Pelosi heads to border

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi will travel to the U.S. border Saturday as the White House scrambles to handle the flood of unaccompanied minors entering the country illegally.

The California lawmaker will be briefed by Customs and Border Protection on the recent surge and will meet a group of children held at the South Texas Detention Facility.

{mosads}“The humanitarian crisis unfolding across our nation’s southern border demands Congress come together and find thoughtful, compassionate and bipartisan solutions,” Pelosi said in a statement Thursday. 

“We must ensure our laws are fully enforced, so that due process is provided to unaccompanied children and the safety and well-being of unaccompanied children is protected. We must also work to address the root causes of the problem.”

Pelosi will be joined by Democratic Reps. Filemon Vela of Texas, a member of the House Homeland Security Committee; Chairman of the  Congressional Hispanic Caucus Rubén E. Hinojosa of Texas and Steven Horsford of Nevada.

Thousands of unaccompanied minors, primarily from Central America, have tried to enter the country illegally in record numbers this year. President Obama begged parents Thursday to stop sending their children across the border illegally, warning of the dangerous journey and saying they would ultimately be returned home.

“We don’t even know how many of these kids don’t make it, and may have been waylaid into sex trafficking or killed because they fell off a train.

“Do not send your children to the borders,” the president continued. “If they do make it, they’ll get sent back. More importantly, they may not make it.”