Biden task force reunites 400 migrant children separated from their families

The Biden administration reunited 400 children with their families after they were separated when crossing the U.S.-Mexico border during the Trump administration, according to the executive director of the Family Reunification Task Force, Michelle Brane.

According to the task force, more than 5,000 families were separated under the 2018 “zero tolerance” policy, under which the Department of Justice prosecuted all undocumented migrants apprehended at the border.

The migrants were often kept in federal criminal facilities where children were not permitted, according to the Congressional Research Service. The children were instead sent to family immigration detention centers. However, if their parents were not released in less than 20 days, the children were treated as unaccompanied minors.

However, critics say the records of the children who were separated were not adequately kept, making it hard to identify families and bring them back together.

Brané said that in most cases the parents were deported after crossing the border, while the children remained in the U.S.

The task force is working on behalf of the separated families, many of which are being given the opportunity to come to the U.S. to live and work legally for three years.

The reunification program also includes mental health services for the family members of families that have been separated.

“You don’t want to just throw kids into an environment with a parent they may not have seen for five years,” Brané said. 

Not long after taking office, President Joe Biden signed an executive order establishing a task force to find and reunite separated migrant families. The task force began reunifying families in May 2021.