U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement plan to open a national hotline to help law enforcement agencies track down unaccompanied minors. The children will either be deported or placed in detention centers.
ICE said there is an immediate need for this around-the-clock call center. The call center is estimated to receive around 6,000 to 7,000 calls daily. The call center is set to open in Nashville, Tennessee, in March of next year and be fully operational by June. This move comes with the Trump administration’s border immigration crackdown.
The U.S. government defines an unaccompanied minor as someone who is under the age of 18, has no legal immigration status and has no parent or guardian in the country to care for them.
The government is getting backlash from immigration advocates about the call center. Michael Lukens, who is the executive director for the Amica Center for Immigrant Rights, which is a group that represents unaccompanied minors, is fighting back against the building of the call center.
“There are a host of federal laws and programs that purport to protect unaccompanied children, which this administration has been actively attempting to dismantle,” said Lukens. “The center will not protect children. It will only serve to make it easier to deport them.”
Over 450,000 immigrant children are thought to have crossed the U.S.-Mexico border during the Biden presidency.
Author: Andrew Streeter
Photo courtesy of Yuki Iwamura, AP News
Editor: Hannah Clove
news@suunews.net
