The Trump administration ripped children, including infants, from asylum-seekers and other parents at the southern border and threw them into children’s detention centers, where staffers have subsequently been arrested for sexual abuse. These kids have been leaving U.S. custody traumatized—some are still in custody—and so afraid that they hide in their closets, thinking they’ll be separated once again. They are scarred, perhaps for life.
But in court this week, Department of Justice attorneys representing the administration in a lawsuit filed by a group of mothers separated from their children claimed the U.S. has no "constitutional duty" to pay for any mental health counseling for immigrant families and said they wanted the lawsuit thrown out. "The Government does not owe a free-standing duty to provide medical care to former detainees," said DOJ attorney Michael Heyse.
The audacity. We piloted and then officially implemented the policy, we stole your children, we threw them in cages, we threw you into one too, we didn’t bother to even note who was stolen from whom, federal agents mocked you while they did it, we’re still violating a judge’s decision ordering the return of these children to their families, and actually we’re still separating families, but if you had a rough time with all that, tough shit.
In a truly just world, not only would the victims of “zero tolerance” have all the resources they need to heal and restart their lives here, but they’d also see the perpetrators locked up. Newsweek wrote about the suffering of Guatemalan mom and plaintiff J.P. that she “had limited contact with her daughter and was found to have been suffering from symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression and anxiety, without being afforded access to mental health treatment while in federal custody.”
Children are still in U.S. custody, nearly 170 days past a federal judge’s reunification deadline, most because their parents have already been deported. Some of these parents have said that they don’t wish to be reunited with their children, perhaps in hope that they’ll have a chance at life here. Their journey here had to be worth something. Other kids are still detained because officials can no longer find their parents. Family separation remains a crisis.