US judge orders govt to reunite immigrant children and parents

LAYING DOWN THE LAW Trump admin told to provide communications between members of families

WASHINGTON: A federal judge in California has ordered the Trump administration to stop separating families apprehended while illegally entering the US, and to reunite the children who were split from their families within 30 days.

He has also ordered the administration to reunite children under the age of 5 with their parents within 14 days, and authorities must facilitate regular contacts between children and their parents who have not been reunified.

“The facts set forth before the Court portray reactive governance— responses to address a chaotic circumstance of the government’s own making,” judge Dana M Sabraw of the San Diego federal court wrote in his order about the government’s efforts.

“They belie measured and ordered governance, which is central to the concept of due process enshrined in our Constitution. This is particularly so in the treatment of migrants, many of whom are asylum seekers and small children.”

In May, the administration began enforcing a “zero tolerance” policy with regards to illegal immigration. Those caught crossing into the US illegally were detained, and adults were separated from their children, often forcefully, accounts and images of which led to national and international outrage.

President Donald Trump first sought to leverage the outrage to force Congress to legislate a solution packaged along with his key immigrations reform demands, such as enhanced security at the border, curbing family-based immigrations and ending visa lottery and switching to a merit-based system.

But news accounts and images from the border were too powerful for him to overcome and he ended the programme with an executive order.

His administration has been reuniting children with their families after the practice ended, but more than 2,000 children are still at in the custody of the authorities.

And the process of reunification has been slow.

Sabraw pointed out in his order that the administration has seemed woefully unprepared to manage a crisis that it created and its aftermath, and officials continue to be seen working at cross-purposes.

While Customs and Border Patrol, the agency that polices the border, has suspended prosecution referrals of families with children that are apprehended entering the country illegally, the justice department has said it was prepared to step up prosecution of all adults.

The court order came on a class action suit filed by the civil rights body American Civil Liberties Union, which welcomed the ruling, as “an enormous win”.