Despite an extensive search (12 minutes on Google), I have been unable to find an objective, fact-based summary of the policies and tactics of the U.S. Border forces with respect to the arrival of "families" that include children, and unaccompanied children presenting themselves at our Southern border.
There is an ongoing phenomenon of masses of people coming to the Border and seeking to enter the U.S., both legally and illegally. Under U.S. law, each entrant must be reviewed and either rejected or accepted. For those claiming "refugee" status, a hearing before a judge is required - a process that can take months or even a year. The vast majority of those seeking refugee status are rejected, due to the very limited bases for such status; mainly, that "wanting a better life" is not a recognized justification.
But a number of problems arise. What do we do with these people while we consider their final status? Must we house, feed, clothe, and care for hundreds of thousands of people who show up unannounced? At taxpayers' expense? And what do we do with children, either showing up alone or with adults (who may or may not be their parents)?
Several years ago, while President Obama was still in office, word went out that one's chances of being admitted into the country were MUCH BETTER if you came in with children, and the number of "families" increased literally five-fold in the years leading up to Trump's first full year in office. Often, it came to pass, these children were not the children of the adults they came with; they had been purchased or kidnapped for the purpose of improving the adults' chances of getting in.
Initially, it was deemed best to separate the children traveling with adults because (a) they might not even be the children of the adults, and (b) the chances of their being abused while housed with unrelated adults was unacceptable. It was analogous to adults being sent to jail in the states, where their children could certainly not be staying with them. Later that policy was changed to keep "families" together, although the kids presenting alone still had to be cared for by the U.S. government, in one way or another. Ideally, they would be placed with "Hispanic" volunteer foster families. But vetting of those volunteers proved problematic. Many were "illegals" themselves.
And a number of other problems arose. The facilities where these transients were kept were not sufficient for the dramatically increased number of people at the border, and the crowded conditions became fodder for "do-gooder" journalists and "activists" who wanted any cause at all to criticize President Trump and his Administration. Kids who were separated from their parents were housed in places all over "the fruited plain," and it was reported that some families were permanently separated. Some kids were placed in foster homes with "strangers," and were subsequently abused. People who were released into the U.S. pending hearings NEVER SHOWED UP for their hearings, thus adding to the fictitious "Eleven Million Illegals" (a ridiculously low number) already in the U.S.
So what SHOULD we have done? What should we be doing? Is it reasonable to expect extraordinary care be given to people who showed up unannounced, and in all likelihood have no legal justification to come in? Do the taxpayers get a vote on this?
If a family presents itself at the border and finds that the prospective conditions are unacceptable, are they not free to "go back where they came from"? Can we not presume that they consider the prospective conditions better than the alternative that they are fleeing? Even if they make American Leftists uncomfortable?
Thoughts? Feelings? Reactions?
There is an ongoing phenomenon of masses of people coming to the Border and seeking to enter the U.S., both legally and illegally. Under U.S. law, each entrant must be reviewed and either rejected or accepted. For those claiming "refugee" status, a hearing before a judge is required - a process that can take months or even a year. The vast majority of those seeking refugee status are rejected, due to the very limited bases for such status; mainly, that "wanting a better life" is not a recognized justification.
But a number of problems arise. What do we do with these people while we consider their final status? Must we house, feed, clothe, and care for hundreds of thousands of people who show up unannounced? At taxpayers' expense? And what do we do with children, either showing up alone or with adults (who may or may not be their parents)?
Several years ago, while President Obama was still in office, word went out that one's chances of being admitted into the country were MUCH BETTER if you came in with children, and the number of "families" increased literally five-fold in the years leading up to Trump's first full year in office. Often, it came to pass, these children were not the children of the adults they came with; they had been purchased or kidnapped for the purpose of improving the adults' chances of getting in.
Initially, it was deemed best to separate the children traveling with adults because (a) they might not even be the children of the adults, and (b) the chances of their being abused while housed with unrelated adults was unacceptable. It was analogous to adults being sent to jail in the states, where their children could certainly not be staying with them. Later that policy was changed to keep "families" together, although the kids presenting alone still had to be cared for by the U.S. government, in one way or another. Ideally, they would be placed with "Hispanic" volunteer foster families. But vetting of those volunteers proved problematic. Many were "illegals" themselves.
And a number of other problems arose. The facilities where these transients were kept were not sufficient for the dramatically increased number of people at the border, and the crowded conditions became fodder for "do-gooder" journalists and "activists" who wanted any cause at all to criticize President Trump and his Administration. Kids who were separated from their parents were housed in places all over "the fruited plain," and it was reported that some families were permanently separated. Some kids were placed in foster homes with "strangers," and were subsequently abused. People who were released into the U.S. pending hearings NEVER SHOWED UP for their hearings, thus adding to the fictitious "Eleven Million Illegals" (a ridiculously low number) already in the U.S.
So what SHOULD we have done? What should we be doing? Is it reasonable to expect extraordinary care be given to people who showed up unannounced, and in all likelihood have no legal justification to come in? Do the taxpayers get a vote on this?
If a family presents itself at the border and finds that the prospective conditions are unacceptable, are they not free to "go back where they came from"? Can we not presume that they consider the prospective conditions better than the alternative that they are fleeing? Even if they make American Leftists uncomfortable?
Thoughts? Feelings? Reactions?