Stephen Colbert makes a serious point about due process rights for immigrants, bookended by jokes

The Trump administration still hasn't said "what they're going to do to put these stolen [migrant] kids back together with their parents, and no indication that they could successfully do so," Stephen Colbert said on Monday's Late Show. "So, 23andme is donating DNA kits to help reunite migrant families." He suggested they check President Trump's DNA, too, to "find out what species can survive that long without a heart." Even migrant children lucky enough to be reunited with their families face a long time in detention due to a backlog in immigration cases. "Now, the obvious answer is hire more judges to deal with the backlog," Colbert said. "But Trump has a different answer," skipping the whole judge and court thing and moving straight to deportation.

"Here's the thing: If you deny anyone due process, you deny everyone due process," he said. "If you can't show your documents to a judge, your passport is as useless as your Blockbuster card. Being identified as a suspect is the same as being guilty." The Supreme Court has consistently held that everyone in the U.S. has Fifth and 14th Amendment due process rights, even unlawful immigrants, and Colbert imagined Trump's reply to that: "Well, what do you expect from the Failing U.S. Constitution? Low Energy founding fathers had terrible ratings. None of them — not many people know this — none of then were born in the United States. I say we ship them back to the 13 colonies.'"

We may not know when the kids will be reunited with their parents, but we know they are required to recite the Pledge of Allegiance. "You can't make migrant children recite the Pledge of Allegiance to a country where they're not welcome!" Colbert protested. "That would be like if a job recruiter for Chili's said, 'We don't hire your kind here — now please sing, 'I want my baby-back, baby-back, baby-back.'" Watch below. Peter Weber

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