Comedian George Lopez is pointing out what he sees as hypocrisy from Donald Trump, a man who attacks immigrants but has four children with immigrants — kids that Lopez calls “anchor babies.”
The comedian posted a picture of 13-year-old Barron together with his mom, First Lady Melania Trump, alongside pictures of Trump’s older kids, Ivanka, Eric, and Donald Jr. The pictures have captions labeling them as “anchor babies,” a term for children born to immigrants as American citizens that allow the families to remain in the United States.
As The Daily Mail noted, the picture Lopez posted included a message directly to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.
“Uh, @icegov ‘ if your listening ‘ you can find these immigrants at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave,” he wrote, mocking the message Donald Trump broadcast to Russia during the 2016 election imploring the country to steal Hillary Clinton’s emails so they could be released to the public.
The report noted that Lopez was asked if it was fair to include 13-year-old Barron in the meme, but Lopez believed that Donald Trump’s treatment of immigrant children has made his own kids fair game.
“Why? Is it fair to put kids in cages? They’re kids,” he said. “Let’s go to ancestry.com and 23andMe. Everyone is swabbing the inside of their mouths to find out where they came from. And you know what we can all agree on? Is that nobody is from here. Immigration has always been a problem and it will continue to be a problem but only targeting Latinos is not good.”
The criticism from Lopez came after Donald Trump announced earlier in the week that ICE would be conducting massive nationwide raids targeting undocumented immigrants. Trump said the raids would target millions of immigrants, though the plans faced widespread criticism and accusations that it was just a political stunt, as the actions were announced just a day before Trump officially launched his 2020 re-election campaign.
. @GeorgeLopez was leaving the Palace Hotel in NYC, where TMZ got a chance to ask him about an Instagram post he’d just thrown up which calls out Trump for being so harsh on immigrant children while his own offspring have immigrant mothers themselves. ? https://t.co/ZXfoMuULL1
— Democratic Coalition (@TheDemCoalition) June 23, 2019
As CNN reported, Trump changed course and announced that he was delaying the planned immigration raids after a phone call from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Trump said that he wanted to give more time to allow for work toward a bipartisan immigration plan.
Donald Trump’s administration has also come under fire after a series of reports documenting unsanitary and neglectful conditions at detention centers where child immigrants are held. Reports noted that the children are held without basics like blankets and toothbrushes, with many of them falling ill without proper medical care.