GOP senators push for clarification on migrant family separations

Republican senators Jeff Flake (Ariz.) and Susan Collins (Maine) asked the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) on Saturday for clarification on the Trump administration’s policy of separating migrant families apprehended at the southern border.

Flake and Collins sent DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen and HHS Secretary Alex Azar a letter asking for clarity on the administration’s procedures and justifications for separating migrant children from their parents.

“We write regarding the safety and security of young children immigrating to the United States,” the senators wrote. “Secretary Nielsen recently appeared before the U.S. Senate and testified that immigrant parents and children who present themselves at U.S. ports of entry to request asylum will not be separated. Despite Secretary Nielsen’s testimony, a number of media outlets have reported instances where parents and children seeking asylum at a port of entry have been separated.”{mosads}

The two questioned whether deterrence was a motivation for separating migrant families and asked for details about DHS’s procedures for processing asylum applications from families.

Flake and Collins also requested information on procedures for keeping parents informed of their children’s whereabouts and welfare, as well as training protocols for those processing, transporting or caring for detained children “to make the separation process less traumatic.“

In a statement released Sunday announcing the co-signed letter, Flake wrote that protecting young children is a “longstanding priority” in the U.S. 

“Ensuring the safety and security of young children is a longstanding priority of the American legal system. In asylum cases, it is especially important to keep families together when neither the child nor the parent has violated any laws,” Flake wrote. “Contrary to what DHS has indicated as proper procedure, we are currently seeing cases where immigrant families seeking asylum are separated after lawfully presenting themselves at a U.S. port of entry.”

Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” policy last month, stating that federal agents would aggressively prosecute adults attempting to cross the U.S.–Mexico border illegally. The policy has led to thousands of separations as a result of adults having to be prosecuted separately.

Sessions, upon announcing the new policy, acknowledged it would likely lead to more family separations, but said it was meant to deter future immigrants from attempting to make the journey across Mexico to the U.S.