Flow of Illegal Alien Children Into U.S. Expected to Rise in 2016
By Adam Kredo. The flow of illegal immigrant children into the United States is expected to rise to record-breaking numbers in 2016 as deportations decrease, according to leading members of the Senate’s Judiciary Committee.
At least 20,455 unaccompanied minors have been caught during fiscal year 2016 along the U.S.-Mexico border as of last month, according to committee chairman Sen. Chuck Grassley (R., Iowa), who warned that if this trend continues, the number of illegal minors could eclipse a massive 2014 surge that strained the resources of the Department of Homeland Security and prompted investigations into the Obama administration’s handling of the issue.
While illegal border crossings surge, the number of children actually being deported from the United States is declining, senators said during a Tuesday hearing with senior Obama administration officials.
The hearing comes just a day after oversight officials disclosed that the Obama administration has lost track of scores of immigrant children, many of whom are being released from custody to individuals across the United States who have not gone through thorough background checks.
“If these trends continue, we can expect to see an even greater number of minors crossing the border this year than in 2014,” Grassley said. “No one is following up on these individuals when they skip their immigration hearings, unless they are receiving post-release services. They are also not enforcement priorities for this administration. This means a lot of these minors are nowhere to be found.” (Read more from “Flow of Illegal Alien Children Into U.S. Expected to Rise in 2016” HERE)
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Sessions: Feds Let 97 Percent of Border Crisis Kids Stay in U.S.
By Joel Gehrke. Only about 3 or 4 percent of the unaccompanied minors who have entered the country in the last two-and-a-half years have been returned to their home countries, Sen. Jeff Sessions charged on Tuesday.
“It cannot be that every young person that appears from Central America is entitled to asylum or entry into the united states, contrary to our laws,” Sessions said during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Tuesday. “It just cannot be. Does anybody in this government not understand that?”
Immigration officials testified that the border crisis could be mitigated if more people were sent home. “I don’t disagree with that,” Thomas Homan, a senior official at Immigration and Customs Enforcement, told Sessions. “I think if you have a consequence of deterrence to illegal activity, the illegal activity will slow down.”
The Alabama Republican noted that 4,680 of the 127,000 minors who have arrived in the last two-and-a-half years have been returned. Senate Democrats argued that increasing the number of returns would be inhumane, although GOP lawmakers pointed to cases of unaccompanied children being released to criminals to argue that President Obama’s policies are creating another kind of humanitarian crisis. (Read more from “Sessions: Feds Let 97 Percent of Border Crisis Kids Stay in U.S.” HERE)
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