US Officials Now Told to Ask Migrant Parents to Either Leave Country With or Without Children
U.S. Immigration Officials have new instructions for the implementation of the Trump administration's "zero tolerance" border policy, according to reports. They were allegedly told to give migrant parents the choice of either leaving the country with their children or be deported without them.
The difficult question comes by way of a government form, which appeared following an order from a court to reunite the more than 2,000 migrant children who were taken away from their families at the border.
Two choices, each to be selected via a signature, are reportedly presented to migrant parents, as obtained by NBC News. One is a request to be reunited with their child or children "for the purpose of repatriation to my country of citizenship."
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The other is to voluntarily ask to be returned to their native country without their minor child or children, who will then "remain in the United States to pursue available claims of relief."
The existence of this form was also confirmed by The Guardian as well. Both choices, it would be noted, all lead to the migrant parent being sent back to their native country, a choice that some call to be "misleading."
"The government is misleading parents into thinking they can only get their child back if they agree to removal," Lee Gelernt, a lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), said about the form. Gelernt also pointed out that the form did not provide a way for migrants to seek a recourse from a court to challenge their deportation.
The court order has raised concerns from both signs of an aisle, with a group of Democratic senators calling it "hastily signed." A letter from the group was addressed to the health and human services secretary, Alex Azar.
"We are deeply concerned by reports of chaotic attempts to reunify parents and children that have been separated at the border," the message stated, which was also addressed to the secretary of homeland security, Kirstjen Nielsen
