{"id":14145,"date":"2018-09-07T02:23:01","date_gmt":"2018-09-07T02:23:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=14145"},"modified":"2018-09-07T02:23:01","modified_gmt":"2018-09-07T02:23:01","slug":"trump-administration-to-sidestep-limits-on-child-detention","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=14145","title":{"rendered":"Trump administration to sidestep limits on child detention"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The Trump administration is seeking to allow US authorities to keep immigrant children in detention longer than the current 20-day limit, a move critics denounced as “sickening” and “cruel”.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The US government said on Thursday it will abandon a longstanding federal court agreement that limits how long immigrant children can be kept locked up.<\/p>\n

“Today, legal loopholes significantly hinder the … ability to appropriately detain and promptly remove family units that have no legal basis to remain in the country,” Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The announcement also proposed new rules that would allow US authorities to detain minors during their\u00a0<\/span>immigration<\/a>\u00a0proceedings.<\/span><\/p>\n

The regulations aim to end the Flores settlement, a 1997 court ruling that dictates the length of time and under what conditions immigrant children may be detained.<\/p>\n

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Trump administration struggling to find deported parents<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n

The agreement requires the government to place children with a close relative or family friend “without unnecessary delay”, instead of detaining them, or to keep children already in custody in the “least restrictive conditions” possible.<\/p>\n

Thousands separated<\/h2>\n

The Flores agreement became an issue earlier this year when the Trump administration adopted a “zero-tolerance policy” of prosecuting anyone caught crossing illegally.<\/p>\n

More than 2,900 children were separated from their parents, prompting international outrage and leading a federal judge to order reunification of the families<\/a> in June.<\/p>\n

More than 500 children were still separated from their parents in late August, according to reports.<\/p>\n

The Trump administration plans to publish new regulations in the Federal Register on Friday, which will replace the Flores settlement.<\/p>\n

The proposed regulations will also allow the Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agency to detain children in facilities not licensed by state authorities to hold minors, a\u00a0<\/span>publicly available copy said<\/a>.<\/p>\n

‘Trauma for children’<\/h2>\n

Representative Paul Ryan, the highest ranking Republican in the US House of Representatives, said he “just heard about it [proposed regulations] this morning”.<\/p>\n

“My position’s been really clear about this: we should not be separating people at the border. I believe that the administration also agrees,” Ryan said.<\/p>\n

The move angered immigrant rights activists and is likely to trigger another round of court battles.<\/p>\n

“It is sickening to see the United States government looking for ways to jail more children for longer,” said Omar Jadwat, director of the American Civil Liberties Union\u2019s Immigrants’ Rights Project.<\/p>\n

“And it’s yet another example of the Trump administration’s hostility toward immigrants resulting in a policy incompatible with the most basic human values.”<\/p>\n

Jadwat accused the administration of “trying to expand the trauma it is inflicting on these children in order to deter other people from coming to the country”.<\/p>\n

Rachel Prandini, staff attorney at the Immigrant Legal Resource Center, told The Associated Press the erosion of Flores’ protections would subject children to worsening conditions.<\/p>\n

“The Trump administration’s decision to exacerbate the suffering of kids – by imposing the cruel policy of family separation earlier this summer and now with this rule change to vastly expand detention of children – is horrifying,” she said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\n SOURCE: Al Jazeera and news agencies<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Trump administration is seeking to allow US authorities to keep immigrant children in detention longer than the current 20-day limit, a move critics denounced as “sickening” and “cruel”.\u00a0 The US government said on Thursday it will abandon a longstanding federal court agreement that limits how long immigrant children can be kept locked up. “Today,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":14146,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14145","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14145","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14145"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14145\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/14146"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}