In a week in which major television networks stopped using the term "illegal" in their descriptions of those apprehended in the border crisis, Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials have told workers to no longer refer to the young illegals arrested as "unaccompanied alien children" or "UACs."
They now are to be described as "unaccompanied children," the agency said in a memo obtained by the Center for Immigration Studies and provided to
Breitbart News.
"This was briefed earlier today during he (sic) command and staff meeting," the email says.
"It has been requested that in correspondence regarding unaccompanied children, They (sic) not be referred to as UACs. The term UAC should not be used in official correspondence."
The subject line in the correspondence was "UACs," Breitbart reported.
"The appropriate messaging on documents should be using the term: unaccompanied children all lower case. (Unless capitalizing would be grammatically correct)," the email says.
ICE did not respond to requests for comment, Breitbart reports.
But another agency involved in apprehending illegals,
U.S. Customs and Border Protection, still uses "UAC" in classifying the more than 52,000 young immigrants that have been arrested crossing the border since October.
Both ICE and Border Protection fall under the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
The revelation of the ICE directive comes as NBC, ABC and CBS have dropped "illegal" from their coverage.
"As so many issues in this country do, it's going to boil down to politics," host
Matt Lauer said on NBC's "Today" show on Wednesday morning, according to news reports.
"And wherever you stand on the issue, one side or the other, I'm not going to weigh in on that. It's hard to see those images of moms and their kids in that situation."
Another NBC reporter, Miguel Almaguer, used the word "undocumented" in his story.
And by Wednesday, all three networks had avoided the word in their newscasts.
Last year, several large news organizations, including The Associated Press and The Los Angeles Times, banned the term "illegal immigrant," saying that it broadly and unfairly labeled a large group of people.
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