A judge commends the Trump administration’s reunification efforts.
SAN DIEGO — A federal judge is commending the Trump administration for reunifying families in immigration custody after they were separated at the U.S.-Mexico border, while also faulting it for hundreds of still-separated families outside of government custody.
U.S. District Judge Dana Sabraw said Friday in San Diego that the government gets “great credit” for reunifying more than 1,800 children with parents and sponsors. But he says attention must now turn to families who couldn’t be reunited because their parents were deported — 431 at latest count.
Trump administration officials say they have reunified all parents with their children that they deemed eligible of those who are in immigration custody. Department of Homeland Security officials said in a statement that officials would continue to work to reunite families who were not able to be reunified.
Sabraw didn’t rule on an American Civil Liberties Union request for a one-week waiting period for reunified parents to decide if they want to seek asylum, keeping a temporary halt to deportations in place.
Annunciation House in El Paso, Texas, says it has received more than 320 families who had been separated since July 17.
Many came in for less than a day before they’re flown out to their intended destinations.
On Friday, one parent, Maria, a 20-year-old Guatemalan woman who was separated from her 4-yearold in mid-June, says her son was well-cared for while he was away. She says he’s been his normal self since they were reunited Thursday night in El Paso.
She spoke without providing her last name to a reporter at the behest of Annunciation House director Ruben Garcia, who bars disclosure of that information for shelter residents’ safety. He said all shelter residents have fled violence in their home countries.
She said she was elated to be reunited with her son after spending weeks agonizing over him and that she “couldn’t live without him.”
Monitor to be appointed
A federal judge in Los Angeles will appoint an independent monitor to evaluate conditions for immigrant children in U.S border facilities.
The decision follows reports in Texas of spoiled food, insufficient water and frigid conditions by the youngsters and their parents.
Judge Dolly Gee on Friday said she reached her decision after seeing a “disconnect” between government monitors’ assessment of conditions in facilities in the Rio Grande Valley and the accounts of more than 200 immigrant children and their parents detailing numerous problems.