Trump official: Feds not responsible for released children

Senators grow angry during testimony on limits of authority

A senior official with the Department of Health and Human Services told a Senate panel on Thursday that the responsibility to monitor migrant children released from federal custody falls on state child welfare agencies – not the federal government.

Jonathan White, who handles the care of minor children for HHS, said federal law requires his department to care properly for those unaccompanied minors while they’re in HHS custody. When releasing the children, the department must also carefully vet parents, relatives and other sponsors to verify their relationship and ensure they don’t pose a threat to the child.

But White said the department’s legal responsibility ends there. If any harm comes to the child after being released to a sponsor, he said there is no federal law that requires his agency to follow up.

“The custodial relationship does end when those children exit (the Office of Refugee Resettlement),” said White, referring to the HHS office that oversees migrant children in its custody. “We are not a law enforcement agency.”

That answer angered a bipartisan group of senators who issued a report Wednesday highlighting what they described as glaring flaws in the treatment and oversight of children released from HHS custody.

Sen. Tom Carper, D-Del., said the federal government is “failing in our responsibility” to protect minors. Sen. Heidi Heitkamp, D-N.D., said she was “frustrated” and “sickened” by the administration’s “see no evil” approach to the treatment of children released from custody.

And Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, became increasingly upset as representatives of four different government agencies explained how they were not responsible for the care of those children.

“That’s the whole point here,” Portman said. “No one’s responsible.”

Under federal law, the thousands of children who cross the southwest border without a sponsor, known as unaccompanied minors, are first detained by immigration enforcement agents. The Trump administration added an additional 2,500 children to that group this year when it implemented a “zero tolerance” immigration enforcement policy that separated families who crossed the border together, then treating the children as unaccompanied minors.

Federal law limits how long children can remain in detention, so those children are quickly handed over to HHS. That department contracts with local shelters to house, feed, provide medical treatment, and educate those children.

HHS then performs extensive checks of possible sponsors for the children, running background checks, and conducting home visits in cases where the child may be the victim of human smuggling or requires special medical needs.

Trump administration officials said federal law allows them to provide some post-release services. But White made clear that there’s no legal requirement, on the part of HHS or the new sponsor, to complete those phone calls and verify the safety of the child.

That answer infuriated several senators. Portman said the law that governs treatment of unaccompanied minors – the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008 – clearly gives HHS broad responsibilities to care for all unaccompanied children, before and after their time in government custody.

Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., compared the situation to state oversight of foster care programs.

“There is a huge network in every single state,” she said. “Because you know what states do? They take their responsibility for having children in their care seriously.”

McCaskill said the problems raised during Thursday’s hearing will likely lead to a “something remarkable” – a bipartisan bill to fix the system.

The Senate Department of Homeland Security and Governmental Affair’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigation has been looking into the treatment of unaccompanied children in government custody since 2015, when federal authorities exposed a labor trafficking scheme at an egg farm in Marion, Ohio. Nearly a dozen teenagers and young adults were essentially working as slave laborers. The workers – from Guatemala and as young as 14 – were forced to work long hours and housed in trailers with no heat, hot water, or working toilets.

After news broke about the trafficking in his state, Portman launched the first probe with McCaskill, who was then the subcommittee’s top Democrat.