Mothers Separated From Children At Border To Sue Trump Administration: ‘To Have Us Separated Was An Injustice.”
Lawyers for the families are set to argue that the U.S. government intended to inflict emotional distress on them. They plan to make that assertion under a law that allows individuals to sue the U.S. government for negligence and misconduct. “The government clearly intended to inflict emotional distress,'' said Erik Walsh, a lawyer with the Washington, D.C.-based law firm Arnold & Porter. News on the border crisis also looks at: how an asylum ban could worsen overcrowding; many teens in Florida released to families; and an agent's alleged harassment of a mother, as well.
Los Angeles Times:
Immigrant Moms May Sue Trump Administration For Border Separations
Like thousands of Central American parents seeking asylum in the United States, Patricia panicked when, after she and her son crossed the Rio Grande into Texas last year, U.S. border agents took the boy away. For weeks, she was crushed by fears that then-6-year-old Alessandro was lost forever. Though they were eventually reunited, Patricia isn’t ready to put the past behind her. She wants the U.S. government to pay for her family’s ordeal, and she has become part of a novel legal strategy to achieve that goal. (Chabria, 7/17)
The Associated Press:
Asylum Ban May Further Strain Immigrant Detention Facilities
A new policy to deny asylum to anyone who shows up on the Mexican border after traveling through another country threatens to exacerbate overcrowding at severely strained U.S. immigration detention centers and makeshift holding areas. Photos and video of Vice President Mike Pence's visit Friday to McAllen, Texas, showing men crammed behind chain-link fences offered the latest glimpse into squalid conditions at Customs and Border Protection facilities. Women are being held in smaller tents at the station. (7/17)
The Associated Press:
Florida Migrant Teen Detention Center Sees Dramatic Downsize
The nation's largest facility for migrant children has released hundreds of teens to relatives in recent days, easing overcrowding at the South Florida center that has come under intense criticism from Democratic lawmakers who call it cramped and regimented. The company that runs the Homestead facility, Caliburn International, said it has released 500 teenagers since Friday under newly relaxed federal requirements for reuniting the children with relatives living in the U.S. (7/17)
The Washington Post:
Border Agent In Clint Accused Of Harassing Mother Of 12-Year-Old Migrant Who Was In Custody
A U.S. Customs and Border Protection agent allegedly sought out an undocumented Guatemalan woman living in California, sent her Facebook messages and asked her to watch a live video of him masturbating — all while her 12-year-old son was in custody at the Border Patrol station in Clint, Tex., where he worked, according to an April complaint filed with CBP and interviews with the mother. (Hauslohner and Sacchetti, 7/17)
