Obama to Central American leaders: Migrant children will be sent home

President Barack Obama made it clear during a meeting at the White House with Central American presidents on Friday that migrant children who do not have a proper claim to stay in the United States will be sent back to their home countries.

The high-level meeting included Presidents Otto Perez Molina of Guatemala, Juan Orlando Hernandez of Honduras and Salvador Sanchez Ceren of El Salvador. Vice President Job Biden was also present.

“I emphasized that the American people and my administration have great compassion for these children,” Obama said. “But I also emphasized to my friends that we have to deter a continuing influx of children putting themselves at risk.”

SEE ALSO: Honduran special forces are struggling to keep children from fleeing to the U.S.

Obama also said the U.S. shared responsibility with the three Central American countries to stem the flow of unaccompanied minors and families coming across the southern border. Since October, more than 57,5000 unaccompanied minors — mostly from Central American — have made the treacherous journey to the U.S.

The president also noted that so far, joint efforts by his administration and the three Central American governments to discourage unaccompanied minors from coming to the U.S. illegally have been working. He said the number of border crossings this month had dropped by half since June.

In addition, Obama told the three Central America leaders that his administration is considering plans to set up asylum centers in El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala. The centers would allow children and families to apply for refugee status to come to the U.S., meaning that they wouldn’t have to making the dangerous journey through Mexico to come to the U.S.

Obama made it clear that poverty would not qualify a person for refugee status.

“There may be some narrow circumstances in which there is humanitarian or refugee status that a family might be eligible for,” Obama explained. “If that were the case it would be better for them to apply in-country, rather than take a very dangerous journey up to Texas to make those same claims. But I think it’s important to recognize that that would not necessarily accommodate a large number of additional migrants.”

Obama concluded that it is more important to find solutions “that prevent smugglers from making money on families that feel desperate.” He added there’s also a need for solutions to address poverty in Central America and to improve the U.S. legal immigration system in a way that “makes this underground migration system less necessary.”

SEE ALSO: Jeb Bush to GOP: Don’t use border crisis to delay immigration reform

While Obama met with the Central American presidents, immigration advocates and faith leaders staged a protest outside the White House.

They argued that U.S. security and economic policies have contributed to the high levels of violence seen in Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador and Mexico in recent years. They also charged that current proposals from the White House and Congress “fail to address the underlying factors forcing children and families to flee their homes.”

“We want to call on Obama, above all, to make sure that whatever bill gets passed or whatever funding is approved is not done so in a way that will rollback the rights of kids that are currently protected under a 2008 law to have a hearing before a judge and to have an attorney present,” Alexis Stoumbelis, one of the organizers of the protest, told VOXXI.

Friday’s meeting at the White House comes as the Obama administration struggles to win approval in Congress for its $3.7 billion request for emergency funding. The funds would be used to care for unaccompanied minors who are apprehended at the southern border, enhance border security and boost the number of immigration judges and attorneys.

House Republicans have made it clear that they don’t support Obama’s $3.7 billion request. On Friday, they held a closed-door meeting and decided that they’ll try to pass a bill next week to address the influx of unaccompanied minors coming to the U.S.

Their bill will cost less than $1 billion. It will include changes to the 2008 anti-trafficking law to speed up deportations of children from Central America, and it will also deploy National Guard troops to the southern border.

Meanwhile, Democrats in the Senate are planning to vote next week on a bill that allocates $2.7 billion to address the unaccompanied minors crisis. The bill does not include any policy changes like the GOP bill does. Instead, it calls for funds for new detention facilities, overtime pay for Border Patrol agents and additional immigration judges.

SEE ALSO: Republicans release 12 recommendations to address border crisis