WASHINGTON (VR) – The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) estimates that 60,000 unaccompanied alien children (UAC) will try to enter the country during Fiscal Year 2014, which runs from October 1st 2013 to September 30, 2014. This is a significant increase from a yearly average of 6,800 unaccompanied minors between the years of 2004 and 2011. HHS also estimates that 70,000 refugees, along with 55,000 asylees and other entrants are expected to arrive in the U.S. this year.
Unaccompanied children numbers began to skyrocket to crisis proportions in 2012 rising to 13,000 and then with 24,000 in 2013, according to a report on the issue by the Migration and Refugee Services of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (MRS/USCCB).
“The vast majority of children are from Central America with Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras being the top sending countries”, explained Wendy Young, the Executive Director of Kids in Need of Defense (KIND), which is an organization that aims to protect UACs entering the U.S. immigration system and ensure they have representation.
She made her comments at a recent panel discussion, held by the Migration Policy Institute in Washington D.C. to introduce an analytical report entitled A Treacherous Journey: Child Migrants Navigating the U.S. Immigration System about the problems unaccompanied minors face when arriving in the United States. The report was authored by KIND and the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies (CGRS).
“Kids come to the U.S. for a range of reasons,” Young said, “including abuse in their homes, violations of their rights as children, trafficking, severe deprivation, and increasingly to escape escalating violence in their home countries caused primarily by transnational gangs and other criminal elements”.
Two undocumented El Salvadoran children, ages four and seven, are cared for by the Beta Group in Mexico as their deportation is processed. They were traveling through Mexico en route to the U.S. Photo credit: © AFP.
The report by a delegation from MRS/USCCB, which traveled to Central America and southern Mexico, states that the primary reason behind the flight of unaccompanied minors north is “generalized violence” and “a corresponding breakdown in the rule of law” while a “perfect storm” of other factors, such as economic conditions and lack of access to education contributed.
In Guatemala, for example, “the demise of the coffee industry in recent years has contributed to the outflow of child migrants.” In February of 2013, Guatemala declared a national coffee emergency due to a fungus called “coffee rust” (or Hemileia vastatrix), that kills plants by withering their leaves and has affected 70 percent of the country’s coffee crop, according the Associated Press.
Honduras, the report said, has been affected by a general malaise caused by bad governance, increasing violence, and “a breakdown in the rule of law”. Between 2005 and 2010 homicide rates in Honduras more than doubled, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.
Meanwhile, El Salvador has been particularly adversely affected by U.S. economic troubles because it relies on remittances for so much of its economic well-being. The World Bank states that almost 17 percent of GDP from 2009 to 2013 came from remittances of family members living in other countries, such as the United States.
Ronald, five years old, walks covered by El Salvador’s national flag, which is held by his mother and other protesters, during a rally in front of the United States embassy in San Salvador 05 April 2006. Photo: © AFP/Yuri CORTEZ.
Young said that the children’s “voyages are harrowing with many… facing sexual violence and other abuses as they move.” MRS/USCCB states that drug traffickers, human traffickers, and law enforcement officials all pose significant threats to the livelihood of unaccompanied youths on their way north. Gangs will charge money for them to ride on trains “throwing them off when they cannot pay”. Children are sometimes forced into indentured servitude to pay off human smugglers that helped them come into the United States or forced to “provide sex to ‘clients’ along the way”.
“But the perils they face do not end at the US border”, said Young. First, border patrol takes them into custody. Then they are turned over to the Office of Refugee Resettlement. From there, they go into deportation proceedings and have to defend themselves against removal from the United States.
“And here is where the gaps in child protection that still remain in our immigration system remain most evident. First, unaccompanied children are not appointed counsel. They remain heavily dependent on pro bono attorneys to represent them. Estimates are that more than half of children appear in immigration court without representation”, said Young.
Elizabeth Dallam, the National Legal Services Director at KIND, told Radio VR that the number of unaccompanied children arriving in the United States constitutes a “humanitarian crisis” and a “refugee-like” situation.
She coauthored the KIND/CGRS report, A Treacherous Journey: Child Migrants Navigating the U.S. Immigration System, along with Lisa Frydman, CGRS Associate Director and Managing Attorney, and Blaine Bookey, CGRS Associate Director and Staff Attorney.
A boys shows a US flag as President Barack Obama speaks on immigration at the Chamizal National Memorial on May 10, 2011 in El Paso, Texas. Photo credit: © AFP PHOTO/Jewel Samad.
The report introduces some solutions to the current crisis and says that the ‘best interests standard’ should be implemented in immigration proceedings, which is a doctrine used to determine a child’s well-being. It also states that an independent child advocate should be appointed. This would be a person that has more of a social services background and can look at the case from a child welfare perspective.
It’s crucial to provide children with legal counsel and funding for that counsel should be provided by the government, according to the report. In email correspondence with Radio VR, Dallam argued that the government should provide funding for attorneys for humanitarian reasons and because it would “enable our immigration court system to operate more efficiently and effectively, saving valuable government resources. It would also ensure that no child in the United States appears in court alone”.
Often times a case is continued and not adjudicated properly because judges do not feel comfortable making a ruling when a child has no representation, according to Dallam.
In response to an inquiry made by Radio VR to the Department of Justice’s Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) about what they plan to do about the predicted major influx of children this year, Kathryn Mattingly from the Office of Legislative and Public Affairs said that “EOIR constantly monitors its caseload nationwide and shifts resources to meet needs in the most efficient possible manner”. She also said that beginning “in the 1990s, EOIR established ‘juvenile dockets’ throughout the country to facilitate consistency, encourage child-friendly courtroom practices, and promote pro bono representation for unaccompanied alien children”, and that immigration judges are provided with training “related to children”.
Considering the exponential increase in unaccompanied minors expected to show up at U.S. borders this year and shortfalls in the EOIR’s current system as outlined by Kids in Need of Defense and the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies, one would hope a more detailed strategy is on the horizon.
Family members reunite through bars and mesh of the U.S.-Mexico border fence at Friendship Park on November 17, 2013 in San Diego, California. Photo credit: © John Moore/Getty Images/AFP.
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees plans to release a report later this week on their findings as to why unaccompanied children are fleeing the region in such high numbers.
