WASHINGTON (AP) – Vice President Mike Pence toured two detention facilities on the Texas border Friday, including a Border Patrol station where hundreds of men were crowded in sweltering cages without cots.
Some of the men said they were hungry and had been held there for 40 days or longer.
“Look, this is tough stuff,” Pence acknowledged at a later news conference.
“I knew we’d see a system that is overcrowded,” he added. “It’s overwhelmed and that’s why Congress has to act.”
Pence’s office said the tour was part of an effort to show the Trump administration is providing adequate care for migrants. But the scene the vice president witnessed is sure to spark new criticism of the conditions facing migrants in U.S. government facilities.