to just keep walking west across Europe,

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and they did.

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They walked all the way
west across Europe,

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and they got on a boat
and they got to America.

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Ellie said that when she heard
the stories of the teens

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walking up across Mexico,

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all she could think about
was her grandfather and his brother.

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She said that for her, the stories
were exactly the same.

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Those brothers were
the Hassenfeld Brothers,

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the Hasbros.

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The Hasbro toy company,
which of course brought us

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Mr. Potato Head.

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But that is not actually why
I'm telling you this story.

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I'm telling you this story
because it made me think

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about whether I would have the faith,

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the courage, to send my teens,

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and I have three of them,

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on a journey like that.

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Knowing that they wouldn't
be safe where we were,

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would I be able to watch them go?

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I started my career decades ago

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at the southern US border working
with Central American asylum seekers,

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and in the last 16 years,

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I've been at HIAS,

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the Jewish organization that fights
for refugee rights around the world,

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as a lawyer and an advocate,

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and one thing I've learned
is that sometimes

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the things that we're told make us
safer and stronger actually don't.

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And, in fact, some of these policies
have the opposite of the intended results,

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and in the meantime cause tremendous
and unnecessary suffering.

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So why are people showing up
at our southern border?

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Most of the immigrants and refugees
that are coming to our southern border

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are fleeing three countries:
Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador.

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These countries are consistently ranked

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among the most violent
countries in the world.

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It's very difficult to be safe
in these countries,

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let alone build a future
for yourself and your family.

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And violence against
women and girls is pervasive.

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People have been fleeing Central America

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for generations.

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Generations of refugees
have been coming to our shores,

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fleeing the civil wars of the 1980s

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in which the United States
was deeply involved.

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This is nothing new.

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What's new is that recently,
there's been a spike in families,

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children of families,

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showing up at checkpoints
and presenting themselves to seek asylum.

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Now, this has been in the news lately,

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so I want you to remember a few things
as you see those images.

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One, this is not a historically high level
of interceptions at the southern border,

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and, in fact, people are presenting
themselves at checkpoints.

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Two, people are showing up
with the clothes on their backs;

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some of them are literally in flip-flops.

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And three, we're the most
powerful country in the world.

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It's not a time to panic.

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It's easy from the safety
of the destination country

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to think in terms of absolutes.

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Is it legal or is it illegal?

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But the people who are wrestling
with these questions

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and making these decisions
about their families

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are thinking about
very different questions.

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How do I keep my daughter safe?

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How do I protect my son?

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And if you want absolutes,

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it's absolutely legal to seek asylum.

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It is a fundamental right in our own laws
and in international law.

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And in fact

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(Applause)

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it stems from the 1951 Refugee Convention,

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which was the world's response
to the Holocaust,

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and a way for countries to say never again
would we return people to countries

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where they would harmed or killed.

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There are several ways
refugees come to this country.

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One is through the US Refugee
Admissions Program,

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and through that program the US
identifies and selects refugees abroad

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and brings them to the United States.

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Last year, the US resettled fewer refugees

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than at any time since
the program began in 1980,

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and this year it'll probably be less.

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And this is at a time when we have
more refugees in the world

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than at any other time
in recorded history,

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even since World War II.

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Another way that refugees
come to this country is by seeking asylum.

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Asylum seekers are people
who present themselves at a border

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and say that they'll be persecuted
if they're sent back home.

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An asylum seeker is simply somebody
who is going through the process

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in the United States to prove
that they meet the refugee definition.

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And it's never been
more difficult to seek asylum.

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Border guards are telling people
When they show up at our borders

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that our country's full,
that they simply can't apply.

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This is unprecedented and illegal.

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Under a new program

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with the kind of Orwellian title
"Migrant Protection Protocols,"

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refugees are told
they have to wait in Mexico

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while their cases make their way
through the courts in the United States,

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and this can take months or years.

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Meanwhile, they're not safe

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and they have no access to lawyers.

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Our country, our government,
has detained over 3,000 children,

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separating them from their parents' arms
as a deterrent from seeking asylum.

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Many were toddlers,

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and at least one was
a six-year old blind girl,

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and this is still going on.

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We spend billions to detain people
in what are virtually prisons

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who have committed no crime.

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And family separation has become
the hallmark of our immigration system.

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That's a far cry from a shining city
on a hill or a beacon of hope

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or all of the other ways we like to talk
about ourselves and our values.