Reunification Struggle Continues

July 26 marked the court-ordered deadline to reunite families who were separated at the U.S. southern border due to Trump’s zero-tolerance immigration policy. The federal government claims that it has fulfilled its promise. Yet hundreds of children still remain in federal custody. Here, Election Central takes a look at the situation and the reason for this deadline discrepancy.

What’s Happening?

The reason the children were separated from their parents is because of a law called the Flores agreement, which says children can’t be held in federal custody for more than twenty days. This means that they are not allowed to remain imprisoned with their parents, who have been detained for illegally crossing into the United States. But stories of young children being wrenched away from their parents and kept in cages have led to public outcry over this controversial policy. Facing harsh criticism from both sides of the political aisle, Trump ended the policy with an executive order on June 20. But by then, the damage was already done: nearly 3,000 children had already been separated from their parents.

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• Click on this Web link to review previous coverage on this issue by Election Central.

As of last week, ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) claimed to have successfully reunited 1,442 children with their parents and said it was on track to reunite the remaining ones by the deadline.

Then What’s the Problem?

However, it’s not as simple as that. ICE is only required to reunite “eligible” families–in total, only about a third of those that have been separated. Hundreds of parents have been denied rights to their children because they have failed background checks or couldn’t provide adequate proof of their parental status. Hundreds more parents were deported without their children, and now the government can’t locate them to return their children to them. Even those who are “eligible” have had to wait days, even weeks, to be reunited with their children. Sometimes, they are even sent to the wrong facilities, expecting to join their children and finding them not to be there after all.

Many of the immigrants can’t read or speak English. In an especially troubling development, some were told that if they signed certain forms, they would get their children back. However, these forms actually stated that the parents were giving up their rights to their children. Because the forms weren’t translated, the parents signed them without knowing what they were signing. The parents were then deported back to their nation of origin, and their children placed into the U.S. foster care system.

There are also problems with how these reunifications are being counted. In the past, the government counted parents. It then reversed the process midway and began counting children instead. So the numbers don’t always match up.

What’s Next?

Privately-funded activist groups have been working hard to raise money to cover the cost of everything from legal fees for the families, to food for the hungry children upon their release from federal detention centers. Government lawyers must now begin the work of trying to locate parents who have been deported without their children. The ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) also is attempting to protect the parents who unknowingly signed documents releasing their children to the custody of the federal government.

Dig Deeper: View this video of a family that has been reunited after being separated for 40 days. Then write a short paragraph describing your reaction. Remember, as always, to be sensitive with your responses.