Washington DC - Today, U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, joined U.S. Senator Jon Ossoff (D-GA) and 33 other senators in a letter demanding the Trump Administration ensures legal representation for children caught up in the immigration system. In their letter to Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum, the senators urged the administration to continue legal services for unaccompanied children caught up in the immigration system as required by law. Earlier this month, the Trump Administration issued a stop work order to organizations that provide legal services for unaccompanied children. Last week, following public pressure, the order was rescinded.
“Pausing or terminating the provision of legal services to unaccompanied children under this contract runs directly counter to the requirements of the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA) and places 26,000 unaccompanied children at increased risk of trafficking, exploitation, and other harm,” the senators wrote to Secretaries Kennedy and Burgum. “The TVPRA, passed by Congress in 2008 on a bipartisan basis, requires the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to ensure, to the greatest extent practicable, that all unaccompanied children have counsel to represent them in legal proceedings and protect them from mistreatment, exploitation, and trafficking.”
De acuerdo a un reporte by the Guardian this month, the organizations affected by the previous stop work order provide legal counsel for around 26,000 unaccompanied minors.
“Cutting off access to legal services makes it more likely that the government will lose track of unaccompanied children, given the challenges such children would face in independently appearing for immigration court hearings, submitting address updates, or otherwise communicating with immigration authorities,” the group of senators continued. “Not only will this make children more vulnerable to trafficking, but it will also create further inefficiencies in an already backlogged immigration court system.”
Joining Sens. Murray and Ossoff in sending the letter were Senators Mazie Hirono (D-HI), Ron Wyden (D-OR), Dick Durbin (D-IL), Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Michael Bennet (D-CO), Chris Coons (D-DE), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), Martin Heinrich (D-NM), Angus King (I-ME), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Ed Markey (D-MA), Cory Booker (D-NJ), Gary Peters (D-MI), Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV), Jacky Rosen (D-NV), Mark Kelly (D-AZ), John Hickenlooper (D-CO), Alex Padilla (D-CA), Reverend Raphael Warnock (D-GA), Peter Welch (D-VT), Adam Schiff (D-CA), Andy Kim (D-NJ), and Lisa Blunt Rochester (D-DE).
El texto completo de la carta está disponible. AQUÍ.
El senador Murray tiene defendido comprehensive and humane immigration reform throughout her Senate career, repeatedly emprendedor por legislative solutions that would offer a fair pathway to citizenship for the more than 11 million undocumented immigrants living in America, including Dreamers, farmworkers, and those with Temporary Protected Status. During Trump’s first administration, Senator Murray helped lead the charge in pushing back against Trump’s appalling treatment of migrant children and families at the southern border— cosponsoring the Ley del Día Justo en la Corte para Niños, which would require unaccompanied children and vulnerable individuals to be provided with legal assistance during immigration court proceedings, the Ley de Alto a la Crueldad hacia los Niños Migrantes to end family separations at the border, and legislación to prevent the separation of families at sensitive locations such as schools, religious institutions, and hospitals, among many other efforts.
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