On Friday, Democrats in the House and Senate called for new investigations into the Trump administration’s policy of child separations at the southern border. This came in light of newly public information in an inspector General report on the implementation of the separations, as well as a leaked draft memo outlining government intent in these policies. Republicans should stand by their colleagues and demand answers.
The Inspector General for the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services’s report, released Thursday, revealed that the government had separated thousands more children at the border than previously acknowledged, that the separations began months before the policy was announced, and that the program was so mismanaged that “the total number of children separated from a parent or guardian by immigration authorities is unknown.”
As the report explains, “thousands of children may have been separated during an influx that began in 2017, before the accounting required by the court, and HHS has faced challenges in identifying separated children.”
The report also noted that even after President Trump, facing public outcry, ended the policy in June 2018, separations continued.
The failures documented in the report also include, for example, a lack of a unified tracking system for separated families and even after the court ordered that children be reunited, that separated children “were still being identified more than five months after the original court order to do so.” Those findings were compounded by a leaked draft memo on the separation policy shared with Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., by a whistleblower, which contained a significant amount of misleading and false information. The suggested policies outlined in that memo offer a dizzying array of ideas to stack hardships on individuals, including children and often contrary to existing laws and protections, who crossed the border.
Under the heading “SHORT TERM (next 30 days) OPTIONS”, the first bullet point, for example, reads: “Increase Prosecution of Family Unit Parents: Instruct CBP and ICE to work with DOJ to significantly increase the prosecutions of family unit parents when they are encountered at the border.”
The explicit goal of that policy, already in effect “on a limited basis in the El Paso Sector,” is to criminally charge parents, holding them in custody while designating children as unaccompanied minors and placing them in the custody of Health and Human Services. The last sentence of that section makes the goal clear: “The increase in prosecutions would be reported by the media and it would have substantial deterrent effect.”
The second point is even more explicit, titled: “Separate Family Units.” That point goes on to outline what eventually became the policy of child separations: “Announce that DHS is considering separating family units, placing the adult in adult detention, and placing the minors under the age of 18 in the custody of HHS as unaccompanied alien children.”
Another short-term idea floated in the memo includes changing the designation of children classified as unaccompanied minors to deny them access to legal protections. Next to that suggestion, an edited comment reads: “This is one of the easiest decisions anyone will ever have to make. There is absolutely no reason not to change this misguided policy.”
Other policy options included the collection of fingerprints of sponsors for unaccompanied minors, expansion of ICE detention facilities, holding of children for longer than 20 days, expanding expedited removal, and even reforming the Trafficking in Victims Protection Reauthorization Act to cut protections for minors, including those subject to abuse, neglect, or abandonment.
Importantly, while these policies were explicitly outlined in December 2017, government officials were still denying their existence despite evidence to the contrary in June 2018:
We do not have a policy of separating families at the border. Period.
— Sec. Kirstjen Nielsen (@SecNielsen) June 17, 2018
The findings from both documents point to a deliberate and systematic government policy that created chaos and left young children literally lost in a negligent and overwhelmed bureaucracy — problems that were covered up and denied in lies to Congress and the public.
As the documents make plain, there are clear and valid reasons for concern over the policy of child separations at the border. That is exactly the sort of government abuse that lawmakers of all political leanings should be intent on investigating.
Republicans must not leave fighting such abuse to the Democrats.
Instead, they must join Merkley, who has asked for the FBI to investigate alleged perjury by DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, who testified under that that there was no policy of separations. They must also support the now-Democratic controlled House Committee on Energy on Commerce that has requested documents from HHS as part of its investigation into the handling of child separations.
After all, fighting the unacceptable treatment of children must be a bipartisan issue.
