Washington sources reported that US government has separated at least 2,000 children from parents at the Mexico border since implementing a policy that results in such family separations, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has confirmed. As per report from April 19 through May 31 of this year, 1,995 minors travelling with 1,940 adults who said they were the children’s guardians were separated due to the policy.
DHS spokesman Jonathan Hoffman as saying that the call was largely to defend the administration’s decision to charge every adult caught crossing the border illegally with federal crimes, as opposed to referring those with children mainly to immigration courts, as previous administrations did. This is because the government is charging the parents in the criminal justice system, children are separated from them, and with no clear procedure for their reunification aside from hotlines the parents can call to try to track their children down.
Moreover the policy to refer all adults for charges was publicly announced
on May 7, though the Justice Department announced it would prosecute 100% of
the cases referred to it at the beginning of April. A DHS official said “We
make decisions based on the ability to detain and the ability of courts to take
these cases, but we no longer exempt categories or classes of individuals”.
