US will release over 50 migrant children

SAN DIEGO — More than 50 immigrant children under age 5 will be reunited with their parents by Tuesday’s court-ordered deadline for action by the Trump administration, a government attorney has said. The families will be released after they are reunited.

That’s only about half of the 100 or so infants and toddlers covered by the order.

At a court hearing, Justice Department lawyer Sarah Fabian acknowledged on Monday that the government wouldn’t meet the deadline for all the children, citing a variety of reasons, including that the parents of some of the youngsters have already been deported.

Fabian said that 54 children will be joined with their parents by the end of Tuesday at locations across the country and that an additional five were undergoing final background checks.

It was the first time the government indicated whether the parents and children would be released or detained together. They will be set free in the US pending the outcome of their immigration cases, which can take several years.

Fabian didn’t say why they were being released, but US Immigration and Customs Enforcement has little space to hold families.

ICE has three family detention centers with room for about 3,000 people in all, and the places are already at or near capacity. The Trump administration is trying to line up thousands more beds at military bases.

US Judge Dana Sabraw in San Diego last month ordered the government to reunite the approximately 100 children under the age of 5 by Tuesday, and the estimated 2,000 older children by July 26.

The children were separated under Trump’s “zero tolerance” policy that called for the prosecution of immigrants crossing the border illegally. The separations were in place from early May until Trump stopped the practice last month in the face of intense criticism.