John Moore/Getty Images A lawyer who works with immigrant communities in the southern US argued that the current fallout over the Trump administration's "zero-tolerance" immigration policy is an extension of practices carried out by the Obama administration. R. Andrew Free recounted a 2015 exchange he said he had with President Barack Obama, during which Free said he implored Obama to close two detention centers in southern Texas, out of concern for the immigrant women and children being held there. "It's wrong.