Tag

#border

3 incidents

Updated January 15, 2020 Deportation & Immigration
Critical Rights and Rule-of-Law Concern

Children in Detention: Overcrowded Border Facilities and Humanitarian Conditions

The DHS Inspector General's July 2019 report documented conditions at Border Patrol facilities in El Paso, Texas: some detainees held for over a month in single-occupancy holding rooms, standing room only conditions, limited access to showers and clean clothing, insufficient food, and inadequate medical care. The Clint facility conditions, documented by attorneys visiting to conduct interviews, included children sleeping on floors, a 2-year-old with dirty clothes, limited access to soap and toothbrushes, and sick children not separated from healthy ones. The administration's response was that the facilities were overwhelmed by a surge in arrivals and that Congress needed to provide additional funding.

Sources
4
immigrationdetentionchildrencivil-rightsfirst-term
Updated June 16, 2022 Deportation to Torture
War Crime / Crime Against Humanity Ongoing

Zero Tolerance Family Separation: Systematic Removal of Children from Asylum-Seeking Parents

Attorney General Sessions announced a zero tolerance policy in April 2018 requiring criminal prosecution of all illegal border crossers. Because federal criminal custody excludes children, this automatically separated minors from their parents. Over 5,500 children were separated in six weeks. Courts ordered reunification; as of 2024, hundreds of families remain separated.

Sources
7
family-separationzero-tolerancechildrentortureimmigration
Updated October 30, 2020 Deportation to Torture
Critical Rights and Rule-of-Law Concern

Zero Tolerance Family Separation: 5,500+ Children Separated at the Border

The zero tolerance policy was the direct cause of mass family separations: parents were referred for criminal prosecution, children were taken to Office of Refugee Resettlement shelters, and the two systems — criminal justice and child welfare — did not have adequate mechanisms to track and reunite families. Senior administration officials including Chief of Staff John Kelly had discussed using family separation as a deterrent as early as 2017. Trump publicly and repeatedly denied a family separation policy existed while it was operating. A federal court ordered family reunification; the government struggled to comply, partly because adequate records had not been kept linking children to parents.

Sources
4
family-separationimmigrationchildrenzero-tolerancefirst-term