U.S. has reunited 100 young migrants, families
WASHINGTON — A Biden administration effort to reunite children and parents who were separated under former President Donald Trump’s zero-tolerance border policy has made increasing progress as it nears the end of its first year.
The Department of Homeland Security announced Thursday that 100 children, mostly from Central America, are back with their families and about 350 more reunifications are in process after it took steps to enhance the program.
“I would have loved to have this happen much more quickly. But we are making progress, and I feel like we’re gaining momentum,” said Michelle Brane, executive director of the administration’s Family Reunification Task Force.
President Joe Biden issued an executive order on his first day in office to reunite families that were separated under the Trump administration’s widely condemned practice of forcibly separating parents and children at the U.S.-Mexico border to discourage illegal immigration.
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas thanked community organizations for helping to locate and contact family members as he announced the program’s milestone on Twitter.
“We have a lot more work to do,” he wrote. “We are dedicated to finding every family and giving them the chance to reunite and to heal.”
In September, the task force had reunited 50 families when the administration announced a partnership to speed up the effort with the International Organization for Migration. A web portal — Juntos.gov or Together.gov — was created for parents to contact the U.S. government and work through the reunification process.
About 5,500 children were forcibly removed from their parents under Trump, mostly in 2018. His administration was seeking to stop an increase in people crossing the U.S.-Mexico border by resorting to criminal prosecutions, even if the migrants were presenting themselves to authorities to seek asylum as permitted under the law.
Amid widespread condemnation, including from Republicans, Trump stopped the practice in June 2018 just days before a judge ordered an end to the program in response to a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union.
Brane said there are still about 1,150 children whose whereabouts have not been confirmed.