nonsense of having to accept tens of thousands of UACs at the border.

Sec. Nielsen evidently was referring to these decisions:

As Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen noted at the meeting, there are two provisions of immigration law that require border authorities to handle UACs and family units differently than other illegal immigrants they detain. The policies were meant to reduce human trafficking and guarantee the humane treatment of migrant children, but they also incentivize illegal immigration, according to the Trump administration.
“These loopholes create a pull factor that invites more illegal immigration and encourages parents to pay and entrust their children to criminal organizations that will smuggle them in,” the White House said in a statement last week.


The first policy is not actually an act of Congress, but a Supreme Court-ordered settlement from 1997. Known as the Flores consent decree, the agreement requires immigration authorities to release alien minors from immigration detention without “unnecessary delay” and to place them in the “least restrictive setting” possible. In practice, this usually means with a parent or other relative already in the U.S.

The other policy comes from a 2008 update to the Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act, which lays out special procedures for alien minors from countries other than Mexico and Canada. The law requires immigration authorities to transfer UACs to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) for care and processing, part of which entails guaranteeing to the “greatest extent practicable” pro bono legal counsel.
As a result of this legal framework, UACs from the so-called Northern Triangle countries of Central America — Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador — are frequently released into the custody of family members or other sponsors in the interior of the country, many of whom who are illegal aliens themselves. Once resettled, the majority of UACs never show up for immigration court dates: About two-thirds of all removal orders for UACs from 2015 to 2017 resulted from a failure to appear for a hearing, according to immigration authorities.(http://dailycaller.com/2018/02/06/trump-says-these-two-loopholes-force-us-to-accept-ms-13-killers-at-the-border/)


I guess the US Supreme Court upheld the Flores v Reno decision. And the other is from a Congressional Act. I do know, however, that the customary international rule is that countries want to get their wandering minors back. That's why there are international conventions regarding the diplomatic protocol to return them. I think the Trump administration could make a good case that they are bound by international treaties to return unaccompanied minors, but just like DACA, the US DOJ would have to request a review from SCOTUS.


I heard that statement from Kjiersten Nielsen.