McALLEN: A federal judge on Friday will hear a Trump administration request to end a nearly three-decade-old policy on ensuring safe conditions for immigrant children held in federal custody.
US District Judge Dolly Gee in Los Angeles will hold a hearing to consider dissolving a policy that limits how long Customs and Border Protection can hold immigrant children and that requires them to be kept in safe and sanitary conditions. The policy also allows third-party inspections of CBP facilities that hold immigrant children to ensure compliance.
Advocates for immigrant children have asked the judge to keep the protections and oversight in place and have submitted firsthand accounts from immigrants in family detention who described adults fighting children for clean water, despondent toddlers and a child with swollen feet who was denied a medical exam.
In its motion, President Donald Trump’s administration said the government has made substantial changes since the Flores agreement was formalized in 1997. The government said it has created standards and policies governing the custody of immigrant children that conform to legislation and the agreement.
Conditions for immigrant children who enter the US without a parent “have substantially improved from those that precipitated this suit four decades ago,” the government wrote in its motion.
The agreement, named for a teenage plaintiff, governs the conditions for all immigrant children in US custody, including those traveling alone or with their parents. It also limits how long CBP can detain child immigrants to 72 hours. The US Department of Health and Human Services then takes custody of the children.
The Biden administration successfully pushed to partially end the agreement last year. Gee ruled that special court supervision may end when HHS takes custody, but she carved out exceptions for certain types of facilities for children with more acute needs.
Advocates for the children say the government is holding children beyond the time limits set out in the agreement. In March and April, CPB reported that it had 213 children in custody for more than 72 hours and that 14 children, including toddlers, were held for over 20 days in April. As part of their court filings, they included testimony from several families who were held in family detention centers in Texas.
If the judge terminates the settlement, the detention centers would be closed to third-party inspections.
The federal government is looking to expand its immigration detention space, including by building more centers like one in Florida dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz,” where a lawsuit alleges detainees’ constitutional rights are being violated.
Judge to consider the fate of an agreement on protecting immigrant children in US custody
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Judge to consider the fate of an agreement on protecting immigrant children in US custody
- The Flores settlement limits how long Customs and Border Protection can hold immigrant children and requires safe conditions
- Advocates argue the protections are necessary and have submitted accounts of poor conditions in detention centers
Hundreds rally in Paris to support Ukraine after four years of war
- Demonstrators chanted: “We support Ukraine against Putin, who is killing it“
- “Frozen Russian assets must be confiscated, they belong to Ukraine“
PARIS: Around one thousand took to the streets of Paris on Saturday to show their “massive support” for Ukraine, just days before the fourth anniversary of Russia’s invasion.
Demonstrators marching through the French capital chanted: “We support Ukraine against Putin, who is killing it,” and “Frozen Russian assets must be confiscated, they belong to Ukraine.”
“In public opinion, there is massive support for Ukraine that has not wavered since the first day of the full-scale invasion” by the Russian army on February 24, 2022, European Parliament member Raphael Glucksmann, told AFP.
“On the other hand, in the French political class, sounds of giving up are starting to emerge. On both the far left and the far right, voices of capitulation are getting louder and louder,” he added.
In the crowd, Irina Kryvosheia, a Ukrainian who arrived in France several years ago, “thanked with all her heart the people present.”
She said they reminded “everyone that what has been happening for four years is not normal, it is not right.”
Kryvosheia said she remains in daily contact with her parents in Kyiv, who told her how they were deprived “for several days” of heating, electricity and running water following intense bombardments by the Russian army.
Francois Grunewald, head of “Comite d’Aide Medicale Ukraine,” had just returned from a one-month mission in the country, where the humanitarian organization has delivered around forty generators since the beginning of the year.
Russia’s full-scale invasion sent shockwaves around the world and triggered the bloodiest and most destructive conflict in Europe since World War II.
The war has seen tens of thousands of civilians and hundreds of thousands of military personnel killed on both sides. Millions of refugees have fled Ukraine, where vast areas have been devastated by fighting.
Russia occupies nearly 20 percent of Ukrainian territory and its heavy attacks on the country’s energy sites have sparked a major energy crisis.
