Feds will now target parents, relatives who smuggled in children

SAN FRANCISCO — The Trump administration said Friday it will begin arresting parents and other relatives who hire smugglers to bring their children into the U.S., a move that sent a shudder through immigrant communities nationwide.

The new “surge initiative” by Immigration and Customs Enforcement marks the latest get-tough approach to immigration by the federal government since President Donald Trump took office. The government says the effort aims to break up human smuggling operations, including arresting people who pay coyotes to get children across the U.S. border.

That marks a sharp departure from policies in place under President Barack Obama’s administration, during which time tens of thousands of young people fleeing spiraling gang and drug violence in Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador crossed the border. The children are then placed with “sponsors” — typically parents, close relatives or family friends — who care for the minors while they attend school and their cases go through the immigration court system.

The government now says it plans to arrest the sponsors. “ICE aims to disrupt and dismantle endto-end the illicit pathways used by transnational criminal organizations and human smuggling facilitators,” agency spokeswoman Sarah Rodriguez said. “The sponsors who have placed children directly into harm’s way by entrusting them to violent criminal organizations will be held accountable.”

Officials did not respond to questions Friday seeking details on the number of sponsors who would be targeted or already had been arrested, or what charges would be applied. Immigrant advocacy groups said they were investigating a dozen arrests or ongoing investigations in Texas, Pennsylvania, New York and Virginia.

Elsy Segovia, an immigration attorney in Newark, New Jersey, said armed agents visited her client on Wednesday under the guise of checking something with his Social Security number, then announced he was being investigated for smuggling his 16-year-old nephew from El Salvador, who crossed the border in Arizona last week.

The man’s nephew had been fleeing gang violence in El Salvador, and the agents told him they knew he had wired money to smugglers coyotes to get his relative to the U.S., Segovia said.

Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman Gillian Christensen said that the agency could not comment on an ongoing law enforcement action.