Panel rules soap, sleep essential
Appeals court turns back government challenge to detention requirements
Immigrant children detained by the U.S. government should get edible food, clean water, soap and toothpaste under a longstanding agreement over detention conditions, a federal appeals panel ruled Thursday in dismissing a Trump administration bid to limit what must be provided.
A three-judge panel for the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco tossed out the U.S. government’s challenge to a lower court’s findings that authorities had failed to provide safe and sanitary conditions for the children in line with a 1997 settlement agreement.
The government argued that authorities weren’t required to provide specific accommodations, such as soap, under the settlement and asked the panel to weigh in. The appellate judges disagreed.
“Assuring that children eat enough edible food, drink clean water, are housed in hygienic facilities with sanitary bathrooms, have soap and toothpaste, and are not sleep-deprived are without doubt essential to the children’s safety,” the panel wrote.
The ruling followed a June hearing where a U.S. government lawyer said the agreement was vague and might not require that a toothbrush and soap be provided to children during brief stays in custody.
Leecia Welch, a senior director at the National Center for Youth Law, said the panel’s ruling wasn’t surprising. “It should shock the conscience of all Americans to know that our government argued children do not need these bare essentials.”