On ABC\u2019s This Week on Sunday, Huffington Post Editor-in-Chief Arianna Huffington confronted former White House Senior Advisor David Plouffe over the Obama administration\u2019s record on deportation. In the midst of the conversations around the IRS scandal and the Department of Justice going after leaks to journalists, Huffington said there is \u201ca lot of scandal\u201d in the debate over immigration:<\/p>\n
HUFFINGTON: It\u2019s what the Obama administration is doing with deportation\u2026 More people have been deported over the Obama administration than over the whole two terms of George Bush. And we\u2019ve had, for example, since 2010, 200,000 parents of American citizens being deported for minor offenses. This is a real tragedy. And [if this were] being done under George Bush, Democrats would have been up in arms.<\/p>\n
In response, Plouffe told Huffington, \u201cWe\u2019re enforcing the law, taking border security seriously. There\u2019s been adjustments. The action on the DREAM Act, those kids should not be sent home. We need a solution.\u201d<\/p>\n
Still, Huffington wasn\u2019t satisfied, arguing that administration officials \u201cneed to be accountable.\u201d \u201cThis goes against what the president professes to believe in,\u201d she said. \u201cDetention and deportation is a nightmare for families. It\u2019s a bit like a gulag.\u201d<\/p>\n
Many immigrant parents have been deported during the Obama administration. Between July 2010 and September 2012, 200,000 undocumented immigrants whose children are U.S. citizens were deported by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials, accounting for nearly a quarter of all deportations. A new rule issued in January is meant to ease the process for undocumented immigrants who can prove that time away from a family member will cause \u201cextreme hardship\u201d by allowing them to return to the U.S. while applying for legal status. The administration also suspended deportation proceedings against undocumented immigrations who pose no threat to national security or public safety beginning in 2011. Yet if the current rate of deportations continues, 15,000 children are projected to land in foster care as a result of their parents being deported.<\/p>\n