For Immediate Release Contact: Barbara Brady
(o) 651-414-2849
(c) 651-202-0845
barbara.brady@mnnurses.org
Rick Fuentes
(o) 651-414-2863
(c) 612-741-0662
rick.fuentes@mnnurses.org
(Mankato) – June 20, 2018 – The Minnesota Nurses Association condemn the continued “Zero Tolerance” policy of the Trump Administration that has incarcerated immigrant children at the US border. The MNA Board of Directors issued a resolution today that President Donald Trump’s Executive Order continues to violate federal law and cause severe and irreparable harm to these children.
“As nurses, we cannot ignore the health implications of Trump’s immigration policies,” said Mary C. Turner, president of the Minnesota Nurses Association. “Separating children from their parents and subjecting them to prison life will result in serious physical ailments and mental harm that they may never recover from.”
The MNA Board members noted that Trump’s Executive Order still allows children to be held indefinitely and violates the 1997 Flores Agreement that dictates that immigrant children are not to be detained for more than 20 days.
“The Trump policy will still hold families and their kids indefinitely until their immigration or refugee status can be determined,” Turner said. “That’s simply cruel and unusual punishment for children, some just babies and toddlers, who will continue to be frightened and scared for their lives with no idea of when they could be freed.”
MNA nurses established a policy in the fall of 2000 that nurses will not be used to report a patient’s citizenship status to any law enforcement arm or support any policy that denies any patient medical care because of citizenship status.
“We nurses see all patients by what they need, not by where they’re from,” Turner said. “There is no border that prevents nurses from caring for patients, especially the youngest and most vulnerable.”