FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 26, 2018

CONTACT
Hayley Burgess, [email protected], (202) 805-0375
Lindsay Toczylowski, [email protected], (213) 634-7181

National Immigration Law Center Demands Information from the Government about Treatment of Jailed Children

LOS ANGELES — The National Immigration Law Center today filed a Freedom of Immigration Act (FOIA) request on behalf of Immigrant Defenders Law Center (ImmDef) to demand that the government shed light on whether its treatment of jailed immigrant children and their parents accords with U.S. law. This move comes after ImmDef was repeatedly cut off from its clients, notwithstanding their due process rights. In several cases, Imm Def has learned that its clients were sent to be reunited in family jails, potentially subjecting these children to prolonged and unnecessary incarceration.

The FOIA request seeks information about the government’s policies, practices, and contracts governing “Stage II” of the government’s family reunification efforts. This includes policies governing how reunited families’ immigration cases are treated, and whether and how these families are allowed to pursue alternatives to incarceration.

“The Trump administration has done nothing but obfuscate and mislead the American public throughout this whole manufactured crisis, and we — along with these children — deserve the truth,” said Josh Rosenthal, a staff attorney with the National Immigration Law Center. “All of us, regardless of where we were born or how old we are, have the right to be treated fairly under the law. ImmDef’s experience with this administration makes it clear that these children’s rights are not being protected — and we need to know why.”

The groups have asked for the government to provide information in an expedited way, citing the growing urgency of the situation these children face.

“We are representing parents and children impacted by these policies, but instead of a government that protects families, our clients have encountered a government that puts its draconian agenda over their well-being,” said Lindsay Toczylowski, executive director of the Immigrant Defenders Law Center. “The government’s practices of moving our clients without notice and stopping all communication between client and attorney would be an abhorrent miscarriage of justice in any instance. The fact that the government is showing such callous disregard for its own laws and policies regarding the treatment of children and families seeking reunification is even more appalling.”

This FOIA request was filed shortly after the deadline a U.S. district court in San Diego had set for the federal government to reunite families it had forcibly separated. Current estimates indicate that only 34 percent of families have been reunited, and several hundred parents have been deported without their children.

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