action there. reporter: this has become the epicenter of the immigration battle in this country right now. here in mcallen, texas, it s a border town just a few miles from the border, across from reynoso in mexico. this facility we re in front of right now is the largest such facility in the country. journalists a few days ago were allowed to tour it for the first time. no cameras have been allowed inside. all we ve been able to see is handout video from some processing facilities. that has stoked some outrage here. critics of what s happening say there doesn t appear to be enough transparency. mcallen as well as nearby towns, brownsville, texas, what we re seeing here, what we have been seeing is that the court system here since the enactment of zero tolerance has been overwhelmed in some cases. we have been to several proceedings where migrants are being charged with illegal entry and they these ports we
scanning them, picking up some for deportation and were unable to release the kids to relatives in the u.s. there be continuing to warehouse these kids and artificially creating a crisis of capacity. so when you see cbp officers and you may have seen this in mccallan and reynoso rejecting lawful asylum seekerses from entering this country providing incentive for them to come in between ports of entry and arresting them, and taking their kids, they created this crisis. this didn t exist till donald trump and administration decided it make it a crisis. the president said something astounding this morning. he said we shouldn t be hiring juks by the thousands as ridiculous laws should demand. we should be building the wall, and here s the crucial part, not let people come into our country based on a lee phrase they are told to say that is their password. he s referring to asylum
30th to fy-17, may 30th, this is from cbp s own website. looked at it before i came on your show. the numbers are down for family units, up slightly for unaccompanied alien children. they are provoking this crisis, deepening it by sharing information from are the office of refugee resettlement with i.c.e. so that as we re trying to place kids with relatives in the u.s. recent i.c.e. is first scanning them, picking up some for deportation and were unable to release the kids to relatives in the u.s. there be continuing to warehouse these kids and artificially creating a crisis of capacity. so when you see cbp officers and you may have seen this in mccallan and reynoso rejecting lawful asylum seekerses from entering this country providing incentive for them to come in between ports of entry and arresting them, and taking their kids, they created this crisis. this didn t exist till donald
reynoso or juarez or tijuana. it doesn t come across. doesn t come across, hasn t come across in years. policies based on funny math, fictional statistics is basically what s dictating the real leaves of people down on the border. in the last 24 hours we heard from the mayor and governor of new york. this is where some of the kids are coming. they said look there is no law that says you have to notify us. but concern over these children, you know, often results in coordination, results in notification. so i guess, did they have any plan in place whatsoever when they decided to separate families for how they were going to get them back to the? no. i ran into bill deblasio in this building after i did morning joe this morning. we were crossing pats. he said 239 kids came into the city. he didn t know as you said they were coming here. those kids, unaccompanied minors often run away. they told me that in the shelter
the kids in these facilities. and so the story we re working on, sadly, is mostly a mystery. we re trying to really get at the truth of what s happening inside these facilities. all right, lawrence o donnell. thanks for joining me. we ll be talking later checking back in in the hour. marian nab an tenseio just crossed the border in reynoso, mexico. there s been lots of reports of people stacked up awaiting entry at the proper port of entry and being turned back. what are you seeing there? reporter: chris, i heard from one mother who says she was turned back and they come to this shelter where they basically find themselves in limbo. this is a shelter in reynosa, one of the most dangerous cities in mexico where these migrant mothers from lon dur ras, guatemala, el salvador tell me they re having to weighing this