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Family separations at US border plagued by problems, watchdog finds
Source: The Guardian and agencies
Family separations at US border plagued by problems, watchdog finds
Efforts to track children separated from families undermined by communication problems that raise serious questions
Guardian staff and agencies
Fri 6 Mar 2020 11.00 GMT
The Trump administration’s effort to track children the US authorities separated from their families at the US-Mexico border is plagued by communication problems that raise questions about the accuracy of the data, a watchdog reported on Thursday.
The administration created the tracking system following its “zero tolerance” policy on immigration in 2018 where more than 2,500 children were forcibly separated from their parents at the southern border – though the watchdog has estimated that figure could be much higher.
Immigration officials have continued to separate some children from their parents at the border for certain reasons including a parent’s suspected criminal history, and have said the tracking system will help avoid some of the chaos, confusion and trauma suffered by separated children.
According to court figures at least 955 children were separated between June 2018 and July 2019.
But that tracking system is flawed, in part because details about whether separation from parents occurred are not automatically transmitted between federal agencies, from US Customs and Border Protection, which manages the border, to Health and Human Services (HHS), which deals with migrant children, the HHS Office of the Inspector General, reported.
-snip-
Efforts to track children separated from families undermined by communication problems that raise serious questions
Guardian staff and agencies
Fri 6 Mar 2020 11.00 GMT
The Trump administration’s effort to track children the US authorities separated from their families at the US-Mexico border is plagued by communication problems that raise questions about the accuracy of the data, a watchdog reported on Thursday.
The administration created the tracking system following its “zero tolerance” policy on immigration in 2018 where more than 2,500 children were forcibly separated from their parents at the southern border – though the watchdog has estimated that figure could be much higher.
Immigration officials have continued to separate some children from their parents at the border for certain reasons including a parent’s suspected criminal history, and have said the tracking system will help avoid some of the chaos, confusion and trauma suffered by separated children.
According to court figures at least 955 children were separated between June 2018 and July 2019.
But that tracking system is flawed, in part because details about whether separation from parents occurred are not automatically transmitted between federal agencies, from US Customs and Border Protection, which manages the border, to Health and Human Services (HHS), which deals with migrant children, the HHS Office of the Inspector General, reported.
-snip-
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/mar/06/trump-border-separations-children-mexico-watchdog
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Related: Communication and Management Challenges Impeded HHS’s Response to the Zero-Tolerance Policy (U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services OIG)