Trump official admits family separation policy 'should never have been implemented'

Rod Rosenstein publicly denounces zero-tolerance' policy for first time, following report showing US didn't effectively coordinate care for children

For the first time, a senior Trump administration official who helped implement family separation has condemned the hardline immigration policy, which made it possible for the government to take more than 3,000 children, including infants, from their parents at the US-Mexico border in 2018.

In response to a damning report published on Thursday by the US justice department's internal watchdog on the zero-tolerance" policy, which made family separation possible, the former deputy attorney general Rod Rosenstein said the policy should have never been proposed or implemented".