‘Mama, papa. I do not want to be alone’
The Trump administration’s ‘zero tolerance’ policy for border crossings has resulted in the forced separation of hundreds and parents and children, said journalist Miriam Jordan. Here is one 5-year-old boy’s story.
W HEN HE LANDED in Michigan in late May, all the weary little boy carried was a trash bag stuffed with dirty clothes from his dayslong trek across Mexico, and two small pieces of paper—one a stick-figure drawing of his family from Honduras, the other a sketch of his father, who had been arrested and led away after they arrived at the U.S. border in El Paso. A U.S. government escort handed over the 5-year-old child, identified on his travel documents as José, to the American woman whose family was entrusted with caring for him. He refused to take her hand. He did not cry. He was silent on the ride “home.” The first few nights, he cried himself to sleep. Then it turned into “just moaning and moaning,” said Janice, his foster mother. He recently slept through the night for the first time, though he still insists on tucking the family pictures under his pillow. José’s separation from his father is part of the Trump administration’s latest and most widely debated border enforcement policy. Last month, Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced that the government would criminally prosecute everyone who crossed the border illegally, a directive that is already leading to the breakup of hundreds of migrant families and channeling children into shelters and foster homes across the country. The goal, according to administration officials, is to discourage Central American families from making the perilous journey to the United States’ southwest border, where they have been arriving in swelling numbers this year to claim asylum. In just the first two weeks under President Donald Trump’s new policy, 638 parents who arrived with 658 children were prosecuted, administration officials told Congress. Kirstjen Nielsen, the homeland security secretary, emphasized that separating families was not the aim but merely the effect of a decision to step up prosecutions of those who cross the border illegally. “We do not have a policy to separate children from their parents. Our policy is, if you break the law we will prosecute you,” she told the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee on May 15. She said the Trump administration is doing a better job than its predecessors in ensuring that migrant children are placed with sponsors who are carefully screened. “We can make sure that the children go to people who are actually family members and who are not traffickers and who won’t abuse them,” she said. Whether the policy will succeed as a deterrent remains an open question. What is clear is that it is creating heartbreak and trauma for those subjected to it, with parents and children often unaware of one another’s whereabouts. Before the zero-tolerance policy was officially announced May 7, the Trump administration already had begun prosecuting some parents and sending their children to government shelters. KIND, an organization that provides minors with legal counsel, says it is aware of at least six children left behind after their parents were deported, including a 2-year-old girl. In several letters to the Department of Homeland Security, the American Academy of Pediatrics has urged an end to parentchild separation, which researchers have said can cause lifelong trauma in children. When the policy was unveiled, the academy’s president, Dr. Colleen Kraft, said she was dismayed at its “sweeping cruelty.” OSÉ’S LAST NAME and that of his foster family, as well as where they live, are not being published in order to protect their privacy. Since his arrival in Michigan, family members said, a day has not gone by when the boy has failed to ask in Spanish, “When will I see my papa?” They tell him the truth. They do not know. No one knows. José’s father is in detention, and parent and child until last week had not spoken since they were taken into the custody of U.S. authorities. “I am watching history happen before my eyes. It’s horrendous,” said Janice, 53. Janice, husband Chris, and their two teenage daughters have firsthand experience with underage migrants. They are among a number of families who have in recent years provided a temporary home, called transitional foster care, to minors seeking refuge in the United States, usually after fleeing violence and economic uncertainty in Honduras, El Salvador, or Guatemala. In the past two years, 12 children, including two sets of siblings, have occupied the room upstairs with its soothing white-andlight-blue walls and twin beds with colorful bedding. All had arrived in the United States alone and remained in the family’s care for a few weeks or months until a long-term sponsor already in the country, often a relative, was identified and cleared by the authorities to receive them. “They had access to their parents on a daily basis,” Janice said. “They talked to them on the phone. We have done video chats with Mom and Dad and siblings with every placement—except now.” José is the first child they have hosted who crossed the border with a parent, rather than alone, then was forcibly separated and left with no ability to contact them. On his flight to Michigan were two other Central American boys in similar circumstances who were placed with families.