DHS announces new rules to detain illegal immigrant families Plan would curtail cou
DHS announces new rules to detain illegal immigrant families
Plan would curtail court scrutiny
https://twt-thumbs.washtimes.com/med...67caf570fb3fcc
Thursday, September 6, 2018
The Trump administration moved to regain control of the immigration detention system Thursday, proposing new rules that would allow them to hold parents and children together in facilities until they’re either deported or win their cases.
Once finalized, the proposal would also end some of the intrusive court oversight of the treatment of children, and return decision-making to the administration, which for years has had its hands tied by judges’ orders.
The 203-page proposal, published online by the Federal Register, establishes minimum standards of care for all illegal immigrant juveniles, including those who come to the border with parents and the Unaccompanied Alien Children (UAC) who show up without parents.
Most of the protections already in place will be continued, with UAC still released to sponsors as quickly as possible.
But families who show up at the border could now be detained together under the new rules, which supersede a 2015 court order that requires them to be released after just 20 days.
The administration hopes that change can help stem the flow of illegal immigrant families — and those posing as families — who have streamed north in recent years, hoping to take advantage of the 20-day policy.
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“Today, legal loopholes significantly hinder the department’s ability to appropriately detain and promptly remove family units that have no legal basis to remain in the country,” said Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen. “This rule addresses one of the primary pull factors for illegal immigration and allows the federal government to enforce immigration laws as passed by Congress.”
She issued the new proposal along with Health Secretary Alex Azar. Care of the children is shared by both departments.
The proposal drew immediate fire from Democrats, who said they don’t want to see illegal immigrants families detained at all.
“This decision will create worse conditions for these children and will inevitably leave lasting psychological footprints,” said Rep. Joaquin Castro, Texas Democrat.
Yet the Trump policy is the same one the Obama administration had tried to pursue, with officials saying that releasing families into the community usually means they disappear into the shadows, joining the 11 million other illegal immigrants already inside the country.
Earlier this year, the Trump administration tried a different approach with its zero-tolerance border policy. Under that policy the government pursued criminal charges against illegal immigrant parents nabbed jumping the border — and since there are no family facilities in federal jails, the children had to be separated.
Public outcry and judicial intervention put a halt to zero tolerance, and sent the administration back to look for other answers to the surge of illegal immigrant families.
Analysts say those families are being drawn apart by disparate treatment.
Under the system imposed by a federal judge in 2015, children caught jumping the border with parents generally have to be released within 20 days — and since they were usually to be released to parents, the entire family was set free into the community.
The Obama administration warned at the time that would create a surge of families — and would even encourage abductions of children as single adults attempted to portray themselves as families.
That is, in fact, what happened, with a massive increase this year in reports of bogus families attempting to enter at the border.
Thursday’s new regulations are long overdue. A 2001 addendum to the original Flores settlement called for them, but neither the Bush nor Obama administrations followed through.
Under that deal, the Flores Settlement is automatically terminated 45 days after the regulations are finalized.
That would end the involvement of U.S. District Judge Dolly M. Gee, who has overseen Flores compliance for years, and who imposed the 20-day release condition, among other limits on the government.
Judge Gee is currently poised to appoint a special monitor to report to her on conditions in detention facilities.
https://amp.washingtontimes.com/news...gal-immigrant/
