Trump unveils plan to detain 30,000 migrants at Guantanamo

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00:00In other world news, Donald Trump says he plans to sign an executive order

00:03instructing the Pentagon and the Department of Homeland Security

00:07to prepare a migrant facility at Guantanamo Bay.

00:10Accommodating up to 30,000 people, he said it would be used to detain

00:15the worst criminal illegal aliens threatening the American people, as he put it.

00:21The detention center at Guantanamo Bay on the coast of Cuba was set up in 2002

00:25by former President George W. Bush to detain foreign militant suspects

00:30following the September 11th terrorist attacks.

00:34Well, for more, let's cross live now to our correspondent in Washington, Fraser Jackson.

00:41Fraser, tell us firstly, what more do we know about this order

00:44to send migrants to the notorious Guantanamo Bay?

00:51Well, this is not exactly an executive order.

00:53It's an executive memorandum, which my legal friends have pointed out is slightly different.

00:57It has different ramifications, especially when it comes to budget in particular.

01:02But this memorandum has now been signed directing the DHS,

01:06the Department of Homeland Security and the Pentagon to prepare this 30,000 bed facility.

01:11And now Trump said, we have 30,000 beds to detain the worst criminal illegal aliens

01:16threatening the American people.

01:17He then continues, we don't want them coming back.

01:20So we're going to send them to Guantanamo.

01:23We also got a gaggle with the new secretary of the Department of Homeland Security,

01:28Kristi Noem, and we asked her some questions along with Tom Homan,

01:32the man who was named the border czar.

01:34They so far have not been told what the cost of this new facility is going to be.

01:39They said that the cost is still going to be appropriated

01:41and they need to figure out how much exactly really it's going to cost.

01:45But Secretary Noem said that the people there are going to be, quote, the worst of the worst.

01:50Then it came out also in that gaggle that the people being held in custody there

01:57are going to come under the purview of ICE, the Immigration and Custom Enforcement Agency,

02:03which has been rounding people up in Chicago and the like over the course of the last couple of days.

02:08Now, we're getting some reaction as well from Cuba, the island, of course,

02:11where Guantanamo Bay is actually located on.

02:14The Cuban government's calling this an act of brutality to our colleagues at the AFP news agency.

02:21And Fraser, Democrats have tried for years to get Guantanamo closed down.

02:25There is little chance of that happening now, we would presume.

02:31Yeah, well, this is known as a prison camp housing terrorists,

02:35but actually it's not just that.

02:37It's actually been used for decades to house migrants who were intercepted at sea,

02:42trying to make it to the United States.

02:44What happens in that process is these migrants are screened on the boat,

02:48just as they would be at the southern border, for example,

02:51and then they're effectively given a choice whether to return where they came from

02:55or to be detained at Gitmo whilst they're waiting for a third nation to take them in effectively.

03:01So they then kind of fall into this legal gray area,

03:04which is not really under the purview of normal, typical US custom laws.

03:08Now, as of February, there were just four people being housed there,

03:12but the conditions have been questioned by government watchdogs.

03:15They've been reports of overflowing toilets and rats in the corridors.

03:20But the numbers that we are told there, that four,

03:23the four migrants being housed there are not counting the untold numbers

03:27that are quickly processed and then deported.

03:29Those four are more long-term residents, as it were.

03:33They are being housed separately from the terrorists that we know

03:36who took part in the September 11 terrorist attacks.

03:40But they are given slightly a few more liberties, as it were.

03:44They do have curfews, but they're allowed to get a job on the island as well,

03:48another part of the camp, not close to the detention facility.

03:52But that now is likely to change.

03:53Now that this is ramping up to 30,000 people,

03:56those few freedoms that those people enjoyed are likely not to be given to the new arrivals,

04:01especially as they're being described as the worst of the worst by Secretary Nome.

04:06Fraser, for now, thank you.

04:07That is Fraser Jackson, our correspondent in Washington.

04:11Let's move on to Otherworld News.

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