A family of asylum-seekers who were torn apart under the inhumane and illegal Remain in Mexico policy were reunited in the U.S. last week after the Trump administration agreed to settle a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts over the family’s separation. “I feel tremendous happiness,” dad Hanz Morales said in a statement. “I am very happy to be with my wife and my daughters, and I feel safe because I am in a safe country with all of my family. This is a great blessing that God has made possible.”
Morales survived being shot four times before he, his wife Maudy Constanza, and their three children fled Guatemala last year. But while Constanza and their two girls were allowed into the U.S., Morales and their son became two of the roughly 60,000 asylum-seekers forced to wait out their immigration court cases in Mexico under the administration’s policy. They would remain separated for nearly seven months until their reunion in Boston on Friday.
The ACLU of Massachusetts said in announcing the lawsuit last month that U.S. officials had threatened Morales with permanent separation from his family unless he followed their orders. “After returning involuntarily to Mexico, the father and son spent several days in extremely perilous conditions, surviving an attempted kidnapping, and going hungry when it was too dangerous to go out to buy food,” the organization said. “While they eventually found shelter farther from the border, they continued to live mostly in hiding.”
Human Rights First has tracked nearly 820 public reports of murder, torture, rape, kidnapping, and other violence against asylum-seekers returned to Mexico under the Migrant Protection Protocols policy, including over 200 publicly reported cases of kidnapping or attempted kidnapping targeting children who have been returned with their families. “Far from providing ‘protection’ for migrants and asylum-seekers,” the ACLU of Massachusetts said, “this unprecedented policy has exposed people to severe risk of violence and persecution.”
The administration agreed to settle the ACLU of Massachusetts’ lawsuit, allowing Morales and his son to return to the U.S., where they reunited with Constanza and the two girls as supporters cheered and wept. In video released by the ACLU of Massachusetts, Constanza turns to the camera to thank advocates for helping reunite her family before becoming too overwhelmed to continue speaking.
While this is an important win, this family still faces an uncertain future in immigration court, while thousands of others continue to be subject to this policy. Advocates pledged to continue fighting for them. “We are thrilled that this family has been reunited after nearly seven months apart,” said ACLU of Massachusetts executive director Carol Rose. “This Trump administration policy is one of many meant to separate families and inflict pain on those who seek our protection. No family should be forced to go through that, yet many are facing that same trauma right now. The ACLU remains committed to ending this policy once and for all.”