Jennifer Lopez Gets Emotional in Tweets About Detained Immigrant Children

Jennifer Lopez joined the ever-growing group of celebrities, activists and politicians criticizing President Donald Trump’s administration for their child detention policy with a series of tweets Thursday encouraging all Americans to fight against what she considers “atrocities.”

“Reading the news about the separation of children from their families, I can’t help but think about my own children,” she said of 10 year-old twins Emme and Max. “I cannot fathom a world where they would be ripped from my arms, taken to a place no better than a prison far from home.”

Lopez’s tweets came less than a day after a rare reversal by President Trump on Wednesday, when his administration backed down over its widely reviled child detention policy, which has separated more than 2,300 undocumented children from their parents since a “zero tolerance” policy was enacted in early May, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

The latest fix to the Trump border policy was a controversial bid to keep parents and children detained together for more than 20 days.

The backlash over the administration’s separation of undocumented immigrant parents and children has erupted in the last week, as stories have emerged of children shipped thousands of miles away from the people they know and love, even as the White House now scrambles to bring the families already torn apart back together.

“I feel we will never forget this moment in time. Bearing witness to these atrocities and that’s what they are, I can say for sure, remaining silent is not an option,” Lopez wrote on her tweets to her followers.

The children separation and detention policy has drawn widespread criticism from a bipartisan group of congress members, as well as former First Ladies, the United Nations, child welfare advocates and many members of the clergy.

But despite the severity of the situation, Lopez encouraged her followers to keep hope alive.

“But I also want you to remain hopeful,” she wrote. “Hold fast to hope, faith and Love. We first need to admit we have a problem before we can heal it.”

Despite reversing the policy with an executive order on Wednesday, many celebrities have continued to express their outrage on social media.

“I came to this country as an illegal immigrant [at] 5 years old,” wrote Nicki Minaj on Instagram. “I can’t imagine the horror of being in a strange place & having my parents stripped away from me at the age of 5. This is so scary to me. Please stop this. Can you try to imagine the terror & panic these kids feel right now? Not knowing if their parents are dead or alive, if they’ll ever see them again.”

Many others weighed in the historic event. President Trump’s order still allows for the detainment of all illegal immigrants, but promises to “maintain family unity.”